First of all, if you are prone to ear worms, then please do NOT click on this link, because the tune will go through your head for days. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0b31Bs7WBag
This comes from all the way back in the nineteen seventies or early eighties and oh Lord, hasn’t life changed since then? Although I do still listen to Tony Blackburn and the jokes don't seem to have changed. There’s an innocence to it that makes me smile and a sense of joy and renewal that we don’t seem to have these days. I was watching it to get my head back into those times and expected my young adult kids to scoff at it and wander off. They didn’t. Instead, they laughed at the jokes, sniggered at the dancers, sniggered more loudly at the hairstyles and fashions, and then went to search for some more on YouTube because they like vintage and retro.
Aargh, I thought to myself, then realised that it IS vintage and retro and so am I, which makes a lot of things make sense. My love of old china and pretty tablecloths and stripy tops and jeans and heading down to the sea for the first paddle of the year. My joy in finding a gorgeous dishwasher-safe melamine picnic set that I can use in the garden and pretty shatterproof drinking glasses that look like real glass but will bounce if (who am I kidding, I mean when, obviously) they’re dropped.
Am I taking refuge in simpler times and places? I don’t think so, unless you count nostalgia for the days before 24 hour news. I’m simply working to change what I can by taking part in the Marine Conservation’s beach clearing programme. It’s not glamorous, but every piece of litter I get with my grabber says ‘It’ll be a little bit better…”
So today I have paddled in the sea and seen little fishies swimming round my toes. I haven’t needed to wear a coat. The sun is shining. Work is coming well, and there’s a new Amy Hammond itching to be written. It will be a good day, because I will make it one. I hope you do the same.
Today’s picture is of the beach where I paddled. I had it all to myself, apart from the seagulls. If you’d put your toes in the water you’d have understood why, but winter is now officially over!
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