Choo-Choo-Itis

Chapter 53 - Lady B and Me

15, January 2013

THE MOM:

Well, I’ve been busy, but it’s been a fairly unproductive past three days from Al-Pal The Son’s standpoint, beginning with a day trip to London on Saturday for a special lunch with friends he’d met down in Rehab, one of whom was celebrating a new teaching job, and ended with a nightmarish seven hour journey home from Liverpool Street Station that should have taken two, thank you Greater Anglia Railways. Alex arrived back finally at 11:00pm stressed and shaken, hungry and cold, all of which appeared to affect, over the next few days, his sleep, sinuses, digestion, and mood.

Now. There’s a part of me that wants to say oh for Christ sakes, so it was a crap train journey, and Greater Anglia should be shot, no question, but hey, we’ve all gone through this at some point, lighten up, it wasn’t to Auschwitz, it was home to your warm cozy bed with clean sheets, get over it! And another thing. What’s the point of this Big Deal Schedule we made if you’re going to ignore the bugger? And what about the dishwasher and what about piano and—

But at this point the other part of me rises up to slap that first part of me down and say “Ah, but everyone deals with things differently don’t forget, he’s a recovering addict, you’re not, he’s on medication and who knows how that’s affecting his brain and body and no, perhaps he should not have taken so much Gaviscon or Nytol or smoked so many cigarettes on an empty stomach, but cut him a little slack here, you knew it was never going to be clear sailing and bottom line, whatever you do don’t nag him to do stuff, you asshole!”

The end result being he has done pretty much sweet F.A until today, when he came downstairs and apologized for his lack of get-up-and-go and the generally spoiling-for-a-fight mood he’s been in. And has since then been dutifully over to collect his Subutex at the chemist’s, is currently out walking the dog in the snow, and planning on getting dinner. Piano, diary, and I believe a scathing letter to Greater Anglia Railways is also on the cards.

And, more good news. He’s reading a book. Don’t get too excited, he’s not tackling Tolstoy yet but during his recent lethargic malaise he appears to have taken quite a fancy to my Kindle, and is by now well into Stephen King’s 11.22.63. Which in my book beats reading the sports section cover to cover, any day. Mind you, what doesn’t.

18, January, 2013

THE SON:

I feel the need to vent my fury at Greater Anglia Trains or whoever is responsible for by far the biggest rail service fuck-up I’ve ever had the misfortune to be a part of. It all happened last Saturday afternoon/evening. I had travelled down to London to meet up with a friend of mine and went to lunch at this marvellous place called the Duck & Waffle where I had their namesake signature dish which consisted of crispy confit of duck and a fried duck egg with mustard maple syrup on a waffle. It was incredible. I also had Bar B Q spiced crispy pig ears to start with but anyway I’m not here to talk about the meal. If I had known what my journey back home from London would be like, delicious though lunch was, I would never have left home.

My train from London Liverpool St was due to leave at 16.50 and I got on nice and early so as to claim a table seat. 16.50 comes and goes. At 17.00 the driver tells us that there are signalling problems and we’re to wait for further updates. At 17.15 the train is cancelled along with almost every other departure from the station. Everyone is told to wait on the concourse for further instruction. It’s now 18.10 and Liverpool St Station is like a colossal battery farm of humans.

After about 10 announcements and apologies for the inconvenience, passengers wishing to use the mainline Norwich services are told to board a local train to Ilford then take the number 86 bus to Romford where another local train service to Shenfield will pick us up and from there normal service will be running. Bloody hell. Even the description of the journey is knackering to say let alone attempt it on a freezing windy Saturday night but thought I’d better get on with it. I was in a foul mood from all of the disruption and I had used the word “fuck” a lot already but by this point most people shared my mood.

The Ilford train was like being the last sardine put into the tin and my back was rammed right up against the glass of the door. It could have been a damn sight worse had it not been for this fit rudegirl right up against me with banging breasts but I was still so relieved to get off at Ilford half an hour later. On Ilford High St, the scene that greeted me was from a nightmare. Hundreds of people queuing at this one tiny bus stop waiting for the number 86 bus which only came every 10 minutes. After missing 2 buses I ran along the road to the stop before the one everyone was fighting each other at, and managed to slip onto the already crammed bus where I found standing space with my face in a guy’s reeking armpit which I had to endure for the hour it took to get to Romford.

Romford wasn’t any better. The platform was a solid mass, we waited half an hour for a train that arrived already packed, more so than the bus, and instead of an armpit for company this time it was the huge arse of this huge woman who kept taking off her coat and bag then putting them on again. I had to balance on one foot all the way to Shenfield and was so close to bursting into tears or screaming my lungs out or punching someone. I remember for a minute I genuinely wanted to die. I wanted to escape the situation. It was such an intense feeling of emotional confusion and I’ve felt like that very rarely.

I thought that once I got to Shenfield there would be some respite but no. The announcer told everyone waiting for the mainline service to Norwich to stay on the platform and our trainload of sardines was added to the literally over 1000 people already waiting. He then announces, 2 minutes before the mainline train arrives, that it will be coming to Platform 2, which is on the other side, where you have to use the underpass to get to, and this information caused havoc. It was like what I imagine experiencing the Hillsborough disaster would have been like. People being squished almost to death with everyone trying to funnel down the staircase to the underpass. For the 25 year old male that I am, it was hell, but there were lots and lots of old people and I can’t imagine what it must have been like for them. Anyway I don’t know how I did it but I managed to get to the other side without having to resort to crossing the tracks, and I seriously considered it a few times. I checked that the train stopped at Ipswich and then I ran down the platform to the front of the train and hopped into 1st class and relaxed.

Unsurprisingly, no ticket inspector dared to show his face that evening on any of the trains I got on but had he tried to kick me out of 1st class for only having a standard ticket, I think I would have knocked him out. Eventually the train left and from there I calmed down and shut my eyes.

I have to say that at many points in that desperately shit journey I felt at my weakest mentally and I could have easily given in to relapse had it been on offer. It shows me the pattern of how I always used when I was emotional about something and to help me escape those feelings. However I don’t think all the drugs in the world could have made that journey any better.