The week didn’t start well. Tuesday – Day 1 – and, for reasons that don’t need to be documented, by the time I retired to bed I had written exactly no words. It was therefore really important that I started Day 2 well and, for the first time, I took the laptop out on the train and wrote my first 400 words. I’ve always been hesitant to do that before. I commute and, despite the fact I like to think I’m not a judgmental person, there are definitely certain groups of people who travel by train. Some of which (and I would like to point out that this list is not conclusive by any means) are summarised below:
1. The knobheads who start a phone conversation when they get on and shout about some particular personal aspect of their life until they get off, regardless of the fact that there are many, many tunnels on my train route. They never get tired of their own tiresome voice and, therefore, every time they are disconnected they will (tirelessly) attempt to reconnect. If I’m lucky, I get to share a ‘what a knobhead’ eye roll with another passenger. This is rare though because, as we all know, the first rule of commuting is to avoid eye contact at all cost.
2. The slightly posh, doesn’t give a fuck, bohemian who manages to take up the whole table with their copy of The Guardian, their psychotherapy lecture notes, their cup of coffee (which includes littering with lid, stirrer and three empty sachets of milk and sugar) and completely hogs the arm room with their comfortable cardigan covered elbows. They also hog the air with their superior breathing. I take very little pleasure in sitting opposite these individuals, placing my bag proudly in the middle of the table and stealing their leg space.
3. The traveller-stroke-shopper. The pre-requisite for this one is baggage. The largest, bulkiest suitcase(s) known to man, or an obscene amount of shopping bags, preferably designer, that are actually designed to cause accidents on trains. These are the people that choose to travel at rush hour, burdened not only by their dreary, crappy lives, but by the obese contents of their life that they have chosen to carry with them. They then have the audacity to complain about how busy the train is. And they will do this for the entire journey because NO-ONE should have to pay this price to travel in such busy, shoddy conditions. You can’t move, the train stinks, and you can’t even get a seat! Well, welcome to the life of a commuter. You obviously don’t work for a living so you have two choices – travel at non-peak times or fuck off.
4. Those who choose to just block it all out. Eyes closed, earphones in, music up as loud as possible, without making your ear drums bleed. If it blocks out the screaming baby then that’s just a bonus. I like to class myself in this category, which is why I will never, ever, ask someone to turn their music down, even if it’s leaking. Sometimes, you just need to pretend that you aren’t there.
5. And, finally, I get to the point. There are the business people. Within seconds of sitting down, their laptops are open, charged and ready to seize the day! Buy! Sell! Write 25 emails in draft form (because you won’t be able to send them because of all the tunnels!). Even better, spend 30 minutes moving the cursor up and down on a really colourful, important looking spreadsheet, because you must check that each cell has exactly the right data in it. It’s important! THEY ARE IMPORTANT. And everybody on that train needs to respect that. And I bow down to those people that, whilst working on their spreadsheets, also receive a phone call because these are our leaders. Not only are they busy with their spreadsheets, they are discussing figures – FIGURES – in real time!
And anyway, I may have gone over the top a little bit there, but you get the idea. By getting the laptop out on the train, I have transmogrified into this other being, but it’s worked so far and my word count, at the end of day 4, is 7,001, which to say I missed day 1 isn’t too bad at all. I still haven’t managed to control the paranoia yet that everyone is sneaking a peek over my shoulder and reading what I’m writing, but it’s been constructive.
And I think that is all. God bless National Rail.
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