I didn’t want to write about this. Not so close to your birthday, Baby Lighty, at least. But in times of worry, in times of fear, I must do what I always do. And what I always do, in recent years at least, is write. Yet in so, so many ways, this morning I have no words.

You see, we wake up yet again in a world that has changed. A world that is different from yesterday. Or maybe the problem is actually that it’s still the same? Still these terrible atrocities are happening. And I worry yet again about the world that you’re growing up in.

I know we shouldn’t let fear win. I know we are supposed to carry on as normal. Of course I know that. But that doesn’t mean that I won’t worry. That I won’t think twice before attending a big event, before venturing into our beautiful capital city, which I’ve lived on the outskirts of all my life. Which I worked in the heart of for much of my career.

I remember the Twin Towers, of course I do. And the London Bombings. I can even just about remember the IRA attacks. But none of them have affected me as badly as these past two attacks on our beautiful city, and the one in wonderful Manchester. Maybe it’s an age thing. Or maybe it’s motherhood that has done this to me? For the thing that worries me massively is the fact that if the world is like this now, for us, what will it be like for you, Baby Lighty?

I know we shouldn’t let fear win. But at the moment, quite honestly, I feel like it is.

I will be holding you a little bit tighter today, Baby Lighty, and for that I won’t apologise.

My thoughts are with all of those affected by the recent atrocities in London and Manchester. I cannot begin to imagine what you are all going through. Hoping that something changes in this world that we live in soon.

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