She Likes Trains: The Engineer Who Saved The Day (1) This week, in the cold, among the switches and the bags, the cheeseburger and the diet Pepsi, it’s all about laughter, phone calls, teasing, my sweet glenn, the bag of tricks, and the engineer who saves the day! weet engineer, when that train whistle wails, when you make sweet music on the mainline rails, you don’t know how you rescue the conversation. All hail the hand on the switch! A cool, crisp evening, Wednesday December 21 finds me sitting here on the wall by the bridge to the south side of Paradise, the last northbound Amtrak for tonight stretches down the track. Earlier, as I walk near the track, returning from a visit to the ladies’ room at the steak house across the parking lot, the engineer blows that horn. Maybe it was for me? Maybe there was someone else standing too close, I do not know, I was further from the people, near the Fullerton station sign. Maybe I have an ego, because maybe it really wasn’t for me? Nonetheless, the cab car approaches and I walk a few feet to my left, not so close to the track this time. If it is me he is blowing that horn for, I am glad he adheres to his rule stating that the horn can be blown as a warning sign. I don’t mind, if he does this for me. He’s doing his job and even if I have walked here for two or three years I always want the engineer to do his or her job. I walk past the now open car doors and take my spot on the wall, ready to watch perhaps for a little longer. The regulars have left, I would have called a cab earlier but decided to make that much needed trip. Returning to the station I indulge my new avocation in a late night session. I rarely stay late, but do enjoy it; it is usually peaceful, most of the regulars and especially those who may want to cause trouble, have disappeared. Valerie doesn’t camp in her cage Steve has been arrested for some reason as of yet unknown to me. The weather is indeed cooler, the homeless have gone to the Salvation Army shelter or have found other refuges for their night accommodations. I work early in the morning, but tomorrow is my day off and so I now sit here, enjoying the comforting stillness. The train pulls away, leaving me to reflect on my day, or maybe my last week. Sitting here has always comforted me, but since last Wednesday when receiving Glenn’s message, and then today receiving another phone call from him, I am satiated, requited, content. I am making a niche for myself in the railroad community; perhaps I’ve always been good at finding my spot, but this one seems to take all my energy at home and away from home, day dreams, night planning, future plans, and might even line up with one of the things I’ve wanted to do since I was a child. But tonight, those things are at bay. The memory is of cleaning out the cat box today, not catching the bus quite yet, and receiving a phone call from Glenn. Perhaps this phone call is in response to a message I sent him. “Do you work Christmas? I work Christmas.” Maybe it is in response to the message I sent yesterday from track 1. I think it signals that the engineer is ok with me. The right one knows my name. Silence raps around me like a warm fleece blanket. It has been a good station day; it has been a good three visits this week, and so sit back and listen to my story. It is a good one. If it’s about catching the right engineers, it might also be about the engineer who saved the day, and the little bag of tricks. It’s about locomotives, teasing, trains, and learning the stories. It is definitely this week, about the engineer who saved the day. “Shelley!” Stock broker Bobby on train 609 calls my name. Yes, this is 609, not 608. We greet each other on the north side of the tracks today, definitely the right side of the tracks since in my world there is no wrong side of the tracks. Tuesday, December 20, a peaceful afternoon finds me coming straight from work, sitting on this healing side of the tracks, where I once met Glenn and wondered if it was really him up there since I couldn’t see his face. I stand here. “I hate that bell!” I clap my hands, wave, I really do hate the bell, it’s the new bell on the new cab car. “I know huh,” he agrees. He’s the one who likes the MPIs, but this is the cab car going to Los Angeles from Ocean Side where this train originates. In three hours he’ll run the locomotive back to ocean side. It’s a cushy job, except when it’s not. He runs two trains, one to and one back, and then gets to go home and be with his wife and kids. “What are you doing over here?” bobby doesn’t see me here often. “I like it here. It’s peaceful.” “Not so many people,” he says, waiting. Bobby is right about there not being too many people here. This is why I like this side of the tracks. The cars stream down Harbor, and though even strangely close, they seem pleasantly far away. 609 gets the high ball. “See you later!” “Bye,” I say, wave, resume my spot on the low brick pillar, really, you can’t call it a wall. Here is where I used to sit and wait for 607 in the morning, once to ride with it to Los Angeles, the other times to greet its engineer. Here another one raced a bicycle on the platform, that would be curt. Tonight, I sit here now, silence