September 7, 2024

A little piece I wrote in 2018 about the time I got to drive a train….and some thoughts on train travel. And I guess my mom.

November 11, 2018

My mother doesn’t fly. Never has, never will. She’s afraid of heights at every level: airplanes, bridges, ladders–doesn’t make a difference to her–they’re all the same, and she can’t do ‘em.

That doesn’t mean she hasn’t gotten around–well, she’s 92 now, so her getting around days are kind of removed but she’s managed to travel all over North America.

Because of her fear, when we were little, we used to take the train down to Florida to visit the grandparents, both sets. It took 2-1/2 days to get there from New York. I remember we would have these little roomettes, where the porters folded down the beds while we went to the dining car, and once the beds were down, the little porta-potty toilets were covered up, so we had to go down the hall to the public bathroom to pee in the night.

I remember waking up in the mornings and looking out the window from the upper bunk as the countryside rolled by, and I remember that I would go to the dining car famished and ready for a big breakfast of pancakes and bacon only to sit down and be completely unable to eat. It took us a few trips to figure out that I have a problem riding backwards, a motion sickness-type of thing; once I got turned around and faced where we were headed, I was fine. And those pancakes were soooo good.

I also remember that after those trips, my little self “chugged” for a few days after, the rhythm of the train settling into my body and making it feel as though the earth was moving the way it did underneath the train.

When I got bigger, I took to flying and so the train trips fell away. Until I moved to Canada.

My first year in Calgary, we still had the main east-west Via train running through the city (from Halifax, I guess, all the way to Vancouver). This was the year of Expo ‘86, so my mother took the train from New York to Montreal and then hopped on the cross-Canada special. She of course, indulged herself with a bedroom—the rail equivalent of flying business or first, I guess.

It was summer, really hot, and I remember that she was delayed on arrival because the tracks had separated near Medicine Hat from the heat. She stayed for a few days before we joined the train again at Banff and headed to the West Coast.

The ride through the mountains was incredible. We passed bighorn sheep and mountain goats on the side of the tracks, and we wound our way through the spiral tunnels in the Kicking Horse Pass in British Columbia (note: you can see the tunnels from the highway, so if you pass through that way, plan to take a break and watch–you’re bound to see something go through if you wait a little bit).

We traveled the inland desert near Kamloops in the dark and woke to the bustle of Vancouver the next morning. After a few days at Expo ’86, which was a good time, we headed over to Vancouver Island and all the way to Ucluelet–my first time on the real west coast of Canada, and hers for sure.

She came to visit a couple more times, taking Amtrak from New York to Shelby, Montana.  2-1/2 days on the train (with a stop and change of train in Chicago). I’d go to pick her up and once I drove her back to Shelby and another time we drove all the way to Chicago and she got to see Yellowstone and Mount Rushmore and Devil’s Tower and she bought me a jackalope for my birthday from Wall Drug in South Dakota.

On that first trip, I had to go back with her to New York (student visa and all) plus I got a summer radio job in New York, so I needed to go back anyway. We traveled together, in a large bedroom, across Canada and then down to New York from Montreal. I remember we got delayed coming down from upstate because someone had been hit and killed by a train (how does that happen?!) that had been going in the other direction and we were the first train to pass. It was the first time I’d seen a dead body, well, except for that guy on the bench at Saint Marks in New York…but I didn’t know he was dead at the time.

All to say, I haven’t been on an overnight train in awhile but almost would certainly consider it again. When you grow up on Long Island, you don’t see too many freight trains. In fact, you don’t see any at all. Which explains why the western half of the island is basically asphalt–everything is brought in on trucks.

The first time I saw a for-real freight train was in the middle of the night on some back road in Arizona, or maybe New Mexico. I was headed for the nearest Motel 6 (back when the name still had something to do with the price) and I got stuck at a level crossing. First time I’d ever seen more than 50 cars on a train.

