This week’s column in The Kerryman newspaper.
Commuting is an art form, it’s special. We might read about commuting but you have to be in the middle of it to get a handle on what it’s like. It’s a great place for people-watching.
Watching people jump off buses and making a beeline for trams when it is still dark in the morning is a sobering experience. Crowded trains, buses and trams, and complete silence, most people either staring into their phones or working them hard with their fingers.
Young people use two fingers to work their phones whereas the older folk use one and are far more clumsy at it. These days has anyone anywhere spotted a passenger reading a newspaper on bus, train or tram? They have to be an endangered species.
It’s not permissible to take a bicycle on tram or bus; one can take a bicycle on trains at designated times if there be space available. But it’s permissible to take a fold-up bicycle on bus, train and tram at all times.
I boarded a Luas in Broombridge with my fold-up; I partially folded and secured it to a bar on the tram. It took up less space than had it been completely folded.
En route a tall sophisticated-looking man and another man, less sophisticated- looking boarded the tram. They were strangers to each other but agreed the bicycle should not be on the tram. I owned up, said it was my bicycle and explained fold-ups were allowed. The sophisticated man, with a small black book in one hand and a phone in the other launched into a major attack, accusing me of being selfish with no regard for other passengers.
He kept going, telling me he lived 20 years abroad. It was that that made me react; with a smile and in a loud voice I told everyone within hearing distance that this gentleman had lived 20 years abroad, how sophisticated he must be and how lucky we were to have him on our tram.
He was not pleased, which led him to use a vulgar expletive. I jumped at the opportunity and explained to him that his sophistication was skin deep. He exited at the next stop. Was I glad to see the back of him. My, was he pompous and so full of himself.
But so far it’s only been a once-off incident. The commuting public seem a grand lot, getting on with their business, going to work, earning a few bob, coming home, doing the things that people and families do. And then back to work the next day.
We are made up of all shapes, sizes, ages, nationalities, beliefs; in many ways it’s a ginormous hodgepodge of human beings. But isn’t that what society is all about. How at all is it held together? I’m scared that we are living in times when that hodgepodge could be so easily manipulated and controlled by dictatorial forces or mega companies that have far too much power.
It’s great to be a member of the commuting public, indeed part of the hodgepodge that we call democracy.
And guess what, Sunday is the shortest day of the year. After that it’s upwards and onwards. Great news.
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