No Smoking

Sometimes in life, I find at least, there are certain events of conversations that occur that, even as a writer, you just couldn't make up. Sometimes these things happen that you just come away from not entirely certain of what actually went on. Did I really see that? Did that really just happen to me?

  This morning, I had one of those little events on a train back from Vauxhall. Having spent the night with Morgan, I boarded a train to take her part way to work. For those unaware of the Oyster Card system, you tap in at the station you board, and tap out when you exit at your destination; the actual route doesn't matter, you get charged for the equivalent journey between the two stations. This means I can go all he way from Norbiton to Vauxhall, and then back to Ewell. As long as I don't pass the Vauxhall station barriers, I pay for Norbiton to Ewell, and get to spend some more time with Morgan. 

These journeys alone interest me, but that's for another post. 

So, having said goodbye to Morgan at Vauxhall, I grabbed a Cornish pastie as way of breakfast and jumped a train back home. Unlike the outward journey, the return is much quieter, on account of fewer people leaving London in the morning than the hordes of self-important bustle-you-outta-my-way jumped up idiots headed in. I took a seat towards the back of the carriage and began to read a little bit of a Metro newspaper someone had just left in the train. Newspapers, apparently, being very heavy and awkward items to carry ten paces to the bins. 

It was a nice relaxing journey, the carriage a comfortable temperature compared to the strong chill winds outside, pastie in one hand, paper in the other. The train passed Wimbledon and I decided, having read the articles that had immediately interested me, to dispose of my newspaper properly (and I'm astounded to report that I did not injure myself by carrying this hefty object to the nearest bin) and to roll a cigarette in preparation for leaving the station.

"'Scuse me, ya can't smoke here." 

It's at this point that, were I telling this story out loud, I'd out on a really cringeworthy chav-girl voice. Shrill and with as much whine as a French Supermarket. 

I glanced up without moving my neck, peering up through my fringe at a girl that made me think of a budget parody of 'The Only Way Is Essex'. You know the type; tights and crop-top combo despite it being two degrees outside, straightened over dyed hair, pudgy face caked in more layers of make-up than the average theatrical supplier carries in stock, and her face glowing that sickly Dorito orange that I'm never sure is the desired effect of months of fake-tanning or a side-effect of blasting your skin with more radiation than Chernobyl. 

I ignored her and continued rolling. I ignored her, a kindness she did not return. 

"'Scuse me! I'm talkin' t'you! Ya can't smoke here!"

I pause and take a moment to breath, lift my head up slowly with a deliberate smile.

"Yes. I know. I'm just rolling a cigarette."

'But ya can't smoke on trains."

Slow breath, quick check to gauge whether or not she's being serious. Glance around the carriage for cameras in case I'm a star of the latest series of Candid Camera. I'm half expecting to find a cheap celebrity cowering behind a seat ready to leap out and explain to me, mic thrust forward like a rapier, that I've 'been had', can I say a few words for the folks back home, please. From the lack of evidence, I must assume she's serious.

"I'm not smoking it, I'm just rolling it." I say, taking the filter tip from my mouth and popping it into the paper gently.

"You can't smoke here." 

I flick the paper up and down to sort the tobacco, then lick the paper, roll it closed and regard her again. She's beginning to sound like a broken record, or the hologram from the recent-ish Will Smith version of 'I, Robot' - "I'm sorry, my responses are limited. You must ask the right questions."

"I'm not smoking."

"That's a fag."

"It's not lit."

"You can't smoke here."

I dig into my pockets and pop my headphones in, set it to play something by Lamb of God, and rack the volume up. Fortunately, it's now my stop, so I stand up. I pop the cigarette into my mouth to keep my hands free as I grab my rucksack. I hear her say something, see her lips move out of the corner of my eye, but it's lost beneath Randy Blythe's soothing guttural screams. I disembark the train, make my way out of the station and spark up.

I realise that I'm not sure if she genuinely thought I was going to light up and start smoking on the train, or if she honestly thought that the act of rolling a cigarette constituted smoking, and was thus illegal on the train. Poor misguided fool possibly thought she was doing a public service, like the girl who emptied McDonalds of paper towels (literally) to cover a spilled coke, making it impossible for the guy with a mop to clean up, then got really aggressive when he asked her to stop throwing paper towels on the floor.

It makes me think of that old Einstein quote:

"Only two things are infinite. Human stupidity and the universe. And I'm not certain about the universe."