musicmakers

Saturday evening was spent at a local amateur orchestra concert, performing an ambitious programme of Beethoven and Dvorak.

Classical music making is one of the cultural traditions of the Western world, and it is wonderful that so many people still make the effort to gather and rehearse and then perform, even if the standard is not quite Radio 3.

Everyone benefits, but probably most of all the performers, who enrich their knowledge of the music by becoming part of it, rather than just passive listeners.

But, in common with so many classical music concerts, both performers and audience were, with very few exceptions, seriously the wrong side of 50.

What can be done to encourage more young people, now that both the classical repertoire in schools and church youth attendance (and exposure to choral music) has declined? Perhaps it would help if concerts were made more relaxed in terms of the presentation, with the works to be performed introduced and explained. And also if the performers actually looked a bit more cheerful. No one seemed particularly happy on the stage - until the applause at the end.

Endings

Driving to work I came across two women standing in the middle of the carriageway with what looked to be a towel. I couldn't work out what they were doing until I passed them and glimpsed the flattened remains of a cat in the road.

I felt for them. Clearly they didn't want the pet's last resting place to be an anonymous and rather bleak section of Tarmac. But to be frank they were faced with a rather traumatic removal exercise.

Bagged

Reluctantly to W H Smith's as I needed to buy a pen along with my daily newspaper. The pen, of course, was already encased in a card and plastic bubble. Automatically the assistant at the till began to put these two small items into a large plastic Smith's bag. Which is exactly the reason why I normally walk past W H Smith's (wide open) doors in favour of an old-fashioned newsagent further down the road.

Then to Jessops, where at least the assistant asked the man in front of me if he wanted a bag for his small pouch of prints. And he said he did, even though he was already carrying one from another shop.

It's the same, perhaps worse, in the supermarkets as shoppers peel off bag after bag at the checkout, stuff in a few items and then pile them in trolleys. Just stand at any supermarket exit for 10 minutes to get an idea just how many plastic bags, containing already over-packaged goods, are trundled out of the door.

There can't be many who are now unaware of the problems we are creating by over-production, consumption and wholescale waste. Maybe we think it's someone else's problem. But it's not. It rests with each one of us to take responsibility for reducing our energy use. And a small, but culumatively significant, step would be the simple measure of carrying reusable bags to the shops. And being brave enough to carry a naked paper out of a newsagents without the aid of petroleum-based, and potentially toxic, plastic that takes thousands of years to degrade.

Turning it out

A really interesting weekend visit to a woodwork exhibition a few miles away . It's a growing interest, as I've started a basic furniture-making course one evening a week.

I watched the unfolding creation of a perfect bowl from a lump of wood. On a small lathe, and in a blizzard of shavings, a rough piece of timber was turned into a beautiful oiled piece in less than 15 minutes. The demonstrator then fielded questions from fascinated onlookers, including myself, about how easy it is to learn woodturning, and how to start.

I'd love to learn more. It looks a wonderful way of immersing myself in an interest well away from work.

What price mediation?

There has been talk for years now about steering angry and separated parents away from the courts and towards mediation as a way of addressing contact problems over children. However this concept has a way to go and is unlikely to be achieved unless there is a significant financial incentive for lawyers to avoid the lucrative mud-slinging route.

I was recently involved in a case where contact had broken down, but from a look at the court papers the issue did not appear at all complicated. It seemed the sort of case where a round table discussion with both parents might well bring good results for all, and most importantly the children.

Instead both parties were ordered to submit statements and a full welfare report called for. Mum's statement made dad out to be a monster who she would fight to the end over his contact plans. I rang to discuss things only to find that free and easy contact had started before the statement ink was dry, with dad calling every day at mum's house to see the children.

It's almost impossible to believe that mum had completely changed her view overnight. I believe the reality is that she was never that opposed to contact, but wanted improved communication over some issues. Instead the UK adversarial system provoked her lawyer into encouraging her to make extreme and inflamatory comments about dad. With the inevitable result of provoking vitrolic counter-claims from dad.

The children lose out and also get emotionally affected by the heightened atmosphere between their parents. Meanwhile the lawyers get fat from the extended litigation, while appearing to represent their client's best interests. Complete madness.

Being different

The vast majority of the offenders I deal with are white British, with a depressingly similar background. It was a refreshing change to interview Manuel and glimpse something of a very different cultural identity.

Manuel was up for a drunken assault of police who arrested him for being noisy and disruptive in the town centre one night. The ferocity of his reaction to arrest seemed out of proportion to the circumstances and, from the reading of the prosecution papers, hard to understand.

In interview, Manuel was a fiercely proud man. Exploring his background was fascinating and began to shed light on his attitudes and behaviour that night.

He was born in a small West African country and his ancestors were slaves transported from unknown regions in the continent. Manuel was conceived and born as the result of the rape of his mother by a white European who had power and influence over her and others in the community. He and his family suffered extreme poverty and hardship as a result of civil war in the country before fleeing with his mother to Spain, France and finally the UK. He has a good work record but his habit is to get drunk on frequent occasions as a way of blocking his thoughts and memories. Under such circumstances, he can react very badly, especially to white male authority figures.

We discussed likely sentences and Manuel said that he would rather go to prison than do community service. He was adamant that he would never work for nothing, as he viewed this as akin to slavery.

I liked Manuel and felt considerable compassion towards him. But then we were sitting in a safe and comfortable office, and he was sober and repentant. I can imagine that police officers who have to deal with him late on a Saturday night, after he has been drinking heavily, might well have a different view.

Bread head

My job sometimes gets me down, but overall I count myself lucky that I meet such a variety of people representing endlessly surprising events.

I interviewed a middle-aged man who, on the outside lived a very ordinary and respectable life: wife in a professional occupation and two children all living in their own comfortable home.

What his wife didn't know was that he was buying cannabis and using it as a special added ingredient to the home-made bread mix. He would then make up his sandwich lunch and, well, drift through the rest of the day.

That might have been OK until he decided to stop buying his dope and grow his own. He obtained, quite legally, the necessary equipment and also a packet of seeds and set up a small-scale cannabis production plant using the back of the garage as a nursery, and garden shed to bring on the maturing plants.

Then the police knocked on the door.

It must have been an interesting conversation he and his wife had, when he got back from the police station clutching his bail sheet.

Rant & rave

The day after the Stern report into the economics of climate change was published, I found myself driving alone in a huge brand-new Mercedes 220E saloon to a prison 50 miles away. The reason? Probation have a contract with a car hire firm, who tend to supply what is going spare on the day. So over the years I've had delivered anything from a basic diesel Astra through an enormous 4x4 Chelsea tractor up to yesterday's limousine. Environmental madness (although I can't pretend it's not fun for a short while to drive some of these huge metal monsters).

It's an example of how changes need to be made right across the board. Many prisons are located in relatively isolated places, and a car might be the only viable form of transport when time constraints are taken into account. But why allow a system that supplies large and energy-wasteful vehicles to be used for 1 person?