Thought For The Day #44

Broadcast 2nd of April 2015 on BBC Radio Bristol

I travel to London by train once a fortnight for work. Door to door it’s about a 3 hour journey. Normally I don’t mind it, I quite like the fact that I have no other option than to do pretty much nothing. My life is basically reduced to 3 choices; look out the window, read or snooze. Of course I can do all those things at home, but I always feel guilty about it because there’s so many other things to do. There’s washing up to be done, bills to be paid, bikes to be fixed and floors to be cleaned.

I recently got driven to Scotland, which was about 6 hours each way. I enjoyed that too for the same reasons. But it was tough as well, motorways can get quite boring and bladders can get quite full! Sometimes we’d talk and other times we’d just stare out our windows.

When was the last time you stared out at the world? I find it worrying that so much time can pass between a good window-staring session. It’s not something I put in my diary. “Oh sorry I can’t come for dinner on Thursday I’ve got 2 hours of window staring that night.” Instead it’s something I stumble upon, like bumping into a friend on the street.

I know life is passing me by right now and that I should strive to stop and smell the roses as often as I can. But it can feel a bit fake when I do it on purpose. Unfortunately, I seem need the confines of a rather pricey train journey to force the decision upon me. I think I might need to reassess my life!?