Of all the farewell messages written on this blog, this one is probably the saddest. Not that it was a shock or even a surprise. Nelson Mandela's death has probably been the most anticipated of the year. He was 95, his health has been declining for some time. His regular visits to hospital have been headline news all year. His time had come. May he rest in peace. You can read and hear endless words about Mandela and I can't really say anything that others won't say better and with more knowledge. As President of the African National Congress (ANC) he was South Africa's most prominent post-war anti-apartheid activist. Then in 1962 he was imprisoned by the Nationalist regime and spent the next 27 years in isolation, out of sight but never out of mind. In 1990 he was finally released as South Africa belatedly began the transition to multi-racial democracy, and served as his country's first ethnically African President from 1994 to 1999. To my mind, the
'Contemplating the teeming life of the shore, we have an uneasy sense of the communication of some universal truth that lies just beyond our grasp.' - Rachel Carson