She Likes Trains: Post Fatality Syndrome “She talks to engineers!” someone says about me. “Wow!” the lady on the green bike exhales. Suddenly, thoughts of a fatality are replaced by a smile. Memory conjures up the first day after Glenn an drichard held the train in Los Angeles for me. I remember talking to the engineers on train number 4 and thinking that since I knew an engineer’s name I could go find him, especially now since I’d talked to these guys. Now here we are! Two years, one lantern, four switch keys, one lock, and three engineers later. Wonder where we’ll go next! A blustery day, pooring, whipping rain all greet railfans who dare to sit at the Fullerton train station on Friday February 18, 2011. I am not among them. It was my plan to be among them but I decided not to join the Fullerton Train Club tonight. The errand I needed to run and would put me right in the path of the station could wait indefinitely. Since I was tired and it was cold and I didn’t want to pay a cab fair or wait for a bus, I decided to sit at home and work on my computer, do housework and hang out with the kitties. A type of sinus mallody bugs me at the moment. Maybe I’m exhausted from that. Maybe it has just been a rough work week, though it goes rather quicly, and I need a day to just chil out and take care of business at home. Sometimes you can’t have a life outside if the one inside is out of order. I am not particularly troubled by a disorderly life, but it’s always nice to take stock and get things together. After the last months of financial trauma and emotional displacement an orderly life is nice as long as it will last. So tonight while rain steadily pounds our section of the country I am home, doing what my engineers always tell me I should do: stay home and dry. Tonight, My three men of the railroad are dry, they are back, and they are working, but hereI am, thinking of them, keeping track of a quiet train night despite the rain, and waiting for next week. I am happy to wait this one out. All my engineers are fine. Cary is back on his run. Glenn isn’t behind. Bobby is the one this week who asks the most personal questions, though they’re really not that personal. But it is Cary, the one who has time off after a fatality, who asks me the most surprising question, a question that I give him information about two weeks ago, the day that I think he is distracted. the rest of the week proceeds at its usual rhythm. Monday finds Dave Norris there, with show feet, he says, drug out, a little under the weather. It is an early night. I get to the station just after Cary’s train, 606, without Cary of course, pulls out of Fullerton. Bobby is the one who provides the little information I get about the fatality and in usual railroad engineer fashion, he pares everything down to the bare bones truth. “What happened on Friday?” I ask, approaching the idling MPI. Tonight I have made the bell, standing directly under his window as he pulls that train to its six car marker. “Some bastard got hit!” he announces, taking all the emotional implications out of the event on the Orange County line, much like Glenn did for Chatsworth when he simply referred to that accident as “a bad wreck out of Chatsworth.” Leve it to my engineers to be forthright, direct, straight forward, and informative. When they aren’t paring things down to the truth, they’re enlightening me. Tonight it’s time for straight truth. “Cary’s train?” “Yeah.” “Was he on it?” The MPI idles, the grill plating on the door faces me, the steel housing protecting my stock broker engineer with the two little girls, perhaps the youngest of all my conquests, stretches out along the rails. “He’s been off. Three days.” “Right,” I say. “I heard that 608 was holding at Anaheim. What happened after that?” “I didn’t work Friday,” he now confidently announces, perhaps smiling, “I missed all that.” Ah yes, engineer number 3 misses all the delays and long nights, the reports and investigations triggered by someone who just couldn’t take it anymore. They all leave Cary, who has been running trains thirty years, to handle it all by himself. I’ll have to ask Glenn about the procedures following a fatality. Like Glenn says earlier to me, or confirms, it is a long night for Cary. It is time to send bobby on his way. He rings the bell and waves. The Sfullerton Engineer Girl makes her way back to civilization, across the bridge, back to Dave and those who make the station their hangout for the evening. The crowd is light on this Monday and everyone, it seems, leaves early, even me. I’m not sure why I leave so early. I want to come down tonight, Monday, to see if Cary is on his train, but I miss it, because I go shopping, and so I show up, my hunger having been slaked by a burrito or sandwich, not sure which now, though Subway and Baja both get my business this week. I know I won’t be down Tuesday or Wednesday so I have to come on Monday, if only to check on my number 2 engineer. It is here, after bobby’s train leaves the station, that I learn that Dave did well at the railroad show, breaking even, he says. I can’t make it