Standing on the Tube platform, oddly, I am reminded of a scene from the children’s movie, “James and the Giant Peach”. James is lying on a beach with his mom and dad having a lovely time and looking up at the clouds. But suddenly, the wind picks up and a dark cloud with the image of a rhino is charging through the sky and James’ parents are taken by the storm leaving him behind.
And like the charging rhino in the movie, the carriage approaches with the same force. One moment there is a remarkable stillness as I wait along with the throng of other commuters and the next a distance rumble tells me it is on its way. A wind builds and my scarf dances and a light shines out of the tunnel. The train bursts into view so violently that I wonder if it will stop. But it halts; people collect and wait anxiously for the doors to open. Will I get a seat? We all scurry into its belly perhaps ignorant of its strength and volatility. Mind the doors, please. Move right down into the carriage and use all available space. Mind the doors. Mind the closing doors. And allow ourselves to get swept along as it travels to its next stop.
The past two weeks, I have felt a bit like James. The HR job, that I was so pleased to have secured, turned into a major disappointment. The woman, who was assigned to be my manager, took great pleasure in picking apart everything I did, expected me to automatically know where to find things and what I needed to do to accomplish my tasks, and instead of being grateful for my assistance was generally irritable and impatient with me. The icing on the cake was when she asked me to update some information on applicants in their spreadsheet and when I simply asked when I pointed to the various documents in the directory which one I should be using her response was “why is this here?” and “what is that doing there?” and “you forgot to add the details on this” while she took over my computer and banged up and down on the cursor arrows going over “my” mistakes. Hold the phone, Aunt Sponge, I just asked which spreadsheet I should be using.
The daily travels to London, as well, were long, hot, and taxing. The trains from Harlow are excellent in that we are on the Stansted Airport express route which means that they run often and fast to London but the challenge was the additional journey once I got off the train and entered the world of Tube travel.
As Canadians, we are accustomed to our space. We live in a large and spacious country and we live, for the most part, in large and spacious homes. There is something , for me anyway, that is not quite right about being so close to a stranger that you can tell what they had for lunch. People sneeze and they cough into the carriage without covering their faces. Their oversized purses and hard covered briefcases often jab you in the back, butt, or the shin depending on how you are pinned in the Tube next to them. And when you think that there simply can’t be any more room for another passenger, the train stops and several slink in and join the band of smoked oysters in this underground can. It gets particularly hot, stuffy, and smelly in there as well and I learned to remove my outside coat before my train arrives. There have been times that I have had to put my scarf around my nose and mouth as someone next to me smelt so awful, it made me nauseous.
Getting a seat is also a luxury and people will toss their manners, if they had any to begin with, out the window and have no hesitate beating you to a place to sit down. I have been bumped, knocked, and at one point when I was actually removing my pack and clearly assuming the seated position, challenged for a seat. Now I can’t say that all travellers are this rude as there have actually been two instances where a man, a very kind one in my opinion, has offered his seat to me. Chivalry is nonexistent in the commuting world. And it is not that I am expecting that a man gives up his seat for a lady but gosh darn it does he have to practically leap and stumble over folks feet in order to get to a place before me?
Then there are the unexpected and ever present delays that occur and you just never know how long it is really going to take you to get from point A to B on any given day. Sometimes it’s a slower train ahead that stalls the process, or someone’s bag has become stuck in the closing doors, or for reasons I just can’t wrap my head around no matter how unhappy or unsettled I may have felt in my life, decide to throw themselves in front of the train and experience what I imagine to be an excruciating death on the tracks.
So when the doors opened on Friday after I had done my final stint with Sponge (I’d had enough earlier in the week and gave my notice) and a gush of recycled air from the platform blew on my face, I felt as though I was leaving a bizarre world where anything can happen behind. But the Tube gets in your head. It can make you hard and put you in survival mode, of sorts. I know for me it heightened my need to create my space when I am out in the public and however convenient public transportation may be here, I’d like to avoid that raging rhino and walk as much as possible to get me where I need to go. Because I’ll mind those doors, mind the closing doors alright. No problems.
