Thursday 30th April. I wouldn't normally do this. It's embarrassing. There are people around and I am wearing a rucksack. I do it quickly. In the name of journalism.
The same building (in the middle) from much further away. I am on the 2:15pm 19 Crescent from New York Penn Station to Charlottesville, Virginia. It's a six hour trip that takes in Philadelphia, Wilmington, Baltimore, and Washington DC.
60 seconds of New Jersey.
The railroad attracts the broken and derelict things in each town. Scrap metal piles up, like the rails are magnetized, held back by the fencing. A lot of old cars and trucks, stacked up. Long landscapes of discarded tires. Bizarre, abandoned industrial structures I can't explain. In Baltimore even the houses conform to this type with whole bombed-out streets within throwing distance of the train: windows boarded up, walls fallen away so you can see the insides, terraces crumbling at their ends.
A train on the way to DC has broken down and ours makes an extra stop to pick up the stranded passengers. A woman sits down next to me, breathing hard and shaking her head and answering phone calls. A little later I wake up and she seems to be feeling more relaxed. She wants to know about my trip. I try to explain. I say that in the UK we rely a lot on the statutory services when people get into trouble. The NHS is our safety net. In the USA people can't count on the state to the same degree. So when someone gets injured, communities in the US often have to come up with their own solutions. I tell her that's why I'm here, because the US has a diverse set of solutions to the same problem, and because many of those solutions have been developed by communities without direction from the state. I say that's what I've come to look at - the different solutions. It's an explanation I've used a few times now - on the plane, in the taxi in New York, now on the train. I can't tell if I came up with it before, when I was planning the trip, or if it's something that's appeared since I set out. It seems to sum it up well enough.
10:20pm. Arrive in Cville. My cousins Oliver (left) and James (right), and Lika the dog. I will be staying with them while I make my plans for the Virginia visits.
Under the sweater I am still wearing the Headway Dance Marathon t-shirt. Point made. I will wash it soon.
Glad you had a good time in the U.S
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