Chapter 161 - Almost 50 Years On

Last week on Friday I needed to visit my eye man in Doctor's Street in Big Smoke. I suggested she come with me by train, for us to experiment suburban trains in the city. She has a real fear of the gap between platform and train. There were no problems for her boarding at our town or alighting at the city end. Strange - perhaps the gaps were narrow. At the city end I found the lifts at the platforms so that she could avoid stairs and escalators to arrive at the lower concourse. After a visit to a disabled toilet we decided to walk all the way, must have been a couple of kilometers, to the doctor's. Along the way, numerous rest stops, a coffee, seats in Jeckyll Park and then lunch. A small sentimental detour after the coffee along the street that bisects the park; to the downhill slope at the corner where the museum is. For that is where I first noticed her 50 years ago this coming August. I was on an errand from the studios into the city and she (I found out later) was on her way to typing classes about 9am that morning. I had been vaguely aware of her because I had recently begun attending the church where her family worshipped. She came down the footpath towards me; dressed in an avocado coloured twin set (I doubt that colour was known then) and a narrow tartan skirt. Small high heels. Wow! She had a way of walking, heavily placing each foot, each hip accentuating the motion, yet not waddling or wobbling - she doesn't walk that way anymore. I think I said "hello" or similar. Then we were both lost in the crowd. I wondered where she had been going, and looked for her during the next few days, unsuccessfully. That brief encounter, that she now barely remembers, changed our lives forever. Last week after standing on that corner once again for the first time since, we returned into the park and remembered our contacts and bonding during the following weeks after that fateful encounter so long ago.

After my visit to the doctor and several eye tests, we only just had time to return to the country terminus so we walked quickly down hill to one of the inner city stations. She froze attempting to step onto the suburban train; refused to move across the gap; a woman gave a hand from the platform while I helped from the carriage doorway. After the train moved off there was an announcement that "the two women who had held the doors open would be kicked off the train if they did it again". She assumed the message was directed at us; I didn't think so at the time, but if it was I would enjoy being removed from a train by some thick-skulled security moron because of my wife's disability. Getting off at the country terminus gave little trouble.

At the country station we moved to where the front carriages would be because in our experience the train is divided at a station half way to our town. Consternation when an announcement told the waiting reasonably sized football crowd that the train was late and there were to be only two carriages! When this palace on rails arrived we stood back from the bun rush until we were able to make an elegant entrance. She was almost in a panic, shied away like a farm animal not wishing to enter through a gate, a couple of railway security types helped while I encouraged her from the inside; I was about to give up by the time she made the step. We jammed into what must have been the only remaining seats; not together. By the time the train left the southern edges of Big Smoke the carriages were as congested as a suburban peak hour commuter train. Back in our town where the train terminated she was able to alight without problem. In later discussion she said that the time pressure of having to step across a gap onto a train that was only stationary for about 90 seconds, combined with the gap between platform and train was what spooked her. I am thinking of perhaps a small mat to cover the gap should we attempt another trip on suburban trains.

The changes 50 years make. And it's not so long ago.