I am sitting on the train, doom scrolling.
In the US a slavery exhibit is being removed from an historic site in Philadelphia. This is to please Donald Trump who thinks remembering slavery is ‘anti-American’.
As the train rattles towards Leeds, I remember how slave trader Edward Colston was dunked in Bristol docks during an anti-racism protest in 2020. The toppling of his statue was seen at the time by right-leaning historians as a disgraceful rewriting of history.
And now an extremely right-wing, autocratic US president is removing reminders of slavery from US history. One irony in this is that Trump would surely have been a slave owner had he been around back then.
Thinking about all this is depressing. As is doom scrolling the latest slipperiness from his British acolyte, Nigel Farage. A man who lies and shouts and evades and blusters. All so that he can dodge whatever question is sent his way and in so doing fool enough idiots into casting a vote for his party.
A man whose every political sin or omission is forgiven or ignored by the media (financial ‘irregularities’, past or present racism, spending half his time in the US toadying to Big Oil).
Not him again, you may well say. Not that shameless man again. Not that indefatigable stirrer of shit.
You may well have a point.
I stop to consider what is going on in this train. A toddler in the seat ahead leans to kiss the window. She looks round at me, then turns away. That window is clearly more interesting than an old man in a cap.
Normally the train goes straight to Halifax but today you have to change at Leeds. A longer trip but I have done too much driving lately.
At Leeds station the train to Chester is leaving soon, stopping at Halifax. Boarding with a minute to spare, I sit at one of those tables for four people.
A woman diagonally over the way is having one of those phone conversations better suited to somewhere less public. She is discussing, it gradually transpires, her divorce. She shares various details about the man she wants rid of, his unkindness, the things he has done or said. She mentions mental health problems she has had in the past.
Matter of fact and unself-pitying, she even laughs at times. But still, it’s not a phone call I’d conduct in public, on a train, across from an old man with listening ears under his cap.
As the train pulls into Halifax, I stand to leave and she continues discussing her divorce. I miss the rest of her story. Often I sit with headphones on, doom scrolling. Leaving your ears open has advantages, and disadvantages. Doom scrolling mostly just has disadvantages; if you stop doing it, nothing in the world changes but your mood does lift a little.
I am in Halifax to interview a potter in his studio. We chat surrounded by drying pots and mugs, like something off The Great Pottery Throw Down.
Later I am back on the slow train. I glance at my phone. Trump has said that Nato allies did not properly fight alongside the US in Afghanistan, where as in fact 457 of our troops died. This statement from Trump is so outrageously wrong even Keir Starmer is getting cross.
I put down my phone. Behind me a young woman is listening to music on her phone without headphones. How generous of her to share. I put on my headphones to listen to the new album from the American singer-songwriter Lucinda Williams, who had a stroke five years ago but has made a significant recovery. She is sounding good. She is also sounding mightily angry about the US.
The man in front has something up on his laptop. He is using headphones, so that’s a mercy. After a while I realise he is watching Agatha Christie’s Seven Dials, a new Netflix drama. We are going to give that a try. But not tonight because it is the final of The Traitors on BBC1. Once snotty about that sort of thing, I have enjoyed this series.
Don’t tell anyone or whatever credibility I have left will be gone.
