Make this the summer of doing things for others

What? Not snazzy enough a line? Okay then, how about this: the summer where we do things for others. Good right?
Because, you see, the older I get (no comments, please…) the more I realise that we are all here, all of us, for each other. England (predictably) crash out of the World Cup before you can even settle on the sofa with your can of beer? I’m here for you. The rain set in before it’s even got to the middle of July? Right here, my friend. Feeling a bit cross because for the love of God that dog has pooped on the path again and the owner has not picked it up? I’m coming with the Neighbourhood Warden phone number right now.

See, this thing, this feeling, this wave of help for one another, please, take it, do, because I want you to have it. No, I haven’t gone mad (again, no comments…). I don’t know, call it the sunshine streaming in through the window while I write this piece, call it the dozens of good folk around Gloucestershire who I read about every week who raise funds for charities, for loved ones. Call it my reaction to the horrendous, unjust war in Syria and the thousands of refugees and children who are forever scared. Call it my deep sadness at people’s sometimes malicious reactions to immigrants in the UK while, in the same breath, they talk about retiring to a timeshare in Spain.

Call it what you will; it’s time we thought of each other. That’s why I smile when I think of our friend’s daughter, Amy Carr, who, this weekend, is shaving off her long beautiful hair to fundraise for Cancer Research UK and St Roses School. And Amy is just 13. Amy who - in a society which places increasingly alarming pressures on young teenagers to look a certain way at all times, what with selfies and all – is thinking of others first. She’ll be shaving her head this Saturday 12th July at 11am in Stroud Farmer’s Market. So pop along (see you there). Or donate at mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers/amycarr1. 
Yes, let this be the summer where we really do stuff. But not, this time, just for ourselves, but, like Amy, for others, too. Then what a summer of all kinds of sun it will be.

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