I’m London bound. It’s a four and a half hour train journey from Edinburgh to London filled with slow but free wifi, an abundance of free coffee, and if you’re lucky a table to yourself. I’m more than half way through the journey at the moment, and unfortunately I wasn’t so lucky on this trip to get some space to myself. I was sitting at a table of four people on this journey. I’d booked the window seat so that I was able to use the power adapter, and lose myself by staring out of the window at the passing scenery of I wanted to. However, because I didn’t have the table to myself, or more to the point, because I had someone sitting directly opposite me, it hasn’t been the most comfortable journey. There’s a finite amount of space to stretch your legs out under the table without completely encroaching on each persons space, and because of that you start to feel a little cramped after a while.

This is my first trip down to London this year, and the first time in about eight or nine months that I’ve had to head there for work. Though I have a few days of work to do in our London office, I always try to combine it with a few social events, and attempt to catch up with as many of my friends that live there now. I don’t always get to see as many people as I’d like because my time is limited, though I do on occasion try to stay with friends over the weekend and head back to Edinburgh on the Sunday, rather than the Friday. That’s not the case with this trip, and so it makes trying to meet friends over the next two evenings can become a little difficult.

I tend to enjoy these trips down to London these days. There was a very long period where I really didn’t want to have to make the trip. It was a long, annoying journey, I barely knew anyone except work colleagues, and it was an unwelcome expense for a few days. Those things have slowly changed over the years. Yes it’s still very expensive to go out for dinner, but that’s not as big a problem as it used to be. I have lots of friends down here now, including work colleagues, so it makes the social aspect a lot more fun. Especially since there are a lot of them that I only ever see when I make these trips. And the journey doesn’t bother me anywhere near as much as it used to. That could be because I used to fly down, and the hassle of dealing with the airport was just too much stress at that time in the morning. Now that I use the train, the total journey time is similar, but instead of rushing around everywhere I’m able to be more relaxed, and it also gives me the time to catch up on a things I normally wouldn’t have the time for.

It’s not all sunshine and rainbows. There still are issues with making this trip, but instead of focusing on them, I use my energy to focus on the positive aspects of it instead. It’s something I’m trying to do in more situations these days, and it seems to be working out well for me.