Trains
23 minutes until the next circle line train
It’s 5.18pm, this means you will not be getting the off peak train from Paddington. Which is quite annoying given you left work early and might now get fired. You’ve also lost all six of your spare return bits (momentarily you tell yourself the lie that they were the ‘wrong’ leg and pretend you therefore don’t mind, you do mind). More pressing though is the fact that you’ve just run up three staircases and your lungs are burning. You know the only solution is to sit down, which you will do after you’ve gone to M&S and purchased a before dinner sandwich. You’re not an animal so you also purchase two cocktails in tins. And a bottle of cava that will go very nicely with the crinkle cut crisps, mini sausages, melon cubes, percy pigs, mozzarella balls and rice-crispy bites. You momentarily consider swapping this haul for a Burger King, but you’re not that guy, so you valiantly resist. This great judgement gives you ample space to enjoy your healthy food, and boy what a fantastic selection you’ve just made - you’d get first place in the competition of best train journey snacks. So now it’s just the small matter of getting a ticket. You go for the ticket machines at the back of the station (left hand side of the lawn, as only my father knows to call it). Nothing doing. 900 people have got there first and oddly not a single one of them can use a ticket machine. You promise to not ever book a ticket in advance and be that person putting in 37 individual letters and numbers. You decide, what the heck, to spoil yourself and go ‘full price’ on a single, it costs you all of your yearly salary. You hate GWR. In order to air this opinion you go to that pub (is it a pub??) in the middle of the station between the platform without a barrier and the one near the Heathrow platform. You order a Fosters, you get a sort of kick out of this appalling beer. Thank god for phone apps you think as you pull out your mobile to check when the next train is and what platform it will be leaving from. So starts 6 journeys to ‘check’ the departure boards, just in case and because in your heart you don’t really trust phone apps. 2 seconds before the train doors are locked they announce which platform you will be departing from. (Side note - we all have our favourite Paddington platform and mine is Platform 2.) You do the walk-run-leap-step-full-running thing. You feel genuine relief that lots of other people are also only just at the turnstiles because you now know you’re not late, one whole second later you hate all of these slow morons. You do not go to First (they don’t get there any faster you think to yourself with a slight smile) or the quiet carriage (no such thing my friend). Instead it’s about 75% down, ie. far enough to be ‘through’ the crowds but early enough so the sweat on your back doesn’t start in lieu of the train leaving without you. Also my Dad used to do this and I still believe, when it comes to GWR train carriages, that his knowledge is infallible. You climb on board and enter, without any written consent, into the gameshow called Does Your £900 Ticket Allow You A Seat, we all know the answer to that. Next stop: Home.
This is not why I love trains.
The reason I love trains is because I come from a family of people who love trains. Because of this I grew up on a healthy diet of train geekery in the land of model railways.
This is what a good hobby looks like
In truth the facts and figures haven’t stuck all too well. But the romanticism, my gosh that has stuck. A bit like how I used to climb into the back of the 2CV and immediately fall asleep, trains are my safe place.
The ideal holiday requires a train journey. I am most happy near a steam train, the sound and smell of them can bring me to tears. I look at maps and wonder how I can knit countries together through train networks. One of the books I often think about is The Great Railway Bazaar (just writing that makes me want to go off and re-read it). I plan to retire and travel the world by trains. I regularly check the internet to see how to get from London to India by train (Turkey and Iran currently make it impossible). I watch films like Goodnight Mister Tom for the old train scenes. If you also need this sort of nostalgia injection I can point you towards murder mystery programmes (Poiret & Father Brown) because they seem abound with steam engines and train platform scenes.
Last year I had the most magnificent of days - I headed down to East Grimstead to meet my twin and spend a few hours on the Bluebell Railway, which we did - amongst a few beers, an ice cream, an interactive museum and a plate of chips. My uncle - no doubt the original source of this Cakebread obsession - has converted a carriage into a book shop. I cannot get across how perfect that is.
The summer before Edward died there was another day spent on the Bluebell Railway. It was arranged with little to no warning and entirely because it was exactly the sort of day we all wanted. I was put in charge of sandwiches and being stressful. Pete took charge of all timings and having an opinion. Edward managed getting out of bed and Dad neatly tied everything together by knowing where they kept the Bluebell Railway and enjoying absolutely every part of this ragtag day. And what a day it was. The weather turned up and the Bluebell - ever the beautiful host - was a delight. Edward was in his element. The consummate train geek, the man looking over his empire and understanding it was good. He spent a lot of his childhood ‘doing trains’. He famously, when asked by a very attractive girl in Edinburgh what his thing was, admitted that yeah drugs are good but have you ever got into trains? He meant really got into trains, because as those in the know will tell you - it’s a detail orientated sport. Forget the go-to ‘bloke at the end of a platform with camcorder’ image, because that is only the surface. What you are negating to add is that small WHSmith’s value notepad (bought in bulk twenty year-a-go) in the top packet of their well worn anorak. There you will find pages of numbers that are diligently ticked and amassed. I have no idea of the validity of this image, but I’d like it to be true because we need more engaged and sincere people in the world, not fewer. But I’ll tell you something undeniable - Edward knew about trains. He knew their stories, he knew the details and he knew the language. Edward was comfortable amongst other enthusiasts. And in him they saw a friend and equal. He also - I am sure we can agree here - knew how to have an adventure. He understood the allure of trains and the excitement of them. He was able to understand them as living things, these magnificent engines cutting across the country. If you have ever been on a steam train you will have seen the faces of people as you pass by them - steam engines just are exciting. They are tantalising and full of wonder.
I now work for a company that operates trains, including probably the most famous of all trains - The Orient Express. In March this year, when we were allowed out of doors, I took my twin on the Asian equivalent of this train. We snaked, slowly and luxuriously, down from Bangkok to Singapore. There was champagne, endless scenery, several daily outfit changes, open air carriages, a piano man and all the hallmarks of a bi-gone era. We departed from the central train station at 6pm so that we could, with sparkling wine in hand, watch the sunset over Bangkok. We spent the days reading in beautiful lounges, embracing the 5pm gin and tonics and seeing South-East Asia as I will never see it again. This is what trains give you - that return to some perfect part of your imagination, where there are rolling green hills and someone waiting at the platform at the other end.
When this is over I will duly take myself to Paddington and embrace all the awfulness of GWR. I will do this because I want to get home quicker than any other transport will allow. I also want to see Moulsford school and the greenery of Oxfordshire as London, and this odd isolation, disappears behind me.
Here’s a lovely thing
I found this gem in my memory box. It’s from when my Dad travelled from London to Melbourne in order to see me but also - I suspect - so that I could take him on the Puffing Billy. And that is why we need more people who love trains, because truly it’s a ticket to a lot of shared adventures & mad dashes on the way home.
