Flashback!

I sometimes go to a small local post-office in this West Country county town, to avoid the queues at the main post office.

The one I like is in a little row of suburban shops, close to a baker's shop called The Crusty Cob. They're all very traditional. I find this quite heartening. It reminds me of the part of Bristol where we used to live in the 1950s (before I was eight). Some things don't change.

Having posted my parcel, I went to buy a loaf of bread. When I was inside the baker's shop, I glanced with some nostalgia for times past at the window display of enticingly sweet iced buns.

I wasn't the only one. Suddenly there were twenty little faces outside the shop, all pressed against the window pane, children of around six years old, squealing with delight and hungry anticipation.

They were all shouting and gesticulating at once, pointing out their favourite sticky buns, jam doughnuts and other mouth-watering  concoctions.

Sadly, they weren't allowed inside (much better for their teeth and health, no doubt); they were on a school project, taking photos of  their neighbourhood.

I wish a teacher had brought a few of the young photographers inside the shop, to  take a shot of the rows of  cakes and all the hungry and excited faces peering in, but all three accompanying teachers soon had them lined up in crocodile formation, and off they marched.


It was a bit like seeing myself as a child in Bristol all those years ago. Which reminds me, I must go to the dentist.