Life of a commuter
It's not unusual to walk head-on in to somebody; or to run down the platform with the train, chasing the nearest train door; or spray deodorant on yourself to cover up somebody's awful body odour at risk of choking your fellow passengers. And it's certainly likely that people will scour at you across the carriage when you land yourself the jackpot...a seat!
Yes, commuting has a plethora of personal rules, aggravating instances and, more annoying than anything, fellow travellers. I've still not come to grips with the fact people want to travel at the same time as me...it's just rude, right?
Power-walking at 35mph, trying to dodge a speeding ticket (aka collisions with fellow travellers), through the train station you're faced with several problems - the majority down to people who don't know where they're going (they shouldn't even be allowed in the station), dawdlers (who think, when your train is leaving within the next 39 seconds, it's OK to block the escalators) and ticket checkers who decide to interrogate either me or the person before me WITHOUT FAIL every time I'm in a rush. NOT OK.
With my blood pressure through the roof, every gland on my body swollen with stress, I find myself on a platform with only enough room left to breathe out the carbon dioxide my body's just cleverly converted within. And as we all see the train approaching the platform, our instinct is to step forward towards the edge of the platform. BEYOND THE WHITE LINE. Palpitations.
AND THATS WHEN I GET THE FEAR.
Every day, at risk of losing my head, I stand with my toes over the edge of the white line because everybody knows you get nowhere in life holding back. I can't help but imagine, each time the train nears my square metre of the platform, that somebody behind (somebody with fewer loose screws than my neighbours 97-year old, alcoholic gran) is about to push me down on to the track. And in that second I'd be over. My life would be done. Bones spread up Piccadilly and my belongings free to anybody witness.
It's like a phobia but I'm not sure if it's only me who has sleepless nights over it. It'd probably be called something like pushedontraintrackophobia. Well it probably wouldn't. It'd be called something much more digestible and 'cleverer' than that. If anybody was to write a book on that, you'd need a novel just to write the title out.
When I'm finally on the train, on my seat which I feel fully deserved of after risking my life like that on the platform, it's often a case of perching and hugging your belongings, taking as few breaths as possible along the way (because people don't understand the concept of showers and deodorant), until you hear the words 'we will shortly be arriving at...'. And that's when you feel ecstasy. I imagine if feels a little like being released from prison. Probably.
And I forgot to mention, I'm unsure how as I'm currently sat dodging them, the thousands of white fluffy things flying round the carriage. Yes I sound crazy. But I feel like they've got it in for me. As if it's not bad enough they fly in my face at every opportunity, attacking my every body part, but as I lean side to side and forward and back to dodge them, my fellow commuters stare on as if I have a problem..
So with my pushedontraintrackophobia and the problem that all the other passengers go and home tell their families I have, I'm a bit (a lot) of a travel fail.
I wasn't born to commute. And if it has to be done, I wasn't put on the earth to ride economy. Not even a snob...
All aboard the peasant wagon.
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