to think solo train travel is not a big deal for most adults?

[traintaker]

My friend and I both attended a wedding that was some distance away in a location we haven’t been to before. Neither of us wanted to do a long drive so we booked train tickets. It was a five hour journey including two train changes. (We are both single, for context, hence planning this together).

We each booked our own tickets, but discussed which trains we’d get. The day before we went, I realised that I had some work that I needed to finish, so I text my friend saying that I would be catching a later train (I booked an anytime ticket) so I would see her at the hotel (we were travelling down the day before so no particular deadline).

She was really upset with me, because she didn’t want to do the journey alone. Not just because it wouldn’t be as much fun, but because she was scared to do it alone. She had bought tickets for a specific train so didn’t have the same flexibility as me, but nevertheless she actually bought new tickets, at great expense, so that she could travel with me at the new time, and now I feel awful and as though I was totally unreasonable for not checking with her first before changing my travel plans.

I have known this friend for 25 years and she has never said anything to me about being a nervous traveller, we have actually flown abroad together twice (as part of a bigger group) and have caught the train many times. She is not a particularly nervous person (or so I thought) and I am now questioning myself because the thought never even crossed my mind that going on a long train journey alone would be a big deal for an average adult with no disabilities or mental health problems. I am a very independent person by nature though, and I enjoy going to places by myself.

So this is just a reality check for me really. Was I unreasonable in assuming that she would be okay making this journey on her own?

YANBU-what an utter snowflake she is!
-And she was also U to buy fixed time tickets originally -I have a friend like this who is penny-pinching with tickets and causes huge inconvenience to other people she is so inflexible about timings.

Then you also wrote which you indicated their isn't. That's the whole point. Don't you get it people don't share their hidden disabilities if you read the full thread you can see why. Wet blankets, pathetic, snowflake etc

I'm split.

Train travel is absolutely not scary at all, and really easy to do alone!

That being said, I'd have been really pissed off if I thought I was going to have company for the long boring train ride and then you changed last minute.

Not go home early, not stay late due to previous plans. And yes, I would absolutely tell my boss that. My employers are reasonable though. Aren’t yours?

I thought this was going to be about an elderly parent who couldn't travel alone any more! Not a normal functional adult for whom solo train travel should be no big deal.

Exactly.
OP it was extremely rude of you to cancel at the last minute. Can you really not see that?

Also - you didn’t change out of flaking - it was work!

Hardly you being selfish.

I’m fine, thanks. I’ve just learned not to be a doormat for people who think ‘friendship’ goes one way.

Nice attempt to invalidate my feelings, though? I take it you are someone else who thinks a friend expecting you to care about their feelings is somehow weak? Interesting….

You're very factual, OP.

I think working on having more empathy in general would be helpful - your responses to people's posts show you're very open to that anyway, so that's great.

Ultimately, you're looking at the wedding event in isolation, whereas your friend is looking at the whole weekend as an experience.

Teaching things like this is part of what I do for work. It's a fascinating and really valuable topic.

I'm thick because I don't agree with you. I think people who can't open their mind to understand that not everyone is the same and that some people struggle with things others don't are actually a bit thick

YABU 100%.

Some people find train journeys really bewildering, hence she wanted to travel on the same train as you.

It was really unkind to cancel at the last minute.

It was five hours of hangout time!!! Train picnic? Cheeky mini wine? Pre wedding gossip update? Just enjoying your company in a chill way? It's like you've cancelled dinner or something AND left her with a boring five hours of staring out the window/possibly sitting next to a stranger with BO ans TWO train changes. Dick move on your part, sorry.

My response would be totally different if you'd said upfront you might have to work late and advised her to buy a Flexi ticket... But you didnt. If I'd done this to a friend I'd offer to pay for their new ticket TBH (and friends have actually done so for me).

I think your attitude to the whole thing is rather awful. You have communicated very poorly and that must have annoyed your friend the most. It might not have been the train journey as such but arriving in a new town/city by herself and then having to make her way to the hotel on her own.

I went on a spa break with a friend earlier this year. We were coming from different parts of the country and both needed to take two trains to get there, it so happened that I had two choices of places where I could change trains to get to our destination. And one of them was the same as my friend so this meant that for the second half of the journey we could be on the same train. So we both chose accordingly. Unfortunately on the day there was a train strike and her train got delayed. I still continued to the destination but waited in the waiting room there for her to arrive. She came 1.5hrs later. I could have gone to the hotel but I thought it would be better if we went together so I waited. It was a new town for her, I have been there once about 8 years ago. When she arrived she was very pleased I had waited as she was anxious about getting to the hotel on her own. So people can be anxious about all kinds of things. It would have been nice if you showed her some consideration rather than be so selfish.

You were unreasonable for changing plans.

I really don't understand the 'rude to cancel/change train' concept!

The purpose of the journey is to get from A to B for a specific event which both OP and friend are attending. They are both still able to do that, on different trains.

There's only a problem if you intend to use OP to meet your unspoken needs without OP's knowledge or consent. Which is manipulative, coercive, abusive behaviour.

If all the trains were cancelled, that would be 'rude' - of the train companies.

It was a five hour journey including two train changes. (We are both single, for context, hence planning this together). so you planned it together - so you could have each other's company for 5 hours. I think you've been incredibly rude and thoughtless to then go nah sorry you'll have to go on your own. Personally I think you should pay for her new ticket.

Yes this is it. The first part is academic, it doesn't matter if she's done the trans-Siberian solo, or needs a handhold for Thameslink. OP made a plan and cancelled without warning. Rude!

Take your purse and phone, leave the rest and go not long after you've left a station. If someone does steal something they can't get off the train with it til the next stop by which time you can alert the guard. Ask a nearby person to keep an eye on things ..the vast majority of people are perfectly decent and nice. There's no need to go without a drink. Or you know, take one with you.

It would be exactly the same

I’m constantly amazed by how difficult people find normal things in life. I had a friend recently tell me she wouldn’t get a taxi on her own as it would freak her out. I’m talking independent adults with jobs and mortgages and children etc. This sounds like one of those stories.

That being said I would have apologised as I would have thought she might have felt like the journey was part of the event, iyswim.

So I have a few friends who are very anxious about travel but not other aspects of their life. To you it's not a big deal but to her it is; there could be a number of reasons;

1. She wouldn't have bought a fixed ticket if she knew you might change the time
2. This isn't an emergency, if you had booked flights you would I suspect be catching the flight

3.For you it's a train journey for her it's time spent together catching up and perhaps she feels more strongly about your friendship I think it's not really about her being anxious travelling...

Absolutely, the fear of solo rail travel is irrelevant here