I don't like politics much. I would certainly never feel it appropriate to try and influence how people vote in much the same way as I wouldn't interfere with how they worship, love or live their lives. I feel a weight of responsibility to take voting seriously though - to research as thoroughly as I can based on what information I can access. To weigh up the sources and potential vested interests in that information and to consider the consequences of my own vote as deeply as my brain is capable of doing. I am not a political, social or economic commentator. Frustratingly I don't have a crystal ball either which would be invaluable this week - the week that has become exclusively 'Brexit week'.
Brexit has already caused unnerving division but personally it is the most united division I have seen in my life time (if such a concept makes sense). The complexities in this argument are vast and far reaching - well beyond the borders of Europe. And most of those arguments are strong and forcefully voiced. Even those who usually show political apathy have engaged, listened, considered and rationalised according to what they honestly believe to be best.
There maybe some startling divisions in opinion and, while I am grateful not to know anyone personally for whom the odious and unfounded arguments of xenophobia or racism are even considerations, the genuine concerns ring out. And loudest of all is the collective sound not of individual interests but of the country as a whole. While we all have different personal priorities, what comes out of this process most strikingly is our unity in looking out for Britain as a nation, as a whole and collective group of humans and our role in the wider world for good. Honestly, whatever we personally think of the arguments for and against Brexit I have yet to hear an argument from an ordinary member of the public that isn't motivated entirely by their own understanding of the collective good, regardless of what I personally think of that argument.
I can't help feeling that any country so united in its fight for its well being and hope to be of positive influence in the wider world - however divided the components of that fight maybe - has a bright future regardless of the outcome. We have to fight our corners with passion because fight, debate and feeling are far less dangerous than apathy, detachment and resignation. Yes there are things we are ashamed of but on this occasion I think the British public at least can be proud. We cared, we thought and we will vote individually for what we all believe to be the collective good. Admittedly I am an optimist but I hope that only collective good will follow.