surrounds me like one of my furry warm blankets. I love blankets. I love sitting on this side of paradise. Locomotives don’t come on this side, well, they’re behind the train is what I really mean, it’s the cab cars, easier to communicate. The freights, the Irvine train brings its locomotive here, but usually it’s the cab cars that control the train. Now I sit here, thinking. It has been a long time, maybe six months, since I sat here. My social life takes me to the south side of paradise. The railfans sit on the north side, there are those who sit on the south side, but a fence runs between tracks 2 and 3 so it’s easier to see trains from the north side. I usually stay on the north side. Someday when I try to make contact with 708 again, I’ll spend more time on the south side. Carey tells me Danny runs that train, unless there is a railroad shuffle, but I haven’t been there for a long time. If he won’t talk to you, don’t go over there, Shirley says once but what does she know. It took me a month to get glenn to talk to me and look what happened. Two years later he calls me his friend. Time passes and soon another train appears. Train 689, says the conductor. Oh, this is 689, a train always late it seems or at least lately. I wave. I know that they see me, I don’t have to wonder anymore. Whether or not he/she is paying attention I do not know. There are some female engineers, none of them have talked to me. Suddenly, something strange happens. I stand there; are we here again? I don’t know who this one is; he, we’ll just say, he, doesn’t respond, maybe for a million reasons. It’s fine, really, but suddenly, I’m back to my pre vocal days, only a lot closer to the train than I was when I first used to wave to Glenn. Maybe the reason he wouldn’t talk to me was because I was so far back. Tonight, that’s not the reason, and I don’t call out to the engineer. Instead, I suddenly become very shy, almost like school girl, I turn to my bag and fiddle with it. Okay, guess I’ll have to find out who this one is. My curiosity is peaked. Wonder what will happen? I can, it seems, never get enough. Now, silence once again settles over the place between the Spaghetti Factory and Harbor Boulevard, I draw back into a place that has become as comforting as the north side of the tracks. My black phone rests in my hand, I open it to Glenn’s name. “Sitting here by track 1 at Full” I text with great care. The rails stretch out before me, the quiet hush of some conversation somewhere drifts on the cooling air. It is a pleasant December night, five days before Christmas and I’m so happy I’m not frantically shoving my way through lines at the mall, waiting for parking spots. Christmas my way is right here, all done, all ready, all attention on my trains and now my phone. I know Glenn won’t respond; it doesn’t matter. “Take care. Rest well my friend. I have two days off.” It really is peaceful here, and I remember when I wondered if he saw me, the night he said he wouldn’t call out to me if they were only going to be there a minute. Patience always produces the best fruit, I think. Sitting here, surrounded by what? Happiness? Maybe I’ve always been content. Years ago when curly proposed to me on the benches by track 3 while we waited to go to the ice house for our Easter service where I was the principal provider of music for the play, I never knew I’d be sitting here hailing the handlers of those locomotives. Here I am, and now as I put my phone back on the lanyard I get up and make my way to our next gathering point, the café where the evening group will come along, waiting for 4. Not me. I always ignore 4. Who knows, maybe 4’s engineer will be my next prince charming? Maybe. Maybe not. My next source of information? I’ve got lots of sources now but I’m always looking for more. I have my book of engineers. The most interesting thing to me about 4 at the moment is the P42s that keep showing up, the locomotives usually reserved for long distance trains, Dave tells me. Glenn ran 4. Carey probably ran 4. I know they ran the Starlight. Ulysses on 4 was the first engineer I talked to in 2009 when the train appeared on track 3. That was the day I told curt, Scooter Boy, I was christened. But generally we don’t visit those crews except the people who know the car attendants or some of the conductors. Guess I’m just a Metrolink girl. It was the death of a Metrolink engineer that got me here so it makes sense. No matter, Amtrak hires the crews for Metrolink now and many of the engineers have run Amtrak trains, so I guess I get the best of all three worlds in many of the Metrolink engineers: freights, Amtrak, and Metrolink. By the time they get to Metrolink they’ve been around the block a few times: the railroad block. Tonight, Tuesday, I enter the café, just as Bob and Janice arrive. I haven’t seen them for a few weeks. Taking my spot at the familiar table, Bob across from me, Janice buying lotto tickets, I wait for Anna to prepare a cheeseburger that must be seen to be believed. The cheeseburger, French fries, and diet Pepsis, my meal of choice. The railroad bag rests next to me, a bulky cookie tin I’ve gotten from work adding its weight to the other usual necessities, a