It is Monday morning. I have 4 days left working in London. In a strange sort of way I am going to miss the people I work with - for the last 10 months I have spent more time with them than I have my “real” colleagues. I have come to know them, like them, and value both their experience and friendship.
When I was first seconded to work in London, it was for 5 days to hand over the source code of a colossal system that I was one of the “inventors” of. Those five days spent commuting seemed like a marathon - 4 hours each day squashed onto a variety of over-ground and underground trains to travel from leafy Marlow in Buckinghamshire to Bishopsgate, in the heart of London’s east end.
When the five days came to an end, the news came that the contract had been extended for a further month.
Over the days I started to recognise people on the train - spotting those making the same commute, or crossing paths with me each morning. We never spoke - and have never spoken - but it is comforting to sit or stand near them in a busy train. The pretty girl with the short blonde hair who wears wonderful clothes, and who I only ever see while walking along the platform at Paddington. The man with the slicked back hair who reads his paper between Marlow and Bourne End. The girl with the long brown hair and impossibly long legs, that leaves everybody standing when she walks home through the streets of Marlow on an evening. The little man who smokes like a chimney until the train leaves on a morning.
The month turned into three months. And then six more. Five days had become a year.
I would like to think the friendships - both professional and otherwise that I have forged while working so far from home will not be in vain. Perhaps the advent of social networks, email and mobile phones will ensure that we might not so easily lose touch as we might have done in the past.
When I sat down on the train this morning, the girl with the short blonde hair sat opposite me for the first time ever. It seemed somehow fitting that this person I have so often walked alongside across the length of Paddington station was now sat with me for the journey in on my final week.
I wonder who else I will chance to sit with throughout the remainder of these final days.