All the lonely people
Where do they all come from?
All the lonely people
Where do they all belong?
I always think of this song when I see people talking to themselves, and yesterday I saw three or four. Railway stations are a natural home for middle-aged men who seem to be ranting at the skies. A couple of men at Ipswich station and one at Liverpool Street were pacing up and down the platforms, chuntering away to themselves, occasionally breaking out into a fit of tics, words that may or may not have been profane. People walk around them, past them, circle and maybe stop awkwardly if they find themselves in their path before carrying on, eyes not meeting. The strange thing is, all the men I saw yesterday had smiles on their faces. I sometimes get the impression that they see the station as their dominion, and they are serving some kind of essential function by wandering the councourse, keeping errant commuters in check and shooing pigeons away.
I can’t help but think of stories for people I don’t know, and these people always make me wonder what their stories are – how they got here, where they live, who they know, who they’ve known, whether they were always barking out loud. I don’t know them, and I’ve certainly no right to sit in judgement on their lives - they may be very happy, but they always seem to be the loneliest people in the world.
they’re probably stressing about the cost of their bathroom renovations…
Years ago, when I had a boring job in a bank, my boss suggested that I should make up stories about the customers to keep myself amused – especially when I was told to sit and watch the decorators painting the inside of the strongroom. It was a good idea but I got a bit carried away. Some of the fake identities were so colourful I couldn’t look the customers in the eye. Hooker, gangster, sweatshop owner, drag queen – they all came through the branch, except that none of them knew it. After a couple of weeks I got bored with it, and they all reverted to boring ordinaryness – or did they?