Dear Evening Times reader,

I’m so excited about my new column! 

My wee mum used to say simply, “Folk are Good”.  Well, I’m going to try to prove her right by bringing you stories of folk reaching out to each other and going out of their way.

Every Wednesday join me on the same page, as it were, where we’ll be sharing “Good Times” ... 

In these days of 24-hour global media, we are repeatedly faced with stories of Isis, babies caught in the middle of wars, school kids in mass shootings and all manner of inequality, leaving some of us without the stuff to preserve human dignity. 

I, like most, find many of these headlines hard to stomach. 

I’m not suggesting we scrunch up our eyes and stick our fingers in our ears but that we actively direct our gaze elsewhere – and I’ll tell you why. 

I have a pal who talks about “The Good Old Days”.

“What, when four-year-olds were up chimneys?” I cry and add that today a child is more likely to reach retirement than her forefathers were to live to their fifth birthday. 

This said, we can all get where my pal’s coming from.  However, I think too much bad news can make us so afraid that we don’t reach out but batten down the hatches. 

Worst case, we don’t support freedom and openness but instead champion a brute who offers us a scapegoat. 

I’m less interested, though, in what is imposed on us from the top down than I am in what folk are doing at a grassroots level to make our world great. 

What I’ve found is that when I turn my attention towards these stories it feels a truer reflection of ourselves than any of the bad news stories. 

Next week I’ll tell you how a simple game of football on a Sunday in Anderston led to homeless people being fed from a temple. 

And finally ...

You know you’re old when your niece asks why, when she gets a cold call on her mobile, you say, ‘Hang up!’

Word play

IN keeping with getting away from our screens, I’m hoping each week you’ll join me in a wee game my dad used to play before we had a telly.

He would sit with a rolled-up newspaper, a pad, the egg timer and the dictionary, then eventually he’d deliver an old saying, but in high-falutin’ terms!

e.g. A superfluity of culinary experts sabotage the potage! 

If you got within time, ‘Too many cooks spoil the broth’ you got the ‘pleasure’ of watching your fellow siblings get bopped on the head with the newspaper.

Each week I’ll set one of these for you and reveal it’s meaning the week after. This week it’s….

Ornithological specimens of identical plumage habitually congregate in the closest possible proximity