The annoying old bag did it again. She got on the train at Cookham, sat opposite me, and kicked my feet deliberately. I moved, and she said something about needing room. I looked down, and while I was pushed back with my bag now wedged between my shins, she had all the room in the world. She also took up the entire seat next to her with the most gaudy gold handbag in the known universe.
I thought about sitting elsewhereof standing up and mouthing “for f*cks sake”,or some other such comment on her behaviour. I didn’t. She spent the journey until Slough applying makeup with a trowel.
Her just deserts came when a businessman got on and sat next to herhis legs spread as wide as possible, and a broadsheet newspaper spread over the both of them. She said nothing. I began wondering if there exists some order in society that I have somehow found the bottom of? She felt fine imposing herself on me, and he felt fine imposing himself on her.
WhateverI lost myself in my book once more, and wondered if it was better to be reading, or to be writing. Which enriches moreexperiencing the record of other’s thoughts, or recording your own?
Leaving the train at Paddington, I walked towards the station alongside a pretty blonde girl. She was pushed aside by a severe older blonde woman in a “little black dress”. It struck me that sometimes London is prettyand sometimes ugly. Today is somewhere inbetween.