The Commute

Do you ever look at people on the train or in the street and wonder what they do or why they are here?  Why the gentleman (I use the term loosely) dressed in a dark pin-stripped suit is wearing red trainers.  Where the young blond woman snoozing in the corner has come from? Where the people with suitcases are going?  Some dressed casually and others in business attire. How often do they do this trip?  Are they happy?  Have you ever asked yourself?

Why do people commuting never smile or talk.  They seem to walk zombie like to and from wherever they are walking to and from.  Eyes glazed.  That is unless they have shut out the world by cranking up the music through their earphones.  Either way, more often than not they are totally oblivious to the world.  Maybe I should envy them, their sense of routine and acceptance.

Worse still there seems to be an evening phenomenon of young women (mostly) talking on their phones making arrangements I guess, wandering ever so slowly across the footpath into everyone’s way, mindless and totally unaware of the  havoc they are creating with those of us who have somewhere to go – usually home to the safe haven of my living room.  I always wonder if they drive like this too!!  You know the ones I mean.  The girls who seem to think they can text and hold a conversation – and drive all at the same time when in reality… well I won’t be too disparaging.

People spend their lives commuting – it would seem mostly to jobs they hate.  I guess this is their way of getting through it.  Their way of making it better.  I am so glad that I have had an interesting job, something on the whole I enjoy going to, that gives me variety in places and people, a release from the mundane of the masses.