this year, the place where I got my first switch key, after planning for it, suddenly, I change my schedule and find myself working on Sunday. I will have to change that for august 7, the date of the next show. But for here and now, Dave has news: news that I know a little bit about. Kimberly, my friend who loves disneyland, has decided she is going to attend in my place. She shows up in the morning looking for someone called Nolan. No, I tel her later, his name is Noris and so after her shopping trip with her mom, she goes back to the place where the railroadiana show is and finds him. She likes what she finds there and she’s already decided she’s going with me in August. He remembers her, of course. I think it’s interesting that she comes to the place, she finds a coupon at the entrance and uses it to get her $2.00 off, and then she eats one of the harvy Girls goodies. They sell baked goods at the show. She lets me know that there is a meeting of the Harvy Girls on Saturday March 5, and so now we’ll be attending that meeting. Kimberly is the one who took me to the railroad model shop in passadena almost two years ago, and so now here she is, learning something new. She loves learning new things. I have recruited her into a rail journey of her own, I suppose. I guess I’m a natural recruiter. For tonight, Dave acknowledges that she spoke to him, and Kathy. I let him know that she took a look at my railroad lantern, my first railroad merchandise purchase. It is a signal lantern with a handle on top, a clear glass globe, one that runs on kerosene, one that I won’t be using of course. It dates, says Dave, probably from the 1930s. It comes from the CWRI, Chicago Western and Indiana, a railroad that operated from the Deerborne station. It is an unusual railroad. It is something I will need to investigate further, this small railroad. This is not to be confused with the Chicago and Northwestern, the one whose key was my first purchase from that collection. There is so much to learna bout railroads that sometimes I hardly know where to start. I guess I’ve started someone else on their own railroad journey. Two years ago a carelessly texting engineer started me on a journey to learning about the rails, and now, three engineers talk to me, answer questions, and countless others help me learn about the world of trains. In May of 2008 I decided not to complete my masters because I said I wanted to spend time writing what I wanted to write. Who knew on September 12 2008, one week after I moved into a two bedroom apartment and was settling in, that I would be thrust into a world to which I had only been introduced years earlier by another friend of mine while working withhim on things that had nothing to do with trains. Now perhaps I’ve launched someone else onto their own journey. Four switch keys, one lock, one lantern, and three engineers later, here we are. Dave leaves to go home and settle in with the cat. I decide it’s time to go and so I call a cab andmake my way to my next adventures: Knotts Chicken dinner restaurant on Tuesday, over time on Wednesday, and then back to trains on Thursday. Janice is here tonight. I sit and enjoy a double cheese burger, served by Wendy, as Janice talks about the funeral being planned for her best friend who passes away on Wednesday due to lung complications. A man comes in and says that here we all are and he knows where to go if he needs to know where to catch a train. He can ask the people in the Amtrak ticket office where to catch the train, but it’s always more fun, I suppose, to ask people who look like they’re interested in trains where to catch them. After two years on my part and 40 on Dave’s part, and everything in between, I suppose we all know just where to catch them, until they are switched on us and appear later on different tracks. Then, we’re all in the same boat: we all need to know where to get the train. But for here, for tonight, we look like we know where to catch them and it makes him happy. Soon it is time to make my way over to track 3 to meet 606, and see if Cary is back. Today, if he was off Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, he should be back, but that can change, of course, especially since he didn’t have to work on Saturday. Does Saturday count as One of his three days off? This question preoccupies me as I make my way over the 49 stairs to track 3, surprisingly emotional. I’m not as teary-eyed as I am when glenn departs for Lancaster, but I am emotional, this is the thing that got me into trains, a fatality, of sorts. Now perhaps one of my engineers has been involved in one. I am sure that all of them have, but this would be the first one that I am aware of. Finally an engineer who knows my name has to deal with the procedures of a fatality. Now I make my way over the bridge. “Shelley Alongi! I havent’ seen you in six months.” It is Rosalynd, the woman who, strangely enough, was present at my last conversation with Glenn on the day he finished his run on the 91 line. Here she is, while I am distracted with an engineer, saving me from myself…again. I tell