Coming out as a yes voter in the forthcoming Scottish referendum has provoked a flurry of interest from my friends. The most common question I’ve been asked in the past couple of weeks has been a variation on the theme of “Given Alex Salmond’s lacklustre performance in the debate with Alistair Darling, are you not having second thoughts?” My answer is an unequivocal “no”.

The question has come most commonly from my friends in England and overseas. My friends in Scotland understand that the question being asked of us on 18 September has little to do with Salmond. Those of us who have been engaged in passionate debate and discussion for months now – and that’s most of us north of the notional border – know that while Salmond is first minister by virtue of leading the largest party in our parliament, in the event of a yes vote there’s no inevitability to his continued presence in the top job.

For this is emphatically not the Scottish National party’s referendum – it is Scotland’s referendum. There are many voices on both sides of the debate, or perhaps I should say on all three sides of the debate, for throughout the process the “mibbies” have taken a vocal and active part, and they may yet be the ones who decide which way the chips fall. (Yes, it’s a Scottish referendum and of course we have to have fried food in there somewhere.) Many of those voices are not aligned with the conventional political parties. For me, those non-aligned voices have often been the most persuasive, raising the most interestingand challenging arguments for radical change, for thinking outside the box, for provoking aspiration and ambition, for seeing in our history a template for our future.

What they all have in common is a dream of a realignment in Scottish politics. A change from the way things have been done before. No more corrupt machine politics. No more special interest. No more monocultural parties run by cookie-cutter clones.

This referendum has galvanised people who haven’t engaged with politics in living memory. I heard one grandmother say in a radio interview, “This has got me off my sofa and I’m no’ going back”. Actress and comedian Elaine C Smith has been fronting public meetings on Glasgow housing estates where audiences have numbered in their hundreds. University lecturers report students talking about politics in a way they haven’t since the Thatcher years. If we get our chance to remake our country, I don’t think these people are going to melt into the background. Their dreams have been awakened – they’re going to want some of them to come true.

What’s been inspiring, too, has been the absence of jingoistic Braveheart nationalism. This has been an overwhelmingly civil debate about a kind of civic nationalism. It’s been about an inclusive Scotland, not a narrow-minded, bigoted, hate-filled breakaway. We want our country to be better, not just more of the same.

One thing that is crystal clear is that nothing on the far side of 18 September is crystal clear. You’d have to be the Scottish Doctor with his Tardis to make any confident predictions about what the future holds. Whatever question you ask in search of hard facts is met with diametrically opposed answers from the politicians. We’ll keep the pound; we won’t keep the pound. We’ll be in the EU; we won’t be in the EU. We’ll be able to watch Peter Capaldi; we won’t be able to watch Peter Capaldi. It’s like a divorce: “If you walk through that door, you’ll never see your kids again.” It’s a threat that can hold us for a while, until we realise that either it’s an empty threat or the price it demands is more than we are able to pay.

I understand some people believe in the union and its value to us, and I have no issue with the ones – like JK Rowling – voting no for those cogently expressed reasons. I disagree with them, but I respect their position. What I don’t respect are the “fearties” – the ones whose reason for voting no is that they’re afraid we’ll turn out to be incapable of managing our own country. I don’t want us to stay in the union because we’re scared of what the future holds if we strike out on our own.

Look at our history: we invented political economy; we led the world in the practical application of science and engineering; we organised and ran the British empire; we run towards, not away, from terrorists who try to blow up our airport. How can we not believe in ourselves?

I hope we take our courage in our hands and vote yes. But whatever the outcome, I hope most of all that on 19 September we can shake hands with our opponents and still be friends.