OTHER SIDE OF THE TRACKS

I don't often go to the end of the platform, but, well, you know, I did have a couple of hours to fill and so I found myself orbiting the entire station time and again. As I was waiting for the arrival of my own eventual train, as each twenty minutes passed, another batch of travellers would arrive, wait and leave. I began to run out of things of interest to look at and drifted further and further away from the busier areas of the platform rather than suffer those "odd" looks I would keep getting as I strolled past people for the third or fourth time.

Eventually, I reached the end of the platform and found a fence preventing any further progress and this rather poignant little sign which perhaps offered some hope in a sea of despair to the occasional troubled soul.

It stopped me short when I spotted it, with its implications of presumably fairly infrequent tragedy, hopelessness and utter despair, and I paused for a moment, considering the implications, and wondering about the wisdom of having the sign there at all, before drifting back to the waiting hordes hoping that they hadn't thought that I needed keeping an eye on just because I'd gone that far out beyond the norm...

I'm so stupid sometimes.

Because, whilst for a while I was wondering whether this was the best place for this notice to be, I was forgetting a whole host of other matters. After all, I unreasonably reasoned, there was a good quarter mile of platform behind me where someone so inclined could fling themselves in front of the next passing express if they so chose, (ruining the lives of the driver, the staff, and all of the other passengers and potential passengers in the process), and this particular point was so far away from the maddening crowd that I wondered whether someone in that particular frame of mind could or would even get that far.

Equally, given that I was standing on a platform, otherwise known as a "halt" or "designated stopping point", this is the one point where the trains are likely to be slowing down and, whilst I'm sure that in a straight fight between several tonnes of heavy engineering and one vulnerable human body, the train's going to suffer the least damage, so it didn't strike me as the most likely place for someone to choose to do the deed.

Later on (much later on, to be honest), I realised that I wasn't looking at the "bigger picture..."

At that point, it wasn't the railway that was likely to be the problem.

Looking beyond the fence there's a quick hop over it, followed by a short sprint and you would be at the huge viaduct which, I suddenly realised, offers a swift and very sheer vertical drop straight downwards to oblivion...

And that's what the little sign is for.

I'm amazed that it took me so long to realise this, and took off my metaphorical hat to those wise people at the Samaritans for trying to keep one step ahead of tragedy, even though I suspected that the thought must have been born out of bitter experiences.

So, if you are feeling so inclined, please stop, take a moment, and ring the number.

You know it makes sense...