One crashing wave on one single day changed everything for our family. How would I keep going?

Before they enter the water, surfers will study the ocean. They consider wind and tide conditions. They analyse currents and patterns, break points and swells. They try to read the waves. I have travelled across oceans and a day to sit here on Tamarama beach in Sydney on a high-tide weekday morning in 2024. A notebook and pen lie beside me on the sand as I, too, attempt to read the waves, to find meaning in their unfathomable churn.

These past 10 years, this beach has loomed large in my mind. Even when absent, it’s as if my face has been turned to these waves and I have been buffeted, sometimes staggering, sometimes falling, always bracing for the next set to roll in. For I have learned that all it takes is one ocean, one day, to come along and knock you off your feet.

The landscape was striking, but so was the diversity of the hikers. We can make this the new normal – and we should

A fortnight or so ago, my two teenage kids and I set out on a three-night visit to the Peak District where temperatures were hovering at a comparatively tepid 28C. We stayed at a youth hostel – more of which in a moment – and began the trip with the 20-minute ascent of Mam Tor, a modest peak that pulls in both dedicated ramblers who then yomp along the ridge beyond, and newbies who mostly want to get to the top and immerse themselves in the jaw-dropping view.

The next bit might sound self-parodically Guardian-esque, but what the hell: in its own way, the most striking sight was the diversity of the scores of people rambling up, down and along. Women in their 20s wearing hijabs picnicked on giant rocks, while multiracial gaggles of young men attempted to race to the top; solo and shirtless white fitness freaks and retirement-age dog walkers took their places alongside them. With plenty of justification, country walking has long been typified as one of the most monoculturally white pursuits there is. But here – presumably because of the relatively close proximity of Manchester and Sheffield – things looked different.

John Harris is a Guardian columnist

Being recognised by the Brits, Grammys and Drake made the singer one of British music’s most famous names – and also left her exhausted. Now, after decompressing in her home town she returns with a record made for raving

It is a sticky, sweltering July afternoon, and I have accidentally found myself at a wake with Jorja Smith. I’m told that the pub where we have met, in the leafiest part of leafy south-west London, is usually a safe bet for an inconspicuous table. But today, sweaty black suits carrying pints drift between tables, and long queues snake round the bar.

Dressed in a simple tank top, bare-faced with her hair scraped back, Smith is waiting for me when I arrive. “I’ve been waiting for my drink for ages,” she says. “But I feel bad saying anything because, you know …”

Following the all-clear, Kevin and Jade found a new openness in discussing sex and intimacy – and also a shared desire for exploring polyamory

• How do you do it? Share the story of your sex life, anonymously

Since the all clear, my relationship with my sexuality has shifted a lot

At 85, the actor has lived through much political upheaval. But, she writes, today’s hostile times feel like ‘the worst yet’. She reflects on her journey from teenage Tory to full-throated leftist – and says there’s still time to save the nation from the bad guys

A funny thing happened on the way to 2026: I got old and the world turned nasty. It happened very quickly and it’s to do with politics (the world) and pelvic floor weakness (mine). It’s strange being this old. Sometimes when I look in the mirror, it’s a shock to see wrinkles and grey hair, because inside I am still that naughty Oxford High School girl, risking detention just for the joy of entertaining her friends. People assume that with great age comes great wisdom, but actually we remain who we have always been, only more so, and we need to make our peace with that and with each other.

The Britain I grew up in, though – that feels almost unrecognisable, and everyone I speak to says the same thing. The historian Eric Hobsbawm, whom I knew and loved, argued that people invent the past they want for their own purposes – that the real past was quite different: “Today is the great age of historical mythology.” He’s right, but that past is still the safe haven I’d like to return to. People feel adrift, they don’t understand or feel a connection to the place they thought they knew.

North Sea oil, once the driving force of the UK economy, may be dwindling but it remains a symbol of prestige and a rich resource for political debate

When oil was first discovered off the north-east coast of Scotland in September 1969, industry folklore has it that the duty superintendent on the rig carefully poured it into a pickle jar commandeered from the canteen and took it back to Amoco’s Great Yarmouth office in Norfolk. There, it was emptied into an ash tray, sniffed and then set alight.

From that modest start, North Sea oil – as the huge basin of oil and gas reserves quickly became known – emerged as a driving force of the British economy and a symbol of national power and renewal as the UK emerged from the Opec oil crisis.

Redcar MP says Teesside community is ‘reeling’ as PM offers condolences and asks public to avoid speculation

Tributes are being paid to two police officers who died on Teesside when a car travelling the wrong way along the A66 crashed head-on into their vehicle, also killing five young men.

PC Matthew Blades, 37, and PC Tom Clough, 38, were killed when the marked armed response vehicle they were in was struck by a Volkswagen Passat in the early hours of Saturday morning.

Grassroots groups to urge PM to break with Starmer policy and impose full arms embargo on Israel

Grassroots Labour groups are gearing up for a conference showdown with Andy Burnham over Gaza, as the party’s members seek to force the prime minister to recognise Israel’s actions as a genocide and impose a full arms embargo.

Momentum, Labour & Palestine, the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy and Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) plan to ramp up pressure on Burnham before his first Labour conference as prime minister next month.

PM Mark Carney says ‘we got attacked’ as tariffs come into force on items from hockey sticks to tongue depressors

Donald Trump has hit back at Canada after a breakdown in negotiations plunged the two countries into a trade war.

In his first public comments since negotiations collapsed on Friday in Washington, the US president wrote on social media: “Canada wants the benefits of being a State, without being one!!!”

Exclusive: Analysis risks deepening perception of ‘unequal protection under the law’, say campaigners

Killers who take the lives of black people have a greater chance of getting away with their crimes than those who target white people, new research shows.

Analysis of unsolved homicides in London between 2019 to 2023 reveals a stark disparity: minority ethnic British people represented 61.7% of reported homicide victims, but 92.9% of all unsolved murder victims.