Worcester Shrub Hill – Reading
Glen Wilson
In all my extensive years as a slave to the rails I can safely say I have never been on a more Middle Class train than this. I’m travelling from Worcester to Reading on the Cotswold and Malverns Line or as it may as well be renamed, The Pimms and Picnic Line.
On most of the trains I travel on pulling out a copy of The Guardian just increases your chances of being given a wedgey or having an empty Stella can bounce off your head as you roll through Rotherham Central. On this train I instead look like someone who has made a desperate attempt to join in and be accepted, like a child on the outskirts of Baghdad waving a hastily fashion Stars and Stripes at a passing US convoy. From my seat I can see four other people reading a copy, and from my seat I can only really see four other people.
As the train heads on towards Oxford it’s passengers become increasingly middle class with each station. As the doors open at each station you here a very educated “Goodbye, and thanks for everything” before the same inevitable couple announce their presence with a loud discussion down the aisle; a large ruddy-faced man with an inexplicably attractive wife or girlfriend. The ultimate Middle Class box-ticker alighted at Moreton-in Marsh, his only luggage a tuxedo in a protective hanger and a hemp wine carrier with several bottles of red wine. When I booked this train ticket I had no idea I would be spending my Saturday morning trapped in a Richard Curtis film.
Although its matchday there is not a single replica football shirt to be seen, instead its rugger jerseys all the way and most of them the non-team-specific unnecessarily expensive variety. At Charlbury a couple with a baby get on and take the seat behind me and not only does the wife decide to read a story for their child, but her husband then interjects to offer very well spoken voices for the characters in the story. Quite frankly I was one more bout of “All aboard for Pentwhistle” “cried the driver and away they went” away from being placed on an NSPCC register. Even the train announcements have an air of stiff upper lip, tally-ho, what what, about them; “We apologise for the delay, this was due to a reported problem with the train, but we are pushing on now”. If I ever travel on this line again I will be requesting to travel in steerage. I was delighted to be able to get off at Reading, it had all been frankly too Chino-heavy an experience for my Northern sensibilities.
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