An unusual mountain...

In normal circumstances, at this time of year a group of Wendy's friends and family climb a mountain in her memory. The walk celebrates both her birthday - it's a walk she would have done herself if she still lived - and the anniversary of her death just 6 days before her 63rd birthday.

But the circumstances this year are anything but normal, with the dark cloud of Brexit hanging low over all our lives. So this year we joined the 'People's Vote' march in London, and I'm quite certain this was an appropriate celebration of Wendy's life, and the 12th anniversary of her death.

You might not agree with me regarding my views on Brexit. But that's not really what this was about. We friends and family who went on the march could all have done that anyway on our own behalf. By making this our 'memorial mountain' this year, we allowed Wendy in spirit to participate in a demonstration that she would definitely have attended in life.

In my email before the march I said:

"This risks being divisive, which I've always sought to avoid in the past. But I think it is absolutely true to Wendy's spirit. Some of you may have originally voted Leave, some may now believe it would be a betrayal of democracy if we don't leave after all, and some may think a 2nd referendum is not the best way to handle our predicament. Nevertheless, I'm certain Wendy would be on this march if she still lived. I think you must all know her politics: she was an instinctive socialist and feminist. She hated smug privilege and always favoured the vulnerable. She sat up in bed and cheered at 4:00am when we heard Michael Portillo had lost his seat, and we knew we were going to have the first Labour government in almost a generation. She wanted to dance on Maggie Thatcher's grave because she was so angry at what that former PM did to the country, especially what Wendy saw as the encouragement of selfish self-interest. How much more angry would she be now at the cumulative errors, misdeeds and outright lies of Cameron, May and Johnson?  And the clear rise in bigotry, racism and hate crimes since the referendum? She had her problems with the later Blair, no question, and I think she might also despair at the Brexit stance of the current Labour leadership, but that's another story altogether. She would have seen this march simply as an opportunity to show the Johnson cabinet and their allies how much opposition there is across the country to (what she would certainly have seen as) an opportunistic, illegal, mendacious power grab by a tiny cabal of privileged and amoral chancers."

Here's Tim, shortly before the start:-

And here's Michael Heseltine near the end of his speech, which closed the rally in Parliament Square:-

What would Wendy have made of our enthusiastic response for this Conservative former Deputy PM?