FIRST RIDE ON A MIDNIGHT TRAIN – Bring your own blanket and chiropractor
Posted: Saturday, January 09, 2010
by John Brazell
Hear that lonesome whippoorwill,
He sounds too blue to fly.
The midnight train is whining low,
I'm so lonesome I could cry. Hank Williams
I packed my Christmas jammies - pretty green flannel with red Santas -- and hopped a Choo Choo Train (they no longer "choo") a few days before Christmas. It was a recurring dream I'd had since age five except then I was the engineer wearing the funny hat and pulling the steam whistle. I asked the Amtrak people but they wouldn't let me wear or pull anything that wasn't mine.
Though mostly a train tenderfoot, I had ridden commuter and excursion trains in a variety of places, some where they don't even speak Texan. I had never been in a "sleeper" room. In recent years my rail-roading has been mostly on the Austin Rescue Zoo Choo Choo with a grand kid, assuming you don't count railroading from politicians in the other sense of the word.
My longtime, loving companion, SB, ever the cosmopolitan, had previously "trained" overnight a long time ago which helped make for a hard sell on my part, "But we'll get a compartment and it's just for one night. I'll buy a can of primo organic sardines and saltines and a bottle of Tylenol PM. Besides with a coal-car load of presents for the grand kids -- except for hooking-up with Santa's sleigh -- we have no other choice."
After closing the deal I was as excited as any seven-year-old (of which I am one) at Christmas time.
A WORD OF CAUTION
Always pay attention to the descriptive suffix "ette" as in dinette, pirouette, layette and "roomette". "Ette" is a French word meaning "dainty" as in holding-your-pinkie-up-and-away-from-a-demitasse-cup kind of dainty. There were larger "Rooms" on the train but none available.
PRIVATE QUARTERS- COMFY COZZY SEATING
Our roomette on the Sleeper Coach was roughly the size of two phone booths should you be seasoned enough to remember public phones. If not, it was six and a half by three and a half feet, the amount of personal space in a dorm room shared by ten. Things didn't sound too bad when I made the reservation but I am spatially challenged. The "Ette" was equipped with picture windows, reading lights and comfortable seats for two fairly normal size people. Perfect for gawking and pointing in private at whatever appeared along the tracks. And there was plenty.
BEDDIE--BYE TIME
True to form we carried aboard the maximum amount allowed plus a fudge factor which is standard for our household. There were books, CW puzzles, iPods, camera, snacks, jackets, blanket, pillow, a Walgreen pharmacy and the kitchen sink. My laptop didn't make it, yielding space to another box of gluttonous pleasure and a pair of well worn gloves to make a snowman in St Louis . Surprisingly there was not enough space to set stuff as SB wasn't keen on my using her makeup for a footrest though I offered to throw my shoes out the window.
When the dainty room is made up for beddie-bye, the otherwise comfortable seats with picture windows and foldout table are turned into two torture pads, an upper and a lower. I stared with wonder as the busy but gracious attendant in two minutes or less pulled a few levers, pushed a few buttons and changed day into night.
This result was perfect for a good night's rest if you're a ten-year old gymnast, weigh eighty-pounds, can touch the back of your head with your feet and fall asleep on a rock. Turns out I had two feet touching my head that weren't mine. I assumed they were SB's in the middle of the night but never checked as at the time I didn't think it mattered. It is best not to force any body part that isn't accustomed to being pressed, pushed, stretched, pronated or generally moved where it hasn't been in a decade or two. Otherwise you may have to ride home on the baggage rack.
Immediately I was relegated to the upper pad which works like a slightly larger fold-out ironing board, I think. Once prostrate on the perch in the darkening room I had the eerie feeling of a full-body CAT scan, again. The contoured metallic ceiling of the train appeared but inches from my recently repaired and expensive nose. If I sat up too quickly my deviated septum would be more deviant-ly embedded in the ceiling.
For safety purposes straps were hooked to the ceiling with a net attached as though one could actually fall from the space. If you've reached the age of a few nightly trips to the bathroom the primary danger in exiting the upper pad in a sleep-deprived stupor is tangling in the net and hanging yourself, or something, or demolishing the person occupying downstairs.
MORE BEDDIE-BYE
On the return trip we didn't bother with the upper pad. We stretched out toe to head on the lower level, which is a few inches wider on a scant softer pad. Should you wish to evaluate the details of your partner's last pedicure, bunions, corns and toe-length symmetry, this presents a unique opportunity.
