The Metal Box
The mysterious title only describes a rather substandard machine, the train. It’s my transportation mechanism, I change but it rarely does. The metal box.
‘It seems foolish to take for granted the mechanisms and systems we use so often. As we change, they stay the same and unknowlingly accommodate to us. I’m sure there’s an application of this philosophy somewhere in life, maybe I’ll find one.’
The thought process that ensues when I approach the time to write this daily account usually follows this pattern:
- What did I do today?
- Did any thought, action or event stand out?
- Okay, so what did I do today?
The answer to questions 1 and 3 almost always comprise of taking the train.
I take the train to work. I return on the train.
As my patterns of use change, the train remains the same.
It arrives at the same time, takes approximately the same amount of time, offers options for where I can sit depending on my mood.
It really does accommodate to my needs. Without doing anything.
Before when I worked in Canary Wharf; I would read the newspaper, read Medium articles and find some time for Netflix too.
Now, I transcribe. You can see a corner of the transcript I’m working on right now. My longest recording at ten minutes shy of an hour.
But like I said in a previous blog, I read the news too.
Sometimes I stand, out of choice or necessity.
The train helps me to practice my manners and maintain my niceties by offering my seat to someone less able or in more need.
The train doesn’t expect anything of me, while I expect everything of it.
It only needs a reasonable fare to allow passage, but I expect data reports of technical faults at an instant when things start to go South.
I think I’ve found the application.
It relates to expectations.
An object cannot expect anything from anyone.
Especially when that object is franchised as a service.
It does its job and goes to depot for rest. It receives weekly cleans and after every train ride, its insides are emptied and cleaned too.
But, I the passenger, expects the train to perform efficiently and effectively all the time.
I want to know why it is late and why it left early. I want to know why it broke down. I want all the answers it can’t give me or doesn’t want to tell me.
I think there are two applications here.
One is the expectation that we have from life. Life being the object or entity that can’t answer us.
The other being our expectation from others. Others being the entity that don’t want to provide an answer for us.
Belief in yourself and expectation on life are two different conversations. Going all in and banking on what life has to hold survey nuances that can’t be classified together.
For these reasons the train, as farfetched as it may seem, acts as a vehicle to assess our own lives.
I really try to not expect anything from people anymore. It’s not worth my energy nor mental health.
And in the same vein, no-one should expect anything from me.
While I try to accommodate to suit others, it sometimes isn’t possible and no-one should feel pressure that they ruined something or cancelled plans.
It may not have been the most glamorous of topics for my 250th daily blog, but it goes to show when you write every day, you can make a story out of anything.
Ones that make you think, even if the parallels are drawn at a stretch.
Some don’t do that, and not all are designed to do so.
I’ve learnt that this blog is anything I want to be. I should be myself and constantly uphold the values I carry myself with on the train every day.
The metal box.