writing on trains

train time is not clock time, it is a paused, suspended, dream-like state

Lately, I’ve been writing on trains.

In the in-between places, cradled by rattle and hum, I find myself visited by words quite different to those that come to me at my desk. It’s impossible to focus on an essay or a book draft when snow-topped mountains swirl with cloud outside the window and I move between countries in my sleep. I cannot pull together paragraphs whilst weaving around a vast, island-dotted lake, through a steep valley, past a tumble-tiled church with a tall white bell-tower and orange trees that glow, still laden with fruit.

In the gently rocking carriage, where the sun flashes an intermittent dance across the window, and the hum of unknown languages soothes me, the words that do come are disjointed and unexpected—thoughts floating free as wheels spin on rails. Liminality brings a strange clarity that comes with viewing familiar things from far, unimagined places. I write these words with pencil in a brown cahier journal, taking pleasure in the physical process of putting them to paper.

The journey has been long—an adventure—four countries, eight trains, two double-deckers, one sleeper. Breakfast by the Adriatic, supper in the Alps. As I pass from Italy to Switzerland and the police step on board to check our passports, a girl in the seat opposite holds a tiny white chihuahua wrapped in her coat. The dog, which wears a grey blanket, has soft, pink ears that quiver. It looks at me with big eyes and yawns. The town outside the window is filled with full-scale versions of the miniature Swiss house music box that stood on my Granny’s mantelpiece.

Train time is not clock time, it is a paused, suspended, dream-like state…until there’s a connection to catch. Then, time belongs not to the train but to the station, existing with precision inside the grand station clock and the ticker-tape clicking departure board. Stepping onto another train through sliding doors, I think of other lives I could have lived: a lakeside house in Como, or a garret room in Paris. The train speeds on through the night towards the life that I have chosen, and choose again, taking me back to the people I love. Tendrils of train-time dreams will cling to me, smoke-like, as I alight for the final time and make my way home.

I return to my desk and enfold myself back into the darkness of the writing cave. In the moments when words don’t flow, I think of stepping outside an Italian railway station, breathing the mingled scents of cold metal, cigarette smoke and coffee, winter sun momentarily blinding against pure azure. A thin, white carrier bag, caught by the wind, is lifted up to the Milanese sky in a floating dance. It twirls, translucent above the concourse, once discarded but transformed for an instant into a creature of pure light.

Thank you for reading,

Laura x

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