Abba ringing in my ears

I look just like everyone else – at last. I’m plugged in and I have cables dangling from my ears. It’s taken me a while (it must be at least six months that I’ve had the technology tucked away in my bag) but now that I’ve arrived I see exactly what all the fuss is about.

All of a sudden, and with little effort on my part, my life has its very own soundtrack. And I’ve turned the most prosaic of moments into the most inspiring and the most aspirational. And, since I’m not sophisticated in my musical tastes and haven’t moved on much since my teenage years, I can inject something very upbeat into every moment of my progress. In fact, just existing can be stirring stuff.

Which I’ve realised is a godsend on a morning like today, when the usual fluency of my journey stutters to a halt and our usually loyal 7.42 abandons us to the wilds of Cooksbridge, a station I’ve only ever experienced once-removed through the medium of a train window. (And in fact it’s not bad at all – the sun shines here, everyone seems happy enough, there’s a certain rhythm to the place, a kind of harmony in the air, and the Downs provide the most lovely backdrop. Yes, it’s not bad at all.)

So I think that finally I’m really getting the hang of this commuting business. It’s a question of isolating oneself from one’s environment, taking the occasional unscheduled stopover in one’s stride … and perhaps catching a glimpse of other possibilities.

Because actually next week is my last in this guise, and I can feel a change in the air. I thought I’d be aboard this train for a good few years to come, but, as it happens, I’ve decided to shake things up a little. I’m off to Paris to live a new life for a while. Yes, I can do anything – especially with Abba ringing in my ears.

Like hell

I have developed, in the last two years of my life, a new vision of hell in which I set off from home without my reading glasses. Until two years ago there were other kinds of hell to do with forgetting the essentials, but this is something else entirely. That’s the kind of age I’ve reached.

So just at the time of my life when I feel a mighty urge to simplification, the structure of life becomes doubly complicated. Faulty eyes are nothing new to me (I’m used to the glasses/contact lenses dichotomy), but negotiating that tricky path between the near and far now takes up much of my attention. My multitasking prowess is shot to pieces, and I’m either here, seriously concentrating on the task at hand, or I’m there, taking in the bigger picture. But I’m never both.

And on the train, apart from the odd glance out of the window as I come up for air and get my bearings, the task at hand is where my focus lies. I know that I’m not the first to avail myself of such opportunities for concentration: Stella Gibbons wrote the whole of Cold Comfort Farm on the move, apparently, and of course we have the very recent (and very local) example of Oliver Gozzard and his Commuter’s Tale. My efforts are nowhere near as concerted, but I’m head down, I’m busy, and I couldn’t bear to be anything else.

And if those reading glasses get left behind, then all I can do is sit and stare and wonder: how do all you others manage who let those endless hours slip away unused? Are you really doing nothing? That seems to me like hell.

I really can't thank Gatwick enough

I’m afforded a particular pleasure by the fact that the 7.42 doesn’t stop at Gatwick. I have nothing against Gatwick per se, but it’s the baggage it pulls along in its wake that I have an issue with. And on the odd occasion that I do avail myself of the services of a Southern train that actually serves a Gatwick purpose (unlike the 7.42 which is a Gatwick Express by livery alone), I struggle with the repercussions. It’s like finding yourself in the middle of a fruit & veg market when all you were after was milk from the corner shop. And, if I’m honest, it’s an affront to the well-oiled wheels of commuterdom.

It’s not that we regulars don’t come with our own baggage, but we wield this with grace and expertise – and of course we’re unlikely to have the contents of our wardrobe with us. In my case, I have one bag that has been specifically chosen for its practical qualities and which sits squarely on my knee, providing a kind of extension to the table. And then there’s my neat little rucksack which sits alert and upright at my feet. And of course the rest of my – emotional – baggage I keep to myself. And, unlike those Gatwick passengers, I refrain from showing interest in what’s around me.

But, just sometimes, the tables are turned, and I board a train which is a Gatwick Express through and through; a train whose primary purpose is to serve those leaving the country, but which, in its new extended format, is on its way to Brighton and will drop me at Haywards Heath. And then the pleasure of the Gatwick connection is all mine. We speed out of London with barely a glance at East Croydon, and it’s this ability to make so light of the suburbs – something Southern could never do – for which, if I’m honest, I really can’t thank Gatwick enough.

A very good thing

It’s fair to say that I’m not the most sociable of commuters, but there’s one moment on every journey when it’s hard to ignore my fellow human beings completely. It is, of course, the moment of boarding, that complex dance of politeness and single-mindedness which forms part of the morning ritual. Again and again we tread the very fine line between appearing chivalrous and standing one’s ground, though Lewes is nothing like I imagine the battleground of Haywards Heath to be or – heaven forbid – East Croydon, where the very possibility of a seat is at stake. But if you’ve become, like I have, attached to the idea of your very own window with unrestricted view, things can get just a little bit tense.

What a relief, then, to be seated and settled, with that window seat, perfect view and even an empty seat beside you. But along with Haywards Heath comes another predicament: whether to appear as normal and unobtrusive as possible, or whether to accentuate one’s bulk and one’s idiosyncrasies? The possibility of that empty seat remaining so all the way to East Croydon is only a faint one, but I engage in fervent hope every time.

I know, of course, that chivalry and normality should be encouraged. But I also know that commuting has never brought out the beautiful or the altruistic in us humans, and what we’d really like is probably a whole carriage to ourselves. Which is why half-term is such a welcome fixture in the calendar. Just now a double seat all the way to London Bridge is not completely out of the question. There are far fewer human beings around, and – from where I’m sitting – that seems, quite simply, like a very good thing.