Commuting is a necessary evil for me. This coming August, I will have bounced and rattled up and down the same piece of track for 30 years. There was a brief rebellious period of my youth when I abandoned the tracks to burn tarmac on a motorbike. That came to an end after a particularly cold winter when I realised that having my hands and knees regularly frozen into one position was probably not going to do me much good in later life.

Thankfully trains in recent years have become a tad more comfortable than when I first started commuting. I remember the seats being little more than fabric covered springs. This gave rise to an amusing phenomenon - on passing over points or a particularly badly laid section of track, everyone would bounce up and down in unison making the entire carriage look like a kind of manic fairground ride.

I was reminded of this comical scene a few years back when a station I was passing through was having the platforms refurbished. At the time there was a temporary surface of roughly laid concrete. The station was a large London terminus and little electric carts were used to ferry long lines of wheeled cages around the platforms. I was following one of these mini wagon trains when I noticed the last one was loaded with boxes of small furry balls. The uneven surface made the un-sprung cages vibrate as they travelled causing the balls to bounce in all directions at a frantic rate. The sight was strangely hypnotic and it was only when the vehicle came to a stop that I realised the balls were actually hamsters. It seems no matter what species of passenger you happen to be, you could be assured of an invigorating ride.

My home is about 15 miles to the east of London and am fortunate to travel on one of the more reliable lines into the city. Trains come along at about 10 minute intervals and being near the starting point I always get a seat, even if I need to travel  in the rush hour. My journey to work takes me on a short stretch of the underground and this has become a little more interesting of late. The terrorist bombing of a commuter train in Madrid has heightened my awareness of who is around me and I now have a little routine I go through each time I board a train.

I get on the carriage at one end and walk through to the other running an eye over the luggage racks and spaces under the seats as I go. Then I find a seat near enough to the connecting door to be able to move along the train if necessary. Don’t get me wrong, I am not worried, just cautious.

A bunch of opportunists recently started marketing an emergency bag to worried commuters containing items which (they claim) may be of help in a terrorist attack on the underground. The price is £30 but the contents are easily available from regular shops. I have been carrying my own version for some time it consists of a dust mask (the Chancery Lane derailment highlighted the amount of dust caused by an incident on the underground), a torch, bottled water and a small radio. Oh yes, and I also make sure I never get on a train whilst in need of the toilet!

Trains, I have decided can be a kind of technology trap. Like many other things in our modern lives, once engaged with them, we become totally dependent. Electricity is a case in point - it's not hard to imagine how we could survive without it - human societies got by perfectly well for many millennia before its discovery - but take it away again, now we have come to rely on it, and our lives would descend into total chaos.  A train journey gives you the freedom to travel quickly and conveniently. However, once committed to it your destiny is no longer in your own hands. Should something go wrong, there is no escape, you're trapped by the very technology that is supposed to free you.

Maybe it's time to think about going back to the motorbike, at least for the summer. No - wait a minute that might look a bit like a midlife crisis. On reflection I think I'll stick to the trains, it may not be so much fun but at least I'll still be able to bend my fingers when I get to 60.