So, it's Easter. Is it my imagination or, as I gently totter towards what upbeat Women's magazines  call 'My Wisdom Years '  does it get earlier every year?

If it does, it does not succeed in fooling the retailers. Go into town...or not.. if you think the centre is just ready for Stephen King in which to set his next dystopian horror...Whether you do or whether you just stick to the outskirts for safety reasons you will be confronted by aggressively fluorescent chicks ( the farmyard type)of every shape and size, baskets of foil-wrapped chocolate eggs filled with sugary fondants bearing names like 'NHS dentist haha caramel' and 'Enamel Dissolver Strawberry'.

And Easter cards! Something I have never quite got my head around.

How can it be right to wish someone a 'Happy Easter ' !  wasn't the first one something of a tragedy? Are you really wishing your mother/aunt/boss/neighbour a Happy Day of Crucifixion?

And even if you're a non-believer, how can Easter be 'Happy' with all its attendant traps of attempting to build a Shepherd's Hut in the garden because 'it looked easy on YouTube '  so Gran can sit in it this time next year snippily remarking that you still haven't painted your gutterings..what were you DOING last Easter??

Factor in blood sugar-busting simnel cakes, hot cross buns and chocolate by the truckload and it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas from the stress alone.

But never mind! Shopping can take your mind off it...from the Designer Village...to the sacred halls of Homebase to egg rolling contests and duck races and dress as your favourite apostle events, there is Something for Everyone in 2023

Very different when I was 'a girl '.

Shops were closed on Good Friday ( not good for the shops). If you'd forgotten your buns...hard luck. There were very few obliging Asian stores then to sell you emergency ones.

Worse...your Mum might attempt to make some. Left for a day, uneaten they'd hunker down and spitefully calcify so your Dad could use them as hardcore for next year's Easter DIY project.

No good going to the garage, either.

Garages sold petrol, oil, antifreeze and auto products. No dabbling about in lurid fluffy bears or giant toblerones.

Certainly no Buns. 

The town was quiet, the churches brisk.

Holy Rood, Christchurch et al working to full capacity.

The Easter 'disco' at the Brunel Rooms on a Saturday night gave a brief respite to returning to austerity on Easter Sunday.

Like bright mayflies in their last few seconds of life Ra Ra skirt clad girls skipped round the revolving bar while youths sipped thoughtfully on lager while selecting their prey for the 'erection section' slow dances.

Usually the Bee Gees or the Commodores.

Devoid of traffic apart from the churchgoing faithful - Swindon was hushed on Good Friday.

Town gardens often had a brass band playing on Sunday afternoon.  Inevitably it was drizzling with a high chill factor but they swung it to 'Go tell it on the mountains' and 'Easter Parade' while we all turned mauve in our flimsy Spring frocks, lips a pale blue until a 10p cup of tea could be purchased from the little cafe or your Dad chucked his jacket round you, tutting that you 'should have covered up'. 

Both my grandads worked at GWR and there was much excitement one year when we were taken to the engine sheds for an Open Day.

I tripped over a fire bucket full of sand bruising my leg and refused to clamber up. My youngest brother wet himself in fear when a whistle blew suddenly and my middle brother was ready to sign up for an Apprenticeship there and then at the age of ten when told that you got a free cooked breakfast on a shovel.

On the way home in Dad's Morris Oxford we saw a dead rabbit in the road.

'There's the Easter Bunny!!! ' remarked my Dad with mean satisfaction..

Mum put her head in her hands as we all burst into tears. My Grandma offered us some battered Quality Street from the depths of her handbag

'Saved them from last year' she said triumphantly.

Happy Easter everyone!