Day 48 – Mysterious strangers in motion calming down the commotion and one hell of a Valentines day gift
Today’s dress was brought for me not by a mysterious stranger but by one of my most generous friends, she is like father christmas but all through the year and is always the first to put her hand in her wallet and the last to complain about parting with cash for the sake of treating friends to a coffee, a bottle of wine, baby clothes or in this case a pretty dress to keep the project alive.
We once had an argument back when I was ten-years-old, I can’t remember exactly what she said, it usually comes to me after a couple of glasses of wine but this being the first day of lent I am stone cold sober and all I remember is that I think she may have insulted my cardigan which was white and knitted and I cried. Anyway back then I was well-known for my mood swings and my darling sisters coined the wonderful and truly inventive song to compliment my sudden sulks which was; “see-saw, mardjeri-door, Ellie’s gone off in a mardi.” Kids can be so cruel.
Anyway thanks to my ability to sulk and us being placed on different buses and in different half of the year at school it wasn’t until upper sixth when we were learning, mainly how to drink, that we crossed paths again. She had a bit of a thing for one of my friends and as she was a lot of fun and her friends clearly lacked the staying power and general hilarity factor of my circle we adopted her and since then she has been one of my best friends and my closest, in proximity (she lives just down the road) and “emotionally”, Harborian friend.
Today has been a bit of an odd one, most of the time I have felt great, really happy and quite positive but I have also been rather frantic at times. 
I am getting a little tired of going up and down the country and am feeling torn between my two homes and missing the security of waking up in the morning and knowing whether I am beside my darling boy or at home in a single bed reaching out for a warm body which isn’t there. 
Also the side effects have started once more due to the increase in medication and it is truly one of the worst so far, nausea. On the train I am constantly holding my stomach trying to settle it and ignore the hot and cold flushes which keep coming over me.
Arriving at the train station all a flutter I find the ticket machine has failed me once again and knowing I can get a ticket on the train with my railcard if this is the case I board without really thinking. It is not until I get to Sheffield that I realise I have not got my railcard or my ticket with me and that my debit card is still up in Manchester. It is rubbish because I start to go red and realise I am going to have to face the full wrath of the train manager. After speaking to my Mum and telling her what is going on she tells me not to worry as the peak district is very pretty so I can take the opportunity to be at one with nature, thankfully I go through a tunnel at this point so am spared any more positive prattle. 
The train manager turns out to be a darling, extremely understanding and issues me with a not paid slip and refuses to take my laptop as a down payment. I have just started to settle down and am in the middle of finishing the final few paragraphs of my carefully constructed feature on the state of the railway network when I am accosted by the mysterious stranger. She asks me whether I know the lady who was sitting next to me in what is it must be said a rather urgent aggressive tone. I tell her I have no idea who the lady is but she persists in questioning me and just when I am about to start crying for fear I have become involved in a low-budget crime movie I remember the lady in question had been speaking to the man opposite us and like a traitor I point at him and cry, “He knows her.” The heat is instantly taken off of me, it turns out she is a ticket dodger and that the mysterious stranger is just trying to protect the kindly train manger who has a good heart.
The mysterious stranger later checks to see if I have survived the difficult ordeal and after I jokingly mention that the two of us should receive citizens award for policing the railway she mutters something about well I was ready to pull it out. Good god I think, I am fraternising with a bloody terrorist. Luckily it turns out she is in-fact a copper not as I had thought just another nosy sod like myself. 
I must admit it really reassured me to know there are people on the trains looking out for us. Though I am pretty sure she was just in transit herself and was not necessarily an undercover transport cop, I was impressed that this lady had gone above and beyond her duty to protect a lovely lady who was being taken advantage of.
The dress I am wearing today is from Next and I must say due to the nausea and the ridiculous cleavage and tummy room it gives one I am not surprised when during the Midlake gig when I have to run to le loo at one point to be sick people are happy to let me back through afterwards assuming I must be as the boy so joyfully puts it, up the duff. Later on the bus home from the gig the nausea comes on once again and in spite of having drunk nothing but delicious Mancunian water I have to sit with my head in my hands with the window open. I am upset because a girl in front of me watches me judgementaly and mutters loudly enough so I can hear to her boyfriend about girls who can’t handle their alcohol. I’m more upset for her than anything as I often find that women who lack confidence in themselves are more likely to turn on other girls and unfortunately I think it hadn’t helped that her boyfriends rattish eyes were drawn to my cleavage. I try not to care and for once I manage to hold my tongue, but I am disappointed in this fellow member of my fair sex and feel sorry for my cleavage which really wasn’t doing any harm to anyone.
