Only an excuse?

As we cast our eyes to the heavens wondering whether we’re going to get a summer worthy of the name, or start a crash diet to get our body ready for the beach, parents, and indeed grandparents, of school-aged children are looking forward to six glorious weeks of summer holidays. 

Holidays, that is, for the kids.  I’m not sure there’s anything particularly restful about the constant demands to be fed, watered and entertained.

Before we were let out of primary school for our summer holidays, I remember the headmaster giving us the same stern lecture about not getting run over, drowned, electrocuted or hit by a train.

Today’s summers, however, are fraught with other perils.  Because, as the school term finishes, so does the parliamentary session, leaving MSPs free to roam the streets, pouncing on unsuspecting constituents.

The summer recess gives me the time and (usually) the weather to get on with some of the best parts of my job.  Roving surgeries, for example, offer me the perfect excuse to get out of the office and into the fresh air.

Not only are they good for body and soul, these surgeries let me hear what people are saying, while picking up some good ideas from the most impressive gardens I’ve admired along the way.

I would, to be frank, have a cheek to call this work.  But in an age when people feel divorced from their politicians, elected representatives need to make every effort to be as accessible as we can.