I went to sleep on the train on the way home from the city last night. I have always been wary of doing this but, man I was so tired I couldn’t stop myself, no matter what I did. I even tried to burn myself by heating up my cigarette lighter. All this did is cause a nasty-looking blister that I had to pop with a pin this morning.
My wariness is for a number of reasons. First of all, the nodding-head look is not cool, regardless of where you are. I’ve watched commuters hold up their briefcases or shopping as shields so that the head of the person sleeping next to them bounces off the item as they nod. The look on the sleeper’s face is priceless. Sure, I laughed but I also remembered.
I’ve seen people move completely out of a dozing passenger’s way as they’ve dipped forward or sideways. This usually results in the sleeper waking up rather rudely, either on the ground or lying on the seat. I’ve seen some sleepers drool all over the front of their shirts or dresses, all over their own shoulders and, in one case, all over the back of the person sitting in front of them. Again, I laughed but I also remembered.
I am also wary because of my habit of sucking my thumb in my sleep. This is not something I do with any regularity but it does occur. I’m sure some headshrink has probably got a long-winded reason as to why I do this but I don’t care. It doesn’t bother me at all, given it mostly occurs in the privacy of my own bed. Past girlfriends have thought it was really cute when it happened and the morning sex after a bout of thumb sucking has always seemed better. I would love to hear what a shrink might make of this.
I am not a violent person but have the capacity if I am rudely awoken, particularly when I’m not in my own environment. I tend to punch out at the poor person trying to wake me. My mother used to wake me by taking a broom stick and poking my foot until I sat up. Even then, I’ve given her a good scare a number of times, having leapt out of the bed intent on murdering the person who disturbed my slumbers.
Mornings just aren’t my time and I consider at least the first hour after I wake as a danger period for anyone near me. If I am in my own bed, the story is a little different, although one ex-girlfriend wore a nasty black eye for a few days after a particular incident. She tried to wake me because she heard a strange noise. I apparently sat up in bed, swung out at her and promptly went back to sleep. I woke in the morning to find a note from her, my front door wide open and both back tires on my car flat. It took me a week of hanging outside where she works before she would even talk to me. I shouldn’t have wasted my time because we split up about a month later. Such is life and romance, I guess.
So, let’s go back to the start. I went to sleep on the train despite myself. When I woke, there was a conductor lying in the aisle next to me with a huge black eye and what looked like a broken arm. I shook him to see if he was still out but he didn’t move. I had a graze on my knuckles and my right elbow felt jarred. I stepped over the conductor and got off the train. It was pulled into a station I didn’t recognise. I walked out of the station, hailed a cab and had him take me home.
I woke this morning feeling somewhat worse for wear. I hadn’t anything to drink the night before nor had I touched any drugs. But I still felt like a weight was dragging me down but I couldn’t figure out what it was.
The first thing I did after I got up was have a long hot shower, which usually does the trick of kick-starting my day. For some reason, this didn’t work this morning. So I decided to go up the street to a nearby café for my morning coffee. As it is just about every morning, I grabbed a newspaper on the way, signalled to Rocco, who owns the café, for my usual and took a seat outside.
I sat down, unfolded the newspaper and glanced at the headlines. There were the usual assortment of articles but this morning, one grab caught my attention. It said:
CITY RAIL CONDUCTOR IN CRITICAL CONDITION (see Page 7)
I turned to page 7 and started to read. Apparently, the conductor was checking a late night train after it had stopped at Campbelltown Station for the evening at about 1:30 am. A cleaner found the man a couple of hours later, badly beaten and in a coma. I shivered, despite it being a warm day.
Then a thought occurred to me. I pulled out my wallet and checked the credit card receipt I got from the cab driver the night before. In pickup address, the driver had scrawled ‘Campbelltown Stn’. The receipt time was recorded as 2:28 am. I didn’t want to believe I was capable of hurting anyone but I knew it was me. A massive wave of paranoia came over me. I furtively looked around to see whether anybody was looking at me but I was paranoid for no reason. Rocco walked out with my coffee and asked me how I was going today. For some reason, I felt like replying ‘straight to prison’, but I knew it would confuse him so I didn’t. I just shrugged and left it at that.
The whole sordid story ran through my head like a bad movie. I drank my coffee, left the bill and a tip on the table and started back home. As I neared my block of flats, I noticed a police car parked across from the main entrance. I ducked into the driveway of the block next to mine and went around the back, through the gardens and into the side entrance of my block. Maybe my paranoia was well-founded. I wondered if I’d find police waiting at my door. I called for the elevator and peeked through the lobby. The police car was gone.
By the time I’d gotten the door open to my flat, I was feeling really paranoid. I turned the radio on to one of the talk-back channels. The first thing I heard was a drawling voice saying, “Well, Graham, I would congratulate the person if I ever met him.” The announcer responded with a quip of his own. He then thanked the caller and went into a spiel about the state of public transport in New South Wales. He went on to say he didn’t advocate violence against individuals who represent an organisation, but in this instance, he could hardly blame ‘whoever’ had beaten up the conductor. As he said, “who hasn’t wanted to beat up a public servant at one time or another?” I smiled at the radio. I was feeling much better already.