7/7

Since last posting I had a sobering experience. I was due to attend a meeting in Holborn, London last Thursday 7 July. I was booked on to the 07:18 from Preston, due to arrive at about 09:45. Fortunately, because of engineering works north of Preston the train was 25 minutes late leaving. Had it been on time I would probably been on Southampton Row at the same time the bomb on the bus exploded. As it happened the train was halted at Watford Junction andwe all had to make our way back North. Of course I was only on the very periphary of the incident, not even being in London, but it did make me stop and think about what might have been.

I have never been overly concerned at the prospect of being caught up in a terrorist attack like that. I don't mena that I think it would be a pleasant experience just that the possibility is remote. It has never been enough to put me off travelling anywhere. I was in New York three weeks after 9/11 having had the flight booked for months and it never occurred to me to not travel. So being relatively close (and having had the possibility of being even closer) was something new.

I can't imagine what it must have been like to be caught up in it all. How would I have reacted if I had been walking past the BMA at the very time of the detonation? I suspect that after the initial shock I would have had the selfish reaction of 'How will I get home today?'

It doesn't put me off travelling. I will continue to travel to London whenever I have to. I will not be put off making plans to go anywhere. this is not a bravado stand agains terrorists, showing them that our way of life will carry on regardless of what they throw at us; it's a lot more mundane than that. It's the way I have always been and I guess the way I always will be. Not necessarily unconcerned but not concerned enough to make me change.