The journey into the office

Here's the first of three vignettes, capturing my journey to the office (once a month) after shielding for a long period of time. They are sharing short insights into my physical and emotional journey. I hope you enjoy them and there is something to take away.

The preparation

First train journey into the office, in over two years. Well, it felt like I hadn’t stopped commuting. The day felt like the first day being back at school. The evening before, I ironed my dress and trousers ready for the morning. The day came round quick, I slept well and hard the evening before ‘the start of term’. I arose, early as usual. 5.45am to be exact. My usual morning routine, that I had set up with my cats wasn’t interrupted. I prepared their breakfast first; I must get my priorities right in the household [laughs]. Then I set about making a pot of coffee, and my bowl of cereal. I sat at the dining room table and drank the caffeine with eagerness and food with the morning steroid hunger I have and scanned my emails and the news on my phone. Then it was the daily am medication consumption. Next stop, the sofa for some junk TV before fully waking up.

The TV screen sluggishly came on, and I scrolled through the programmes I had taped – okay, I know we don’t record anymore on VHS cassette, but they are still recordings on the hard drive and can be described as being taped, can’t they? [laughs]. Ah ah! GP Behind Closed Doors was on last night, let’s watch that I thought. I pressed play. The time ticked away. Oh, I had better do my lateral flow test I reminded myself. This test was a weird one, it asked you to only stick swabs up your nose, they usually ask for swabs from the nose and throat – goodness I never thought something like testing for viruses would become part of a daily routine. Test completed, results all clear, no COVID so it’s okay for me to start to get ready for the commute into work.

I showered and dressed and packed my bag. My partner made me a pack lunch. Well, it was now ready to start the journey to the office. I live on the other side of London from the office and it can take 2 hours or longer, depending on traffic, transport delays etc. An hour and a half on public transport is a good journey. My partner drove me to the train station. I entered the station with apprehension. I had put on my mask and found my travel card and walked into the station slowly and stiffly; was my body going to cope with the physical element of walking between platforms and to the office from the tube station at the other end – well we were about to find out!

This is written in my voice and may not be grammatically correct.