ENTHRALLED BY THE ENGLISH COUNTRYSIDE

Long shadows on the fields of Oxfordshire this morning. It’s fresh too - the twinkling sun catching wisps of mist between the trees and hedgerows. This is golden autumn, Keats’s Fall, the glorious shimmer of September, under a big sky, scattered with high white clouds.

My eyes are stinging - not just with the flickering sunlight through the train window, but with sadness. I don’t know why. Seasonal Affected Disorder? Perhaps. My heart feels heavy too, like an over-ripened apple, too weighty for the branch. I don’t know. SAD’s irrational isn’t it, but this deep aching feels more like there’s a hidden reason, so deep and buried, even I don’t quite know what it is.

Sorry. This is probably depressing reading. Let’s talk about how lovely the autumn is. I do think that; that’s not sarcasm. This time of year, this time of day, is utterly gorgeous. Two ladies opposite talk about how difficult their jobs are, but every now and then the one nearest the window smiles - which is a hint at a privilege, the silent blessing of being alive, being thankful to see a morning like this. It isn’t British to discuss this. But it would be odd not to secretly acknowledge how beautiful our land is.

I have mixed feelings about work today. As always, I love the journey. What I face at my destination though - I do wonder. Something less glorious. Funny old system, isn’t it? Travelling through beauty and wonder on a perfect Autumn morning, for the purpose of spending hours on a laptop, in a room, talking about things that will be forgotten in a year’s time. 

Fast forward the clock even by a whole century, and I suspect people will still be enthralled by the English countryside, the translucent leaves, and the dappled shadows of a sun low in the September sky. I mean that is, if the high-speed hyperloop doesn’t make it fly past at 800 miles an hour.

Nearly at Oxford. The city sparkles into view and the train slows towards the platform. My heart aches a little. I blink as the sunlight flicks on and off between the buildings and the station gantries. I’ll be alright.