I popped out of my rental car, lit up a smoke (yes, I did that then), and sat on the hood in the darkness, just watching the train whip by. Mesmerizing.

I’ve also ridden quite a few trains in Europe (so efficient!) and even did an overnight train from Inverness in Scotland to London, although it wasn’t quite the same as a slightly older grown up. I was stiff and cranky and barely slept. And they didn’t have pancakes.

My only other experiences with trains (well, besides subways which I’ve ridden all over the place) are– and I’m sure I’m not alone on this—on the Long Island Rail Road.

I got to thinking about this a year or so ago when I found a button in a box of keepsakes:

Dashing Dan. Anyone remember him? I found it in a box with some others from the time (“Nixon’s the One”—oh yes, he was,  and “Attica is All of Us”).  

I used to listen to the LIRR every night from my bedroom, and in summer when the windows were open to let the breeze in (and the occasional boy), I would first hear the whistle–from a distance initially, but then there was a level crossing a mile or two away, and that’s when I’d listen just a little harder, because I knew that would I would soon hear the clickety clack of the train on the tracks as it passed closer to my house. It was a comforting, regular sound in the middle of the night–much better than the creaks and groans of the house or the snoring of the monster under my bed.

There was an overpass about five minutes’ walk (or I guess a two minute bike ride) from my backyard (for those in the know, it’s not the “Virgil is Frog Boy” bridge, but the one right before/after), and sometimes we’d head out after dinner in time for the 7:00 PM train to come by, using that far away crossing horn as our warning. We’d run or bike ourselves over, getting there a few minutes early, and we’d scramble up the side of the bridge to lay pennies on the tracks. When the train came by, we’d stand underneath and scream (just ‘cuz) and wait for the pennies to shower down on us. As I got older, sometimes I’d walk the tracks from the station back to the bridge, as it was a much shorter distance to take the rail line from the station to my house than to follow the streets.

And all of this thinking about trains reminded me of the time I got to drive one.

When I was 19 or 20, a million years ago, I had a boyfriend in the city. I used to take the train into New York on Friday afternoon and spend the weekend there. Now, this was back in the day that most people commuted out to eastern Long Island on Fridays, rather than now, when it looks like no one ever leaves. But the train obviously had to go back, and very often I was the only one on board for many, many stops.

I got to know the conductors pretty well, and they were nice enough guys. So, one day I asked a regular conductor I knew whether I could see the engine from up front.

Much to my surprise, he said yes.

I recall leaving my bags (40 years ago, you could do that) and climbing into the locomotive car. It was greasy and grimy and smelled like hot oil; it was loud, and we had to turn sideways to get past the massive generators and diesel engines.

Once I got to the front, I could see everything. Having the windows to the front of the train must be like being the pilot on a plane –you can see all over. There were two high chairs on big lifts (sort of if you took a barstool and pumped it waaaay up).

When you’re driving the train, your feet stay on a pedal at the base of the chair, as there’s a built in dead man switch, in case you keel over. And tons of gauges and dials and the arm, or lever, that controls the speed.

Now, I am certain this would never happen now, but they let me drive the train. No kidding –from Speonk (yes, that’s a place) to Patchogue (yep, that’s also a place). Sliding the speed control lever, we trundled along at about 40 miles an hour or so. Believe it or not, I kept on track. (That’s a joke.)

I also got to blow the whistle too–a cord pulled down from the ceiling at designated spots on the route, and that’s when I learned about “here comes the bride”.

All those years of hearing the train, I guess I never really listened to it. Turns out the engineer always blows her/his whistle using the exact same rhythmic beats each time. It’s a universal thing (at least in North America): two medium blasts, followed by a quick one, and then a longer one. Think of the rhythm of “Here Comes the Bride”.

And now, a lifetime later, when I hear that tune, I get all teary because I think of trains… and, when I hear the train whistle sound with that cadence, I think of… well, getting to drive the train.