blue jacket I’ve picked up from Valerie on Sunday night who needed a new home for it. It’s a warm thing, almost too warm, and it will do nicely. It fits, it’s in excellent condition and it was free. I don’t usually take things from the station faithful, but she knows me, I know her, and so now the jacket lends its weight to my bag. When I wear the blue jacket, the green sweater, hold my phone, and drink the diet Pepsi that rests there, the bag is much lighter. But for here and now it sits here in all its splendor, just waiting for me to pull out its treasures. Now, among the holiday songs we’ve heard again and again on this radio station, among the kids coming in to order cookies and candy, the people with red and black and gray or blue bags, sweaters and jackets in plain view, the conversation concerns Steve who has been arrested after having some confrontation with a large black woman at the bus dock, or Shirley’s absence from 784, her usual position as business car attendant. She’s always full of crew gossip, or who hit whom where, why this train was late, or family news. Apparently it’s the death of a cousin that keeps her away today, though this is somehow tangled up in a vacation somewhere. I’m not sure when she returns. Time, returns all of us whether crew or spectator to the trains. Their pull is inescapable. Missing Carey’s train because of the vastness of the cheeseburger I decide to visit the crew on 645, the Laguna train. “So you’re here to see bobby tonight!” teases Eddie the conductor making his way to track 3 to meet whatever train that is on track 3. I’m not sure why he does this, but I’ll find out I have a plan. My plan is to ride on that practically deserted train to mission Viejo and then return with it to Fullerton where it awaits its next departure time to ocean Side. Then I’ll get to talk to that conductor, maybe. And maybe I can meet its engineer. Besides, I have to see where that train boards. The siding here is very long, accommodating two trains, and so now I walk about three quarters of its length, exploring, refreshing my memory, but not making it quite as far to the fence where the locomotive rests. I do want to try and meet Bobby’s train. “Tell him I want my equipment back! You tell him Eddie said I need it!” I just laugh. “I already saw him,” I say, but that won’t stop me from seeing him again. A man and a woman stand huddled against the cold, clad in parkas, talking. “Are you taking the train?” Yes, he’s taking the train to Mission Viejo and he’s starving. Well, the train will leave, initially I think he’s catching 608, but, no, I remember later, he’s catching Eddie and Dave’s train. I pace the platform waiting for 608. It shows up right where I used to meet Glenn at the five car marker. It’s a short talk because I’ve had to run to meet it. So I don’t get to tell Bobby to give his equipment back. But I will and I’m sure Eddie will have a prompt reply. It’s an easy job, Dave Norris says about the Laguna train, but I don’t remember why they think it’s easy now. It’s a very lightly traveled train. I haven’t been on a train for a while, my last trip being my birthday trip in 2010. So I’ll take this trip, probably next week since I have five days off and I don’t have to get up on Friday to get to work. It just sounds like something fun to do and maybe its’ time to just hop on a train since my plans to get to San Bernardino and see my restaurant owner friend have been thwarted. And maybe I’ll do that, too. Maybe I’ll hop on the train one day and go out to see Libby, and then go and take the train to Mission Viejo for no better reason than to meet the crew. Besides I have to try out these new cars everybody hates! Glenn says no car manufacturer wants to make cars for Metrolink anymore. Maybe so, maybe not. But I haven’t tried the new cars so we’ll just use that as an excuse to do that. Why not! Sounds like fun! My whole railroad journey is just turning into fun: especially since I’ve caught the right engineer. Fun seems to be the theme this week beginning on Sunday afternoon when I leave early from work. I want to see the trains. I miss my engineers. I’m tired of locking myself away and typing. I’ll do it again but tonight I at least want to see the trains and figure out what’s new down here. I won’t see all my engineers but I’ll be near the trains. “Shelley, lend me $100 so I can go Christmas shopping!” It’s Mike, drunk Mike, Dave Norris says later on this week when Jonathan asks if he knows Mike on the Internet. It’s probably not that one but Mike says tonight anyway that he’s borrowed money from John, there are many, this one I’ve seen a few times, to buy beer, he says. Sure I’ll lend you $100,” I respond cheerfully, getting up and coming to his side of the patio, putting my magazine in my bag. “After I borrow it from someone else!” Now he sits and talks to John about a guy at Rose and Tustin at a railroad crossing who gets it; a train introduces itself politely to a car at sixty miles an hour. The friendly overture is fatal, of course, a middle-eastern man Allen says on Tuesday. I guess he knows about it. The last person that got hit by a train was a middle eastern man, they say. Maybe the trains don’t move so