Reflections While Waiting for the Train

Well, to be fair these are not my reflections. Today was going fine; I was making progress on a translation project at work. Just as I was about to shut down and head home, I received two requests for help that in all of my overblown pride seemed to be "asking too much". After blowing off some steam to some colleagues (I can be a girl-doggie in two languages!) I rushed out to catch the train home, settled in my seat appreciating the isolation and time for thinking this mode of transport affords. All of that to introduce a translation of a cool little essay written by Will last week in French class. He got a good grade and the teacher read it out loud to the class. (He posted it in French on his Facebook wall)

It is possible that the train is the thing that brings together and concentrates in the least amount of space, yet the most intensely, all of the great diversity of the entire earth. That is why sometimes in order to understand many things it is enough to go sit in a train station.

A train heading to Malesherbes stops at the Evry-Courcouronnes station. It is one of those trains with two levels with more seats, which remains, however, insufferably full for the reserved French. The doors open. The people waiting on the quai step back to let flow the mass that exists the train. Someone tries to graciously get off with his bike and heads to the exit. Those in a rush make a little jump while leaving the train. Some business men pass by, with their ridiculous "bluetooths"; not far behind files out some gypsies who are surely begging. A man helps a lady who pushes a stroller with her baby inside, before getting in the machine himself. One woman is wearing a Muslim veil, another wears a traditionally African colored dress. Some British tourists already are getting out their map and looking around them. Two teenagers with those faux-hawks, that they themselves will find ridiculous in a few years, listen intensely to their music on a cell phone (that ruins the sound, for those of you that don't know that).

And there are so many so many other people to notice, each having their own destinations, their own thoughts, their own lives. It is very impressive, when you think about it. But there is something else going on, which is very sad; rare are those who don't have this fixed stare, empty and without emotion. For fear of those surrounding them, they act as if they see no one. Only people surrounded by friends and those who are not constrained by society seem to be at ease and comfortable. The whole earth is assembled in one place and we are too frightened by what others think to be ourselves, and to speak to others "ourselves". We prefer to rush on to return to the world that is familiar, yet is very restrained toward the real world.