Staring but not seeing

[The following is part one of stuff I wrote while on the train today. It's already one o'clock Tuesday morning here.]

I have all the time in the world while I'm in this train carriage. It's elevensies as I write this line but it will be shy of ten at night by the time I reach Sydney. hakamadare requested that I flesh out sections six through eight from the previous post. Thus I shall start tale number six tomorrow. For now I shall write about what happens in this box and see how it all flows. I shall likely nod out during the trip and wake back up. Please understand the waves. ( Let's catch that first wave, dude. )

-I'll explain about the Oits in the next post, Ps/d

Guess what else has caught on here?

My day sleeper shares a bathroom and shower with another sleeper. The other sleeper had been empty from Coffs Harbor until just before 3 in the afternoon. Then came what I have decided to call The Oits.

There is a young mother, strapping massive father and possibly five year old son. The son is loud and intrusive, to which I can relate. The father bellows "Oi!" a lot, a sharp sound with a trailing hint of an A. He also hits the boy after saying "do as I say, oi!" frequently. While I can close my door to trim the noise, his door and mine each have vent slats that cannot be closed. Thus I get to hear one generation of redneck create another, the father's yelling and smacking incapable of solving the problem. The father is young enough to have the energy to fight but none of the wisdom to stand back from the situation.

I sweat to death if I close the door, so I don't bother. I just watch the scenery change and stop myself from intervening. I will switch back to wearing ear plugs when I need to sleep again because the drama and fatherly yelling is grating. "Get out muy sit, bai!" (Get out of my seat, boy") and "yea want another smack?" are reminding me why I hate dealing with... well, I'll say it. I hate dealing with rednecks. I paid more to avoid being smothered in coach and wound up next to a new television show: How to Turn a Baby into a Bully.

I finally could not take it and asked to change to another empty sleeper. Even though my new neighbor has a baby that cries occasionally, the mother is calm and in good wits. I can still hear the Oits, but only when the shouting peaks. I can get back to writing about interesting things.

I later found out the child was two years old. This is a giant toddler! If he's this big and rambunctious now, he'll beat the snot out of his father by the time he's twelve. They really do grow 'em big here.

-did I mention I'm ready to come home? Ps/d

Two for Tuesday

We've just stopped at Maitland. It's half past seven in the evening a few days after winter solstice in the southern hemisphere, so it's dark out. I can't see evidence of massive flooding right now. In theory this train shouldn't be speeding along at all. We should be coming to a washed-out bridge in the Hunter Valley. I can still see work crews in the streets handling re-electrification but otherwise I'd never know this town had been victim to the worst flooding in fifty years two weeks ago.

This first-class carriage has been a blessing for my back and my sleep schedule as I try to get back to Boston time in advance. It's early Monday morning, five-thirty at home. The day I've already had is just starting where most of you will read this. By the time I post this, you'll be long into your work day and I'll be debating whether to get a good night's sleep only to be zonked when 3 a.m. Sydney time is 10 a.m. Los Angeles time and a customs agent is asking me where the hell I've been. ( But what would happen next? )

This ride reminds me of the Water Table Route down the Mohawk Valley into the Hudson. Maitland is where Sydney's CityRail suburban service begins, thus making the last two and a half hours of the journey an express run with only discharging passengers and no new riders. Maitland is thus Poughkeepsie. I do not know these suburbs so I cannot tell whether Broadmeadow (our next stop) is like Croton-Harmon or more like Yonkers. I can only guess by the frumpy passengers walking down the platform that this is nothing thrilling. Then again, perhaps the demographic for long-distance trains in Australia is the same as America's.

-enough until I wake up later, Ps/d

Something to do while I hunt for a job, eh?

I've been reading Emergency Sex (and Other Desperate Measures) in between naps and writing sessions. It's written by three people, each experiencing the same situation in turn. It's early in the book so they're still meeting each other and sussing their ability to get along. One is a high-level social worker of sorts who divorces her big-time agent husband because she no longer feels connected, another is a Harvard Law grad who skipped taking the bar to pursue a noble goal he has yet to discern, the eldest is a Kiwi doctor who of the Medicins Sans Frontieres ilk who spent years in Cambodia when no one else would touch the place. Together -- well, so far they drink. Gimme a break, though: it's only page 67.

I want to write a travel journal worthy of publication. This is the first time in months that I've sat down to write at length when it wasn't about work. I think I have enough to say about my short journey that I could make a first book out of it. I'm not ready for fiction but I'm totally ready to write 150 pages as a bound paperback. I'm not even going to ask anyone whether this is a good idea. I'm just going to write it and let you know when it's time for alpha testing.

-no you won't dissuade me, Dante