Opinion: “Good things can also happen in threes”

Written by Joe Riley

If we apply the superstitious medieval sooth that bad things happen in threes, to obsessive, overwhelming and depressing news coverage over the past five years, we would produce a chronological trio of disasters that will remain unchallenged by historians: global warming, Brexit and COVID-19.

No wonder the sanity of tens of thousands of previously rational and steadfast individuals is being challenged as never before.

But good things can also happen in threes, and sometimes in much more rapid succession.

On Friday for instance, Nasa’s Perseverance rover landed on Mars; Max, a 13-year-old springer spaniel, was awarded the vets’ charity Order of Merit (“the animal OBE”), for starring in uplifting on-line Lake District walks; while on Radio 4, the valiant Malala Yousafzai, shot by the Taliban after campaigning for female education, and subsequently the youngest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, was the subject of Desert Island Discs.

The object lesson of these last few paragraphs? To be less resigned to inflicted gloomy pessimism and more open to discovering  still flourishing optimism.

Royal Navy Falklands veteran Joe Ousalice, who also served in the Middle East and Northern Ireland, was kicked out of the forces with a reduced pension for being bisexual.

Despite all the subsequent high profile law changes allowing same-sex civil partnership and marriage, many issues surrounding sexuality and gender remain hopelessly and even cruelly dated, as this case proves.

It’s taken an unbelievable 28 years for Joe, now 70, to have his service medal and badges personally handed back to him by defence secretary Ben Wallace.

Let’s hope the pension loss has also been fixed.

Many people think that professionally writing for a living – and that includes all forms of journalism – is a doddle. Not really a job; more of a hobby.

The illiteracy, libel and lack of fact-checking on Facebook and Twitter surely proves otherwise.

Even those charged with official communication have lapses.

Such as in a letter forwarded to me by a near neighbour, and coming from a Royal Mail service adviser, answering his complaint which concludes: “Please be assured that we take letting our customers down seriously.”

Not quite the intended sentiment!

Joe lives in Formby, Sefton, Merseyside and writes a weekly column for the Liverpool Echo.

You can find his previous columns here.