Diary of a Shopkeeper, 4th April

This week sees the launch of Kirkwall BID’s annual Easter Egg hunt, where the young and the young-at-heart are encouraged to wander all over the town centre, tracking down colourful BID eggs hidden in member businesses.

It’s a great way to fill in a few hours of the school holidays, introducing the kids to the highways and byways of Kirkwall.  It’s also a good way to introduce yourself to the many new goods beautifully displayed in the shop windows.

Hard to believe, maybe, with this week’s icy winds whistling round our lugs, but we’re firmly in the spring/summer season now, and everything from fashion to home furnishing to foodstuffs proves it.

This year the Hunt has to be different, of course.

It’s safe for us to visit shops, cafes and other businesses, as long as we stick to the well-known and not-too-onerous safety guidelines.  In fact, with the total absence of tourists, it’s a particularly good time to visit the town: there may not be the buzz of the busy Easter holidays of recent years, with the voices of happy visitors from Glasgow or Gotham City filling Broad Street.  But that means all the more space and time for local folk to enjoy ‘Scotland’s Most Beautiful High Street.’ 

That’s the award we won in 2019.  I don’t think anyone had the heart to run such a competition in 2020.  Kirkwall holds onto the title for another year!

So normal shopping is safe, but what isn’t sensible is for BID to encourage large crowds to congregate in close proximity.  So, no face painting this spring.  No homemade Easter bonnet competitions.  And no celebrity appearances by Helga the Rabbit.

Instead, BID has arranged for shops to display their Easter eggs in their windows.  On each egg is a colourful letter. Collect all of those, decipher the jumbled-up words hidden there, and you could be one of three lucky winners of a Kirkwall Gift Card.  (You can download the entry form here: https://www.kirkwallbid.co.uk/news.)

I must say, having to make sense of a confusing, mixed-up message is a fitting metaphor for our lives these days.

It’s good the Scottish Government collected views from islanders on easing restrictions, but bad they only gave us a few days’ notice and a badly-designed form on which to provide them.

It’s good to protect the physical health of our population, but bad to allow an excess of caution to damage our economic health.

It’s good to enjoy the benefits of working from home while we’re required to do so, but bad to forget that home is, really, more than just four walls and a roof. 

Home is a network of places radiating out from where we lay our heads at night.  It’s the houses of friends and family, it’s workplaces, it’s cafes, pubs and restaurants, it’s kirks and clubs, it’s halls and pitches and cinemas and beaches, it’s shops and services of all kinds.

What better time than Easter to treat ourselves to the rewards of safe interaction with all those who share our island home?  Until the rock rolls away completely, the experience may feel slightly different to previous years, but it’s just as important and enjoyable.

Good luck in the BID Easter Egg Hunt.  May all your anagrams be dunsmacrble!

This diary appeared in The Orcadian on 8th April. Other diaries continue to appear weekly. I am posting them in this blog a few days after each newspaper appearance, with added illustrations., and occasional small corrections or additions.