DINING IN STYLE
The dining car was a spacious and welcome respite from the cramped quarters of our Barbie Doll existence. The food wasn't gourmet, though a tasty salmon entree was served for dinner and Haagen-Dazs ice cream or cheesecake (or both) for dessert. It was roughly a thousand times better than anything served on a flying machine. The space was comfortable and the genial greeters and servers were straight off a Smiley Face sticker, thereby proving not a single one had been to Flight Attendant school. My guess is the entire Sunday School Class from Ebenezer Baptist Church at origination point worked there.
BO JANGLES
On the subject of "characters" and there were several, a dapper little guy whom I named Bo Jangles heads the list. Bo was the size and age of my favorite entertainer, Sammy Davis Jr. when Jr. departed and hence the moniker. He arrived at our arched dining table for three wearing a beige wool designer-cap (with nary a sprig of hair showing) and matching sweater, looking fine. Any GQ model would have been envious. Obviously his ensemble was not something in which he had slept.
I sat next to him wearing a day's growth of beard, an IED hair-explosion look and jeans I'd wallowed in all night. As we sipped our coffee, I noticed he had only two upper teeth, which worked as he didn't dribble a drop on his new sweater. We talked, me immediately, he warily at first.
He was a man about town, with at least two girlfriends, heading to Chicago his old hometown to see his kids. I asked about them. To which he replied, "I have five - three girls and two boys. No, no ... I have three boys and two girls ... hmm, I got ..." (scratching his head)
The scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, hash browns, gravy, grits, biscuits, juice and a smile arrived and I changed the subject. I had planned to ask where he bought his good looking duds as it clearly improves one's social life, but decided SB wouldn't let me wear them anyway. Maybe just combing my hair would help.
SIGHTS TO SEE
There's a lot to see "training" through the heartland from Austin to St Louis that you're not likely to notice from a plane or highway, some good, some not so good. But most all pretty interesting if you have a curiosity glandular condition like moi.
Dallas Cowboy stadium -- the eighth wonder of the world -- shot out of the ground like a mushroom cloud in Arlington , Texas, not far off the tracks. Glass buildings towered over us as we stretched our legs in our old home towns of Dallas and Ft. Worth . The now famous countrified "blue roofed" cafe in tiny Crawford where Prez Bush has coffee when he's in town -- and Cindy Sheehan had her fifteen minutes -- stands in stark contrast. A solitary figure fidgeting and struggling with Mother Nature's call caught our attention at a combination train and bus station in the mini-metropolis of Cleburne , Texas .
As we sat on the motionless Texas Eagle Superliner filled to capacity and glistening with drops from a cold misty rain, the sprightly little man appeared out of nowhere to stand and fumble on the train side of the station. My guess is he had just ridden in on a Greyhound, bus, that is. He had four sides of the small building in which to hide and conceal himself -- three with less visibility than the one he chose. With a hundred eyes squarely on him, he heeded nature's call, turned, faced the train and zipped up. SB gasped, and I whispered, "Things could have been a lot worse. At least he wasn't holding a plastic explosive."
Would I do anything different next time? Yeah, sure, I'd wear my pajamas to the train station.
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Top-level comments on this article: (2 total)Hi John,My wife and I took an Amtrak train trip from Ohio to Florida years ago and had the biggest "room" they offered. The trip took 32 hours and the trip was somewhere between a nightmare and unique. My wife called it a nightmare, I still call it unique. I have been a train lover ever since I was a kid. I grew up near trains and fell asleep to their sound every night and my kindly next door neighbor was a train engineer.Our room was cramped and dirty, the tracks so out of shape that one night I seriously thought I was on a runaway train. Food was outstanding, the people quite unique to say the least but I'd do it all again tomorrow. Thanks for the article...Steve, I didn't "save" my previous response to you and assume it feel into the black hole. Whatever, thanks for responding. As you I enjoyed the train ride though tiresome at times particulary at night. I wouldn't recommend it to the "fussy" or those void of humor. I suppose it comes from a lifelong exposure to watching old westerns, but it's still exciting just to watch the trains go by and remember the impact they had on creating this great country.Best to you and continued good writing.John
Absolutley loved this! "perfect for a good night's rest if you're a ten-year old gymnast, weigh eighty-pounds, can touch the back of your head with your feet and fall asleep on a rock", and "I noticed he had only two upper teeth, which worked as he didn't dribble a drop on his new sweater", had me crying. I love your sense of humour John. Keep 'em coming.Hi Brianna. And I absolutely love hearing from you! When you've reached my age, it's advisable to have a sense of humour and laugh at one's self. You know for darn sure somebody is laughing at you.Good writing to you and keep your outgoing bubbly style. I love it.John
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