In 2015 I had to take the train into Sydney city everyday for three weeks.
It was July, and the cold winter wind whipped around me as I stood on the platform. I wrapped my coat further around me as I looked around at the other people waiting for the train. I wondered who they were and how they got so caught up in the 9-5 monotony of the corporate life.
I wrote the first few pages of this story on that train ride back in 2015, and it’s been waiting (quite patiently) for me to return to it ever since. I hope to spend the next few months breathing life back into it, making friends once again with the Man, the Woman and the Train.
It’s been almost ten years and they still haven’t met each other. I think now is the right time for this story to be written. It is my hope that each month I release another installment of this little tale.
Would you come with me on this literary adventure?
All aboard.
The Man stood on the platform, back against the icy winter breeze, collar flared.
Sturdily he stood in the morning, hand in hand like old friends he greeted the pale light. Every breath cast steam-clouds soaring, arching, being — bringing a smile to his face; His favourite time of day. The once piping hot coffee in his hand now brought little relief, the harsh elements chasing integrity from sense.
The Man breathed deep, sighing towards another full-time week ahead. Now don’t misconstrue that sigh, the Man loved his job — the effective and clever use of numbers, he believed, kept the world perfectly oiled. However, it were times like these that Monotony fell upon him, guiding his life from the unconscious thought, allowing his father’s words to echo through his mind.
Work. Provide. Survive. The trinitarian ghost of verse haunting him wherever he went, the mantra clinging to his back afresh each morning with the trill of his alarm clock. The Man sighed again and sipped his coffee only to be disappointed, the once hot golden liquid now bitter cold.
Walking through the crowd of morning commuters to discard the paper cup, the Man couldn’t help but wonder at the faceless-faces around him. Who were they? Where were they going? What drove their thoughts, actions, and decisions? Wind whipped around the Man’s face as the 8.04 am train pulled into the station, the sound of shuffling feet and warning sirens of the trains’ opening doors distracting him.
The whistle blew shrill as the Man took his leave— doors shutting, seats squeaking as the 8.04 am train departed, leaving the Man’s questions hovering longingly on the grey platform behind.
Part story, part allegory, teasingly poetic, The Man, the Woman and the Train tells the story of how two people met and changed the others’ life.
And all it took was a distracted train.