fast in the Middle East, I mean you can just drive out in front of a train? Not in my world! Dave tells me about a wreck where the engineer sees this guy trip and fall in front of the train. Apparently his girlfriend and another woman in the car on the other side of the tracks sees that one happen. I don’t remember why he was on the tracks. Some kind of short cut, but tonight, Sunday, the Rose and Tustin incident, is usual around these parts. I feel safer around trains than cars, I tell Dave later. “Even if the guy nods off he can’t run into you,” Dave says. “that’s exactly it!” I’m in full agreement. You really have to plan to get in the way of a train. I don’t’ know. People just don’t learn, do they? How many years have they known this? It is a lazy Sunday afternoon, as I come trackside from the bus docks after leaving work a little early, I notice Amtrak 587 pulling in, a freight passes after that, and Mike whines. “There haven’t been any freights since 1:00,” he whines, growing steadily more inebriated. “Sure there was! Right after 587,” I inform him. It comes on this Sunday afternoon around 3:00. There aren’t many freights that come by, in contrast to Tuesday when two freights pass simultaneously as I sit on the planter by the railroad tracks, waiting for Amtrak to leave. The two freights appear, one waits for the other, and here I sit in my blue jacket and green sweater, almost asleep; warmed by trains if not train talk. Sunday is a bit of a different story, the afternoon is quiet, leaving lots of room for conversation about cats. Mike has three cats, a six month old kitten, a thirty pound cat, and another cat. They’re all lovers, he says. Dusty weighs 30 pounds and is heavy when he sleeps on his feet. Abyssinia, the six-month-old is hyper. Robert shows up, walking rocky, the three month old new station mascot. Rocky is another black lab, he is a rescue dog, he doesn’t quite like trains, yet. Oh he’ll get used to them, Tom the schoolteacher, whose attitude about things is starting to bother me, says on Tuesday as Robert regales us with tales of his surgery. Apparently he had a plop on his vocal chord, he did have some trouble talking I remember, but now he talks fine! An ENT discovers the problem and the surgery is pleasant, why not? When a nurse or doctor or pharmacist treats you to a concoction of sedatives and pain killers life can get pretty pleasant, in a controlled environment of course. Apparently it’s pleasant. But tonight, Sunday, the conversation on the patio is about cats and how he has two cats and they have two litter boxes. Mike is having trouble with one of his cats, apparently, and I chime in, just observing it all. I had two litter boxes, I say. But now I only have one and everyone seems ok with it. I just keep it clean. Cleaning the cat box now will have pleasant memories, forever, since it is then that I receive the call from Glenn, sitting on his train as a second crew runs it to Taylor. “It doesn’t look very good,” he tells me as I hyperventilate. “We’re stopped.” “Where is Taylor from the station?” I know it’s not really called Taylor anymore. I haven’t been there so I don’t know where it is. I know It’s close to the station. “I’m geographically challenged,” I say, or something like that. “About two and a half miles,” he answers me. “What’s up?” he’s quiet, I can hear him, I’m not competing with his blue tooth. he asks his question as I wash cat stuff from under my short polished nails. Yes, my nails are red, again, I think I spend the money to manicure them so I won’t bite them. “Are you ready for Santa?” Glenn asked me that once before. “I’m ready,” I say. “We’re all done. Are you?” He buys a car for his grandson that he can walk around in, I’ve seen the toy before. I’m so excited Glenn calls, I reach for my phone, it’s hiding somewhere, and I miss the call. I pick up the phone and call back. It’s my comforting Glenn. I almost can’t remember the call I’m so excited. “You caught me cleaning the cat box,” I tell my number one engineer. Is he working Christmas? He’s working Christmas Eve, I think he’s not working Christmas, though the Antelope Valley line runs on Christmas. I’ll have to use it as an excuse to call him back. Well, we’re both working Christmas, I say. “Alright,” he sounds excited though he’s probably smiling. How does a man like that stay so friendly? He just does. I’m counting on it. When that phone rings today as my hands are in the cat box my heart pounds. I breathe in sharply, dropping everything and running to the sink to at least wash my hands so the phone won’t get dirty. Can I make it before it stops ringing? I don’t’ know why this guy does this to me. Is he really oblivious to all of my overexcitement? I don’t’ think he is. I think he just likes it. And if he is oblivious, more power to him. It’s the way I’m wired, really, there’s no harm, I’m not going to steel him from his wife. NO way! He says she lets him get away with answering railroad questions. “I had a very technical conversation with an engineer today,” I tell Dave Norris that night. I leave ten minutes after I hang up with Glenn. “Yeah?” His voice rises on a questioning note.
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