We sit in silence. Each passenger on the train has their own amusement. Work emails on the company laptop. Instagram scrolling. Daily Mail lite diatribes masquerading as free newspapers. Music bleeding from headphones. The standard commuter fayre. We feel lucky. We the survivors. Those who made it into the office when all trains were cancelled that morning. The ones who didn't pull a cheeky working from home manoeuvre. We don't go as far as hugging each other and exchanging reassurances that everything will be better tomorrow. If talking’s not on the agenda it’s unlikely that our physical boundaries will be troubled. We're aware of the farcical nature to this too. If we do risk conversation it's likely to be travel themed. The novelty of the bus ride in. Why can't the train companies get their act together. Is it so hard to tell us what's going on? Something neutral. Benign. Safe. Not even a placeholder to a real conversation. Especially considering the alternatives. The implications of a hard Brexit. The slaughter by random geographic misfortune in Indonesia. Is a rapist going to be elected to the supreme court in the US? Whether Boris Johnson's role is simply to grind Theresa May out of office to clear the path for Jacob Rees Mogg. Where is this bus going? The same could be asked of the country.
