The conductor, a small, blonde, square woman in her thirties, comes to our carriage last. She has checked all the tickets and has plenty of time to chat. I, invisible to the three boys sharing my carriage, am apparently invisible to her too. She does not look near me. Twice she tells them the time … Continue reading Off The Rails (II)
I am alone in the carriage when the train pulls out of Derry. I take a seat on the left by a window, the side that will skirt the water, give me the best views along this stunning section of line. As the train gains speed along the Foyle estuary three boys tumble into the … Continue reading Off The Rails (I)
I’ve been travelling on trains these last few weeks. First, an early morning train from Antrim to Portrush, the sun not long up, mist lying in patches on the fields. It looks like the land is draped in a soft, white muslin cloth, which makes everything appear dreamy: half-real, half-apparition. A slick of dew coats … Continue reading I Love Trains
The majority of planes are grounded and the sight of a contrail ribboning the sky (I’ve always thought them beautiful) has become noteworthy. I turned my car engine over yesterday and revved it; car-physio, is what I’m calling this monthly, one-minute resuscitation. I’m not sure it will make any difference, it’s probably as effective as … Continue reading Close Your Eyes and Go
Setting off backwards, with a view to the west from my seat on the train, the sun is so bright that it hurts my eyes. A storm is forecast, it should be here by now. The weather is running late. Rabbits are frozen like ornaments in a scrap of scrubby field alongside a stream. The stream … Continue reading Journey
Two men appeared outside my kitchen window. This is no mean feat, as my flat is three floors up. Below them I could hear noisy clattering and voices shouting instructions. Then braces, brackets, poles and boards appeared. Jack In The Beanstalk style, an ugly metal structure was shooting up, as a long, thin section of … Continue reading Scaffolding
Yesterday, I was the recipient of a cheeky wink. It was lobbed to me as I was disembarking the train at York in a distracted flurry, trying hard not to forget my trail of accoutrements that, over two and a half hours, I had liberally deposited above me (on the rack), beside me (on the … Continue reading Wink
Yesterday I had to be somewhere by 6pm. Not anywhere. Somewhere. Seated, prepared, centred. Getting to that somewhere would take me two and a half hours by train with a spare hour tucked in my back pocket. This was my unassailable, one and only, Plan A. Then the wind arrived. Yorkshire, where I happened to be, … Continue reading Running Out Of Time
I arrived into London’s Kings Cross three hours late, running through the connecting underground passageways of the Tube network towards the Victoria line in a pool of sweat. ‘Horses sweat, men perspire, ladies merely glow,’ my father once taught me. Would that it were true. It was 34 degrees and I was sweating. “Sorry! So … Continue reading And Breathe
I re-watched ‘Before Sunrise’ recently. It’s the first in a trilogy of films by Richard Linklater, each set (and filmed) ten years apart. In the first film (set in the mid-nineties), a young couple meet on a train and, in a spontaneous gesture of youthful foolishness and adventure, disembark at Vienna and stay up all … Continue reading Girls On Trains
My Edinburgh Press 