Commuting can be a pretty grim experience, packed trains, tubes and buses. People pushing and shoving, tutting and sighing- it can be a torturous environment.
The Life of a Tube Commuter
“The Man-spreaders, seat-hoggers or the leg crossers. Newspaper readers, the drinkers and noisy eaters.
The pushers and tutters, sighers and moaners. Tourists battling for space with their oversized case. Giant handbags, wheelie cases and a rucksack, squeezed into a carriage back to back.
Winter brings gloves and hats, summer gives us sweaty backs. Parents with screaming children, cheap headphones making a din. Move down please, mind the gap, don’t lean on the doors. Eyes closed dreaming of sunny shores. The golden chalice of a seat or trying to balance on your feet. Oyster, paper ticket, contactless, phone; as long as a valid ticket is shown.
This is your stop, struggle to the door, out of the train. 5.00 o’clock comes, we do it all again!”
We all have our complaints about commuting, and some horror stories to share. The majority of us tune out by popping in our headphones and zoning out to our favourite music or listening to a podcast. I’m a music kinda gal, and Ed Sheehan helps me get through the morning bedlam that is the Northern Line.
The Giggles
This morning on the tube, with a sea of “commuter faces” all trying to grin and bare it on an over packed train, I was feeling tired and fed up and certainly not smiling. That is until my fellow commuter next to me, watching a film on his device, burst into fits of giggles. Clearly the film had tickled his sense of humour. His laughter was contagious, and made me laugh as well as a few others
We can all get lost in our own thoughts in the morning, thinking about life and sometimes we forget to do something as simple as smile. I’d like to give a shout out to the guy on the northern line, you gave my morning a little boost, and in the words of Charles Dickens “There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humour”.