Diary – 7 April 2007

This afternoon we are saying farewell to the 11-year-old daughter of a close and much-loved colleague, Robin McKie, the revered and veteran science editor of the Observer. Olivia was killed in a road accident one Friday lunchtime. What the family has gone through is unimaginable, and everyone at the Observer has been affected by the tragedy. But the day is strangely uplifting. It is a brilliant, glorious early summer’s afternoon, warm, cloudless, glowing, and the crematorium is packed — with friends, colleagues and countless kids from Olivia’s school, their faces full of optimism but now shadowed by sadness. Her favourite colour was purple and we have all been asked to wear something in that colour. All around is a sea of purple — hats, ties, shirts, dresses, shawls. A wonderful and touching sight. The courage of Robin’s family seems boundless. His elder daughter Anna, 18, even tells a very good joke about Olivia’s spirited nature.