Celebrating "the rare wins"

THERE is a wonderful quote from Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird about having the courage to fight your corner even when you know "you're licked to begin with."

"You rarely win," Atticus Finch tells his children. "But sometimes you do."

I was delighted to hear the news this afternoon that one of these against these odds successes had been chalked up locally, with a second-hand bookshop raising the funds it needs to stave off closure.

The chances of volunteers making up the five-figure sum in six weeks seemed remote - a "daydream" as they described it today. One would not have blamed the team for simply accepting the charity's decision to shut up shop.

No one would have blamed pensioners or young mums or fellow traders along the high street for failing to invest too many hours or pennies in what appeared a lost cause.

Yet the donations came in dribs and drabs. Iced biscuits were sold in a local cafe. Schoolkids gave in the name of World Book Day. 

Week-on-week these small gestures stacked up and in the end the team hit the £30,000 target with seven days to spare.

I wrote a few weeks ago the pang of sadness I'd felt about the apparently inevitable fate of the store.

I'm not sure there was any particular reason why this place struck a particular chord with me; I live not far from the town, but not actually in it, and I don't have any close connection with the hospice that runs it.

It had just become a place I'd come to like visiting while in a copywriting job I really didn't enjoy and when trips out at the weekend had become an important breathing space.

Now I've seen enough in my journalism days to know that spirited local campaigns don't always end well.

No matter the passions of people in often close-knit communities sometimes there just isn't the money, or on other occasions perhaps there is and it's talked very loudly. Never underestimate what damage a predatory developer or a short-sighted council or the poisonous influence of austerity can wreak.

I've seen fights to save nature reserves fail, I've witnessed historic buildings bulldozed, I've known many a beloved local shop go under.

But at the same time I've been happy to report on precious parts of greenbelt given a reprieve, heritage assets saved for future generations and those places that reporters love to dub "the heart of the community" carry on beating. Happily the battle for the bookshop is one of Finch's "rare wins" but it only happened because a chance, however slim, was taken on a positive outcome.

Over the past few years I've often felt powerless at events both globally and nationwide.

How much good can one individual do in the face of climate emergencies, global pandemics and uncomfortable reminders some of the worst people on the planet have access to "end of the world" switches? One vote can't topple a rotten government, bunging a couple of cans to the food bank isn't going to solve poverty or entrenched inequality.

And yet you can and should do your bit in those battles taking place closer to home. Support your friends, give a kind word to somebody struggling, call out bastards, give what you can to deserving causes, do what you can to demand better governments. Plant a tree, sign a petition, make as much noise about issues you care about as you are able.

These aren't world-changing gestures but they still matter. I firmly believe most people in most places are for the most part decent. You wouldn't know that if you read international headlines, but I saw it often enough in the people behind the local ones. 

That gives me some hope. And it gives me a lot of pleasure when the quiet cohort of people who turn their frustration and sadness into an attempt to get something done pull out results like this one.