Dah-dah-ding! Please stand clear. Doors closing.

“Doors already closed more like,” I angrily grumble as I shove a hand into the pocket of my chequered skirt, the ticket inside crumpling. Why do I bother buying a ticket when all it does is make me miss the train? Now that is one thing mothers and aunties are very wrong about.

“Do the right thing Jessie and all good will come to you.”

“Yer don’t wanna end up in juvie do yer? Shake those naughties out of yer. Shake, shake, shake yer bootie”

A smile starts to form on my face. It’s fairly amusing because firstly, me missing the train today is blatant proof that mum is quite mistaken and secondly and most unfortunately, I lack any form of seating cushion in the rear end to shake.

Dah-dah-ding!

My strained back instantly stiffens at the automated female voice.

Train on Platform One to Circular Quay, now approaching. Please stand behind the yellow lines.

Thick streams of suited men and women quietly shuffle their feet, murmuring. My shoulders slump downwards as I realise that the impending rail craft was not destined for me. The voice, which was once comforting, now adopted a wily mocking tone, sneering at my tiny hunched figure. My eyes hungrily scour the empty space to my right. Far into the distance, a silver light shone. It slithered effortlessly like a snake as it quickly emerged to reveal a large metal face, followed by many appendages, all generic and just as metal as the face.

Dah-dah-ding! Please stand clear. Doors opening.

A blue sea of business workers drift steadily into the parting doors. Watching them, I am struck by the realisation that my bony backside is quite sore, so to ease the uneasiness, my feet pull me off the hard wooden seats. However, in standing up, the natural ebb of the tide draws my bag and I into the cramped up carriages heading towards the harbour. Struggling profusely to avoid being trampled in the guard’s compartment, my palms tightly catch hold of an aluminium bar that sprouted out from the grey linoleum floor to reach the grey ceiling. Even if I couldn’t see any, I could imagine swarming masses of green shrubbery whirring past from behind tall wire fences from outside the slithering snake. Large concrete slabs would be adorned with colourful artwork. I pictured inspiring pieces amid the trashy vandalism.

A round bolt digs itself bluntly into the heel of my leather soled shoes. I bustle my feet away and stare down at my clothes. A tie, a jumper, skirt and stockings. To the commuting hour, I am just an ordinary guest and here, on a train, I am packed like a greasy fish with other greasy (well-dressed) fish in a greasy tin, like school. At school, all my classes were starting to become grey like the grey floors, bolts and bars that enveloped me. Teachers, friends, recess and lunch were so similar each day that I often forgot when my weekends started and when they inevitably came to an abrupt end. All this led to quite an uneventful life and so, like a born-again monk, I decided to escape the gruelling routine of this lifestyle for just one day. I briskly passed the 705 this morning and instead of flashing my bus pass to the portly driver, I punched in numbers at the ticket machine at the train station.

Next stop, Central.

The pre-recorded voice sounded again. A thick murmur flooded the compartment like rains do through storm water drains. As most of the commuters leave off for a monotonous day in an office cubicle, I remain behind. Looking around, there are plenty of seats that offer their services to beings like me. I began to savour the luxury of freedom and quiet solitude as I placed myself comfortably on a seat opposite the railway map. My pale slender fingers started to repeatedly clasp and unclasp as I ran out of things to think about.

My blank stares darted from place to place until they settled on a brown, lanky man under the railway map. I hadn’t noticed him there before. Deep furrows travelled across his forehead down to his temples where they merged with the crow’s feet that radiated from the corners of his eyes. He looked about sixty. He lifted up his dark mottled hands to a mouth that was bounded by thick lines that came from the bottom of his nose.

*

“These lines, Jessie, are from many, many years of laughter,” my grandma had explained to me while pointing to the wrinkles near her eyes one day.

I always replied with an optimistic spark in my voice, “Really gran? Really? And what are these from?”

“This here,” she gestured to a little scar on her cheek. “Was from when I was trying to climb to the highest branch of a tree.”

“But you fell?”

She smiled, “Close, I slipped and scratched my face on a twig but I caught hold of a large branch and swung off that instead.”

“Do you like your wrinkles?”

She thought for a moment before answering, “They don’t look very good but to me, these lines are like a road map of my past, of things I’ve done and shouldn’t have done. It’s sort of like a photo album of my life, eventful or not, it all shows.”

*

I turned to the elderly man again and we exchanged grins.

Dah-dah-ding! Train on Platform One, now in Circular Quay. Please stand clear. Doors opening.

Taking the crinkled train ticket out of my blue plaid skirt, I read its destination out loud, “Kings Cross.”

Initially, I intended on boarding the train to Kings Cross from Campbelltown, just so I could go and see groups of eclectic individuals at ease in their strange environment, free of rules and structure. But luckily, in doing the right thing, as mum always tells me to, I missed that train. Besides, Kings Cross is hardly going to be very exciting at 10 am in the morning is it?

Kicking off my leather shoes, I pad lightly over the vibrant green grass in the Royal Botanic Gardens. The ocean’s waters hurl rhythmically against the concrete walls that edge the outskirts of the gardens. A wizened Bunya tree stands in solitude on a slight hill, spreading its shade to a diameter of about 7 metres. I walk up to it and run my now-pink palm across its deep-furrowed trunk.

Now there’s a tree that’s led an interesting life.