Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Jam doughnuts and our new First Minister

Some years ago, as on overly-earnest, politically interested teenager, I went along to the SNP Annual Conference in Perth. This would've been 1995 I think. I had joined up a few months previously, looking forward to the passionate, ideological debates that would ensue at my local branch. Ah, the naivety of youth. As any activist in any party will attest, the most passionate local party branch meetings actually get is when deciding what colour paper to print the local election leaflets on. So going to Conference was manna from heaven for me. All these stalls, MPs, cooncillors, elections, booklets, badges, fringe meetings and all the rest of the circus that accompanies party Conferences.

I was a rather shy and quiet lad, and didn't know anyone other than my fellow delegates from the branch - about 4 out of 700 attendees. So I spent a fair bit of time pottering about on my own, no doubt appearing a rather sad figure (though inwardly I was grinning madly a lot of the time - look! A Catalan Nationalist badge! A YSN t-shirt!).

One afternoon, I was sitting on my jack jones in the cafeteria, mulling over a horrible cup of coffee and a rock solid jam doughnut, feeling a bit sorry for myself at my lack of company over the last few days. I had my head down and was hunched over the jam-filled savoury rapidly hardening in front of me, so only noticed a shape plonk their way down onto the chair across the table from me. I lifted my head...

...and there was Alex Salmond, leader of the SNP. To a 16-year-old political anorak SNP member, this was the equivalent of a Friends fan sitting in Burger King only for the Aniston to plonk her arse down at a chair. I gulped in a comedy action film kinda way, but in real life, and managed to whisper "eh, hullo". Even now, if I see the word 'awestruck' somewhere, I just need to think back to that moment to know exactly how it feels.

And you know what? He was really nice. He sat and blethered for about ten minutes about lowering the voting age, how boring some meetings were, House of Commons whisky, the debates that were going on at Conference, Heart of Midlothian and Partick Thistle's fortunes that coming season and other bits and bobs. Then he shook me by the hand and went off, no doubt off to discuss some vitally important policy detail (or maybe just have a shit).

Why have I written all this? I dunno really. Other than to expose me for the sadsack political groupie I am, I just wanted to tell a wee story about the guy who became Scotland's First Minister this morning. He didn't have to sit with wee lonesome speccy 16-year-old me and indulge me with stories of Select Committee meetings; I'm sure every single person in that room and hall were higher up the party hierarchy than me, and therefore more politically valuable. But he did. And ever since then, I've believed, maybe rather naively or maybe not, that Alex Salmond, despite the accusations of smugness, too smart for his own good, control freakery etc - despite all the shit that people throw at him, he has a fundamental core of human decency within him.

I believe we shall see that core time and again over the coming months and years.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I know Alex quite well and I'm glad to report that yours is a very typical story with him.