Things are transient: we are more permanent

When you are young you feel the built world around you is permanent and you are ephemeral.

If you are lucky you live long enough to realise that, while you go doggedly on, that world is in flux.

Take the two primary schools I attended in Hemel Hempstead.

I have found a photograph and a drawing of the old Boxmoor school and put them on this blog.

But I have never seen a photograph of Fields End, which was one of celebrated concrete-and-glass schools that Hertfordshire County Council built after the war.

And what does the photograph above, which I took today, have to do with all this?

Not so long ago this would have been dull to me too. It is a scene I see every working day: unremarkable modern rolling stock passing through my local station.

But things have changed.

East Midlands Trains has lost the franchise to operate the St Pancras main line, which means its livery will soon be a thing of the past. Suddenly this train looks interesting,and in 10 years' time it will be far more interesting.

And the track it is one will soon be a thing of the past too, alignment lost under an extended station car park.

At the start of June trains will be calling at the new platforms that are currently taking shape.