highI wish the flight were over not so much because I am nervous but partially that but also because there is something absolutely dull about flying and it is a boredom that train travel even though it takes much much longer manages to avoid. honestly I do not see why more people don't take the train except of course that the trains are falling apart and are always late but if we spent as much money on them as we do on air transportation they could both be more appealing and dictate their own schedules. I mean hardly anyone you speak to enjoys flying but rather endures it as an unpleasant transition between destinations whereas on the train getting there hardly matters at all because the time in between is blessed we who ride know this and if that is not the whole point of traveling I do not understand the average Westerner's attitude towards travel.
this is of course entirely possible. but for instance I feel no particular desire to pull out my computer on the plane in order to write. there is nothing in flying that seems particularly inspiring although I suspect this could be ameliorated if people weren't sitting in each other's laps for the whole ordeal but of course if they gave us space they'd lose even more money. the train however begs for narration. it is perhaps old fashioned in this way although far be it from me to be some sort of romantic about narration it is not as though narration itself is dwindling but there does seem to be some disinclination to sit still (while moving, of course) and take down what goes by.
but I'm not going to go the way of easy cultural criticism and say this is some modern disease because it probably is not particularly modern and it might not even be a disease quite the opposite it might be the most advantageous of adaptations. business after all has been an ideal for some time. business. being busy. and there is of course nothing transcendent of all this busyness in sitting still while moving and taking everything down in fact it is its own busyness and no less a compulsion than running down the street yelling into your cellphone to sell sell or buy buy or whatever it is that you people yell.
that said trains are still better and more of you should try them. be patient with them though; they are neglected ugly stepchildren in the overall scheme of transportation funding.
