Friday was the 75th anniversary of VE Day and the celebrations are not quite what the country expected.
With the weather unusually sunny, this Bank Holiday weekend would typically be marked with garden parties, and jugs of Pimms.
But it can also become a time for reflection. Over the past three months we have seen extraordinary changes to our communities and way of life.
And it has been helped along by a variety of heroes, each doing their bit for a bigger cause.
In some ways, it echoes the way that soldiers, 75 years ago were fighting for a greater cause.
Each life that was lost in the Second World War was mourned, and each life lost to the coronavirus pandemic is being mourned now, and every day the virus continues to take the lives of those dear to us.
And through it all, there are heroes; doctors, nurses, health and social care staff, cleaners, pharmacists, teachers, supermarket workers, scientists and researchers, bus and train drivers, postal workers, waste collectors, council staff and volunteers doing their bit.
And the national appreciation for these people — some of which were referred to as low-skilled workers back in January — has increased in a way few of us will have ever seen before.
This VE Day our streets aren’t lined with Union Jacks and crowds consuming cake, they’re adorned in rainbows and messages of thanks as our key worklers continue commuting to work.
If ever there was an appropriate time to foster some national pride, let it be now. And let your appreciation be known for the heroes up and down the UK.
A version of this editorial was published in The Wokingham Paper of May 7, 2020
