SCABs

10 days – By @ellebellwood

By Elle Bellwood

 

10 days 

 

One of the scariest things coming into SCA, for me, was the commute. The Thameslink line that takes me into London is notoriously known for being rubbish. There are constant strikes, power failures and just lack of trains. I am fully prepared that some days I might be stranded either end due to cancellations. I always was scared that commuting would eat into my evenings, meaning it would be hard to go to the gym and socialise with my friends and family. 

However, I must say, so far I’ve been pretty impressed (it’s been four days aha). My overall commute door to door is around an hour and ten minutes, but it’s worth it. 

However, there are 306 days at SCA, so if my calculations are correct, that’s 220 hours (minimum) that I will be sitting on the train. That is the equivalent of 10 days. I’m spending 10 days of my life this year, sitting on a train. So what am I going to do with my time? How am I going to be productive? How will I utilise this time? 

I will use this time to process thoughts and take out some reflection, especially on the commute home. I will write SCABS. This will help get my brain in gear in the morning. I will people watch. There is some bizarre behaviour on the trains, someone on my current train is making noises I can’t comprehend. Read BBC news (maybe even have a look at the Daily Mail gossip section). Once we have some briefs, I’m sure I can do some work on the train. Listen to music (don’t tell Marc that it will probably be the Little Mix album). Catch up on the latest BBC or ITV drama. Close my eyes and have a little snooze. 

One thing I will try and not do is online shopping. It’s a bad habit. 

But in reflection, this made me think, what other things do we do that add up? That ends up being a significant amount of time in our lives. 

There are the typical ones, such as eating and sleeping. We sleep over half our lives away, and we all complain we want more. Weird when you think about it like that. I’ve just googled quickly how many hours do we eat, and it turns out we spend over three years of our lives, just chewing. That’s not preparing or cleaning up the food included. 

But how many hours have I binged watched Netflix? How many hours have I moaned? How many hours have I cried? The big one is, how many hours have I sat scrolling through my phone? I am always sickened when my phone pops up and breaks down my weekly screen time. 

SCA has taught me, in the short time I’ve been enrolled, that being present and positive is essential. It’s important for growth, development and creativity. The main thing I’ve taken away from my first week is to put the phone down, look up, ask questions and take it all in. 

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