Being there part 6
When I travel by train I like to make sure that I'm catching the train before the train I need to catch. If that is not possible then you drive. However there was one occasion when my car was in the garage for repairs and there was only one train I could get which would get me to court on time (I was travelling to Southport). It involved catching a train from Manchester Piccadilly, which itself meant that I had to get the Metro tram from Altrincham. Those travel every six minutes, with every other one going to Piccadilly. Since I could not afford to miss the train, I arrived in plenty of time so that even if I missed several trams I would still be at Piccadilly well before the train was due to leave.
Unfortunately the alternate Piccadilly trams did not arrive. After three no-shows I was starting to get a bit tight for time. Since the Piccadilly bound train had come into Altrincham station (trains as well as trams go from there) I decided to catch that. Unfortunately I did not know that the route taken had changed since the last time I travelled, when it was a quick and direct service to Piccadilly. Imagine my horror when after a few minutes the train turned off a branch line, away from the direct route to Manchester and in entirely different direction (to travel to Stockport first). By the time the train arrived in Stockport I realised there was little chance of my making it to Manchester in time to leave the train, find the platform, and catch the right train for Southport. If you've ever been late for or nearly late for an important exam you will have some idea of the sinking feeling that you get in your stomach when you think you're going to be late for court.
Stockport is a major station, and it occurred to me that there might be a different train going to Southport from there. At that moment I was sure that I heard an announcement for a Southport train. Was it an auditory form of hallucination, wishful thinking run riot, or was I about be extricated from this unhappy situation? Without more I was obviously reluctant to leave the train I was on. To do so, if there was no Southport train coming to Stockport, would be to reduce the little hope to no hope.
I asked a passing railway employee if he knew whether any trains went to Southport from here. He said he didn't know. (This of course was a long time ago: now you can tell the staff by their red jackets and not confuse them with off-duty drivers etc, and of course now there are screens which tell you which trains are going where and from which platform). Then I heard the announcement again. My only hope was to find that train and catch it. I left the train, clutching an enormously heavy bag which contained my case papers and various authorities I wanted to refer to. Asking a guard where the train was, he said he thought it was platform 3. That meant running down the stairs, along the underground corridor, and up the stairs again. It was a hot day and hard going running with a heavy bag, especially upstairs. Imagine my horror, when I reached the platform, to be told by the guard there that in fact the Southport train was on the adjacent platform to the one I'd just come from, so I had to retrace my run. The train had now arrived. There was no time to lose
This time it was a full on sprint. Very difficult with the bag. I once walked 8 miles following a mounted party (for reasons I will not bore you with, I was the only one without a horse) ascending from 11,000 to 14,000 feet, which is not so easy. (Before you ask, that was not in Stockport). Obviously that was more difficult for being so much longer, but on a shorter scale the sprint with the bag represented that type of difficulty. Having put on such a burst of speed I made it there as the passengers started to get on the train. Just at the last minute I stumbled. A confetti storm of case papers flew out of my bag and onto the floor.
I obviously got the papers back into the bag very quickly, but at the time it seemed to take an eternity. I had just retrieved the last piece as the last passenger got in. Jumping up I leaped aboard and the doors immediately closed behind me. I caught the train with about 1/10 of a second to spare. It got me to Southport on time. Thus I was not late, and in fact had a fairly comfortable win when I arrived at court. Fortunately I had had time to calm down on the train journey. Had you take my pulse or blood pressure at the moment I got on the Southport train, I suspect you would have been talking cardiac arrest level.