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Brighton Half Marathon
ByJohn MayLast week I said I wanted to shave off another couple of minutes to get my personal best under the magic two hours. Well, today I achieved it… Just. It really was a beautiful day in Brighton. No wind. Sunshine. Lots of very keen and polite competitors. And a relatively flat course, which went mainly…
Pride, Scouting and the quiet power of belonging
ByJohn MayAt the beginning of Pride Month, I find myself thinking about how much has changed in my lifetime, and how much still depends on the quiet courage of ordinary people. When I was a young Scout, the United Kingdom was a very different place for LGBTQI+ people. Male homosexuality had only been partially decriminalised in…
Why WINGS Still Gives Me Hope
ByJohn MayYesterday evening I had the pleasure of visiting WINGS, and I drove home feeling reminded why events like this matter so much. For those who do not know it, WINGS is one of the UK’s largest international Scout and Guide camps. Every few years it brings together thousands of young people from across Britain and…
St Albans 10k
ByJohn MayWhat a terrific course! It was described as ‘gently undulating’ and I suppose it was. There were no really difficult hills and most of the trail went along traffic free country lanes. The start was a bit narrow, being a pavement by a relatively major road, but otherwise it was a very jolly run, well…
A framed reminder of what a small group can do
ByJohn MayOn the wall of my study hangs an old cutting from the Lichfield Mercury, dated 11 November 1988. The headline reads: “Breaking out!” The page is yellowed now, the photographs are grainy and the print has faded. But it remains one of the things on my wall that means the most to me. The article…
Preparations for Delhi
ByJohn MayThis afternoon I set off for just over a fortnight in Delhi, as part of a 25 strong delegation from the UK, attending the Xth Commonwealth Study Conference. This conference, originally set up 25 years ago by the Duke of Edinburgh, takes participants drawn from commerce, the unions and the third sector from all over…