her of my move, and then tell her I’m making my way to talk to the engineer after the fatality. She and her companion, Lilly, eating potato chips and waiting for the train, are unaware of the fatality. I am keenly aware of it. I dismiss myself and make my way to the marker. This time I am determined not only to keep a respectful distance, but to find my spot, successfully spot the train by using the bell: or maybe spotting is the engineer’s job. Lately it feelslike my job since I’ve missed the bell a few times. Tonight I will not miss the bell. I stand well behind the yellow line, playing my game with the bell as intensely as I do with glenn’s bell, careful to find my spot. It is the MPI, the strident bell, a bell that Cary likes. It’s a bell, he says, but I say no it’s not a bell. Give me the neumatic bell, now that’s a bell. Of course the steam era would probably say that the neumatic bell, the one whose clapper is powered by air, is not a bell. So I guess it depends on your perspective. Tonight I find the spot and here he is. I walk up to the train, wave, call his name. “Hi!” comes the familiar call. It is Cary! “Cary!” I put my hand out, touch the gril plating on the door. “I came to see you.” I am shameless in my admnission. I simply don’t care anymore; I only have two minutes He’s not going to give me his phone number; at least not yet. “Yeah,” he says. It’s the standard engineer response, I guess. “I came to make sure you are okay.” Of course if he’s sitting here he’s okay; he’s doing his job, but I just have to know; I have to see him. Is he replacing glenn? Oh, no; no one can replace glenn. “You’re back.” “It’s my second trip,” he says. “Wednesday was my first day back.” He’s answered amillion questions. Yes, it was he who was on the train Unlike glenn, he has not missed a fatality. I don’t know which one this is for him, but he didn’t miss it. “How have you been?” he asks. He doesn’t want to talk about it. I don’ blame him. I’ve had my questions answered. “Fine. Working hard.” Then he asks the question, the one that surprises me. “How do you like your new schedule?” I’m so surprised by his question I wave my hand across his window. “It’s awesome!” I remember telling him that I changed my schedule to work Sunday through Thursday. “yeah,” he says. He gets the high ball. He turns to the radio. I step ack and wave. “It’s good to see you,” I say. Again, I am shameless in my admission. I only have two minutes. I’m not going to hide my feelings; my relief, my happiness to see him. I’ve been talking to him for over a year. Next time I’ll have to ask him how long he’s been running 606. It seems like he’s been running it quite a while. I remember once not being sure I wanted to talk to him; now I’m more than happy to see him. My 608 train meet shows up. I’m always happy to see this one and tonight he asks me where I’ve been. I approach the train; I find the bell. “You have one of these!” I exclaim, touching the grilled plating on the door of the MPI. “All week,” he says. Suddenly I just stand there, not sure what to say. “Where have you been?” “Working,” I say. “How many days do you come down here?” “Two or three,” I say. Somehow it’s time to go. “See you next time,” he says. I’m not sure why I clam up. There are so many things I could ask him. I have the attention of three locomotive engineers; one makes me nervous when I call him, one remembers my schedule, and one asks me where I’ve been. Maybe for once I am speechless. I’ll have to ask him some questions. I don’t have a crush on any of my engineers, just my first one. Maybe it’s post fatality syndrome. Maybe I’m just so relieved that Cary is back that I don’t know what to say to Bobby. Who knows. Maybe it’s just all part of the plan. I make my way back, waving my third engineer into the sunset, on his way to Oceanside. The one who pares the fatality down to the straig truth, the one who was in it, and the one who has seven fatalities all ply their magic and so now I go back across the tracks and make magic of my own. I stay there late since I don’t have to get up on Friday morning. We talk about trains, tonight it’s about trains. Glenn and Kathy show up having attended the railroadiana show on Sunday and discuss a book he has purchased. A woman on a green bike comes along. Apparently she’s been here before. She’s waiting for 589 to come alongso she can go to Los Angeles. She has missed this train on one other occasion. Tonight she’s determined not to miss it. “It’s the fullerton train club,” she says cheerily. “She talks to engineers!” someone says about me. “Wow!” the lady on the green bike exhales. Suddenly, thoughts of a fatality are replaced with a smile. Memory conjures up the first day after Glenn an drichard held the train in Los Angeles for me. I remember talking to the engineers on train number 4 and thinking that since I knew an engineer’s name I could go find him, especially now since I’d talked to these guys. Now here we are! Two years, one lantern, four switch keys, one lock, and three engineers later. Wonder where we’ll go next!
Copyright © 2011 Shelley J Alongi |