Public Transportation

Of all the millions of things I miss about living in England, the National Rail Service and the Tube are probably in my top 5. Aside from the fact that you don't have to gas up your car to go every where, and it's better for the environment, so many fond memories are centered around particular London stations and stops.
(Sister, Mom and I at the train station in our village)
  • I remember the first time we went into London as a family (and I left my sister's purse that I had borrowed on the tube).
  • I can still clearly hear the lovely british woman coming over the speaker saying, "the next station is PIC-adilly CIR-cus, change her for the PIC-adilly line."
  • I miss getting a coffee or a Cornish Pasty in Marylebone station before hoping onto the Bakerloo line or while waiting for the next train back to Gerrards Cross.
  • I miss my parents always wanting to hold on to the rail cards for sister and I.
  • I miss walking out of Covent Garden station and seeing the narrower cobbled streets and some of my favorite shops.
(That's sister outside the station below.)
  • I remember our family of four trying to fanangle our luggage on the tube all the way to Waterloo station and then on to France.
  • I remember feeling so confident as I breezed through stations and changed lines like I'd been there my whole life while showing around visiting friends or my sweet boyfriend.

As I am considering a move in the not too distant future to a big city I am a excited that I may get to rekindle my love for public transportaion. Since I have finalized/decided/committed to nothing yet, I've just been been playing around with the metro website. I enter in where I could potentially be living and the addresses of all the places I've applied to work in order to calculate convenience and travel time. It's making these future plans more real and tangible in my head. Obviously though, planning for the future is making me nostalgic for the past...

Comments

  1. I'm going to have a little cry now : ) That line about the tix made me laugh!

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  2. When we lived in Germany I missed having a car especially when I would be running to the bus only to have it pull away. But after filling my car at $3.75 a gallon I suddenly miss the transportation convenience of Europe. But I must say I don't miss the Euro BO that lingered on the rails! Have a wonderful weekend.

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