The commuter’s blues

I’m stopped right now on the hill just before the four short tunnels that will take us to Paekakariki on the tranzmetro 8pm train. It was a long day at work today with ultimately fantastic conversations at the meet-and-greet with the NZCER board after work, and I stayed longer than I thought I would (longer than the event was supposed to take). And then had to face the long trip home—the walk to the train station, the wait for the train (just missed the 7:30 and have the blisters on my feet to prove I tried to get it), and then the 40 minute train ride which will turn into nearly an hour by the time we wait for the goods train to make it through these 4 single-tracked tunnels.

And, I have to say, I don’t regret the commute at all. We’ve just pulled in the half light out of the sheltered green space in which we were waiting, and are now riding along the last bluff before the village, the jeweled lights of Muri scattered on the darkening hill behind me, the last remnants of the sunset past the South Island to the west, and Kapiti shrouded in grey mist to the north. I put my hand in my coat pocket to answer my cell phone and it comes out covered in sand. When I get off the train, I’ll slip off my sandals and walk up sandtrack—so quiet and still—and then walk home along the beach where the children and Michael will be waiting for me, probably chatting with the fishermen who tend to come out after dark.

This ride begins in beautiful Wellington. Tonight I walked along the harbour and watched Māori long canoes filled with men and women rhythmically rowing. Like crew only utterly different—oodles of people (20 in a boat?), sitting in pairs with short oars pushing in and out of the water in staccato strokes. In the distance, a container ship heaped with containers that don’t belong to me chugged out past the mountains and out to sea. I arrived at the train station breathless—to see the taillights of the 7:30 disappearing down the track. But I got on to the silent waiting 8pm train—two train cars long—and pulled out the laptop in the clear evening air. The train filled up slowly, with a wide variety of passengers—Maori and pakeha (this is a Maori word that means non-Maori—an interesting way to define the newer settlers), young and old, in suits and jeans. Finally, on with the conductors and the driver, and we were off. Past the rugby stadium, the shipyard with the stacks of containers (none of them mine). Then through two mountains in the lowpoint of the ride—dark, dank tunnels with horrible air. And then the stop-and-go trip up the coast. Past little green nooks with streams running past playgrounds. Past Porirua and the harbour there, with fishing boats chugging in the distance past black swans sticking their necks deep into blacky water. Between the hills and into green rolling farmland, sheep just visible in the twilight, only occasionally looking up with interest at the passing monster of a train. And then the first glimpses of ocean and the centring that comes from that, from seeing the familiar shapes and hills falling into the sea.

When I glanced at my watch at 7:15 in Wellington, I sighed for the long commute home, the time I wouldn’t have with the children, the late dinner that awaited me at the end of the journey. But watching the sea and then feeling the sand in my toes at the end of the journey somehow washes the time away. In Paekakariki, the commuter's blues come in shades from aqua to navy, from the sea and the sky. That’s not such a bad ride.