Trains

Seems every where we have traveled we have been followed by a train. I know it is not the same train, but you know what I mean :) As we went across the country to California it seemed we were always listening to a train at night. Sometimes just a subtle train whistle in the distance, or at point the trains were so close they shook the entire coach and the light from the engine lit up the motor home!

As we traveled along I-10 occasionally it seemed we were racing side by side a long winding train, which due to the fact of no trees in the desert, you could see the entire length of the train. I am always amazed how the engines are able to pull all that weight. It just seems like so much back there, tons and tons of freight!

We even stopped at the ghost town of Steins which was created and abandoned because of the railroad. Once a booming town selling distilled water to fuel the steam engines out in the middle of New Mexico it eventually was abandoned over night as the diesel engines were introduced.

Westward we went, seemingly following a railroad line the whole way. And then back on our eastward trek home we had the crawl up the famous Tehachapi Pass along side a train that seemed to be moving faster than we were. But once out of that valley we had level ground to traverse back to Florida.

Back at my hometown of Cincinnati during Christmas I even made Sharon go with me to see the huge train display they put up every year that my dad would take me to when I was young. I always loved model trains. My parents never had the space or the money to create a big setup like I wanted. I had a few small ones here and there. I loved building the little towns, complete with mountain passes, little trees, buildings, park benches and little people.

Even lately as we stayed out in Milton in the motor home for a bit, we heard the rumbling and whistle of a train every night. In our current house in downtown Pensacola we were lying in bed one night and Sharon said “Can you believe it, we are still hearing that damn train?”

It was then I realized the sound for me was soothing. I liked hearing the train. It reminds me of my childhood in Loveland, Ohio lying in bed at night listening for the train and imagining what far off places it is headed. I fantasized Where would it take me if I just hopped on it one day. New York? Washington DC? Montana? The Wild West?

I remember when I first realized they no longer had cabooses on them. I was so bummed out. Like something had been taken away from me without even asking me :) It just takes away the self-sufficient nature of the trains. That is another concept that I gravitate towards that is the subject of another story someday.

As many of you know we are having a baby boy sometime in late July. I plan on using him as an excuse to start up a huge model train collection. I wonder if I can instill the fascination of trains in him, or will it be inherited naturally? Either way, he is destined to have a trains running through his life as well I believe. Maybe it has to do with the traveling spirit in me, or I was supposed to be hobo with just a napsack on a stick, but I love trains and everything about them?