Conversations With Glenn: Sweet, Lucky Engineer “Thank you,” Glenn says, his kind voice surprised. I’m not sure what that means but it’s the first time he’s ever said that to me. I think I’m getting less nervous when talking to him. I think this year is going to be a good Glenn year. I know one thing. My engineer wasn’t on that train and I’m the happiest love sick, star struck railfan in the world. Phone Call To An Engineer One sentence from Glenn on Wednesday January 19 dries my tears, but he doesn’t know it. This is the second time he has unknowingly dried my tears. I tell you I’ve never responded to anyone like this; it must be age and menopause, emotional attachment, midlife crisis, or trains. We’ll blame the trains! It is true that I have cried today. I have tears in my eyes during my lunch hour. I sit by the fountain in the courtyard of the building next to ours, the pleasant day around me, not too many people here for some reason this day, the fountain gurgling in front of me, plants in their terracotta pots quietly surrounding the wooden slatted benches, a place some have called the Zen garden. Today it does bring a sense of tranquility. Perhaps it was designed for moments just like this. My emotional state is raw during the next couple of hours because glen’s train, 221, on Tuesday January 18, has hit someone on the tracks near Sylmar, , a nineteen year-old man, the Associated press says. This is going to give Glenn and his conductor whose name I do not know a long night. I get the message on my phone about 8:13 on Tuesday night, sitting at my computer about to look up a hymn called “Life is Like a Mountain Railway” because Diesel Dave’s cassette of Jimmy swag art music has reminded me of that song. I sit in stunned amazement. You know this happens, especially when one runs passenger trains, and finally, it has happened to an engineer that I know. I remember once talking to Glenn and him telling me that sometimes you don’t’ know you’ve hit anyone till you’ve gone over that part of the track. Visibility can sometimes be an issue. This is the reason of course for all the extra bells and whistles. Every self respecting rail fan and crewmember knows that; and hopefully people who are outside the train know it, too. By the time a person’s frame of mind is such that they want to step out in front of a train, they don’t care, it seems, for all the repercussions. I sit, holding off, I won’t text him, he’s having a long night, he has to do a drug test and paperwork. These thoughts go through my head as I continue to receive constant updates. Buses are leaving for Sylmar to transport passengers to Lancaster. A bus will make a straight run from Los Angeles to Lancaster to replace train 223 because it is blocked by the investigation that goes on around the area where the man has been found dead on the tracks. One bus makes all Metrolink stops from Los Angeles to Lancaster. One bus makes Metrolink stops from Sylmar to lancaster. Finally, unable to help myself though I know he won’t get it till tomorrow if he responds at all, I text him. “Glenn are you okay after the incident on 221? Please let me know. Good luck. Sorry.” My journey into all the endless possibilities continues. Maybe he has to drive home to Lancaster and how is he getting from Sylmar to Lancaster to get his car if he has to give a report? I sleep lightly on Tuesday night; I am distressed. I have to know if Glenn is okay. Wednesday is a quiet day at work. Thank God! I early release at 3:30, two hours before I’m off. A year ago when I stood back from Glenn’s locomotive, he told me to watch the early releases. I have taken his advice. I have figured out a system for early release that works for me and the company. I work as many hours as I want to, or can afford to work without losing too much pay, and then put in my request to early release. If I don’t’ work hours I won’t get paid time off so this is a happy medium, I think. Sometimes I am let go one hour or two hours before my shift end, and sometimes not at all. Today I am off two hours before the end of my shift. I put away my thermal, metal Starbucks mug with the sleeve around its bottom, make sure my desk is clear of papers or cords, clock out and head gratefully out the door. I’m not going to wait anymore for Glenn to respond. I can leave a voicemail or he can answer the phone. If he answers the phone I’ll know he has time off. if he answers the phone he won’t tell me to go away. He is a friendly man. He likes attention, just not too much, and he will tell me if he doesn’t have time to talk. I just have to know or at least try to make contact with him. Glenn is my number one engineer. He has the best job, he says. Tuesday night maybe his job isn’t the best. You can be the number one engineer with the best pay and the best priority job till an idiot steps in front of your train. And then you do the drug test, the paper work, and get three days off. By the time I get off work I am in a frenzy. I haven’t been this worked up about Glenn since March when Mo told me he asked her if I knew he was married. I guess this is my second bout of engineer drama. I’ve been asking myself lately if he minds me texting; he never says he does. Maybe he doesn’t read them? I don’t know. I think he does read them, he just doesn’t always respond and really that’s okay. I think he would say something if it was a problem, but as usual I always wonder and of course I try not to overwhelm him. I just get excited knowing someone who runs the train and who is friendly. I’m sure he has other people who contact him. I’m not the only one, but still I wonder. Glenn is in his own world, I’m in his train world. I just like Glenn. He is the best engineer. Now I make my way to the Baja California restaurant where I’ve decided I will eat before I go to the station. Lately this is my favorite spot for a bean and cheese burrito combo. I can get chips and really good salsa, rice, beans and a big glass of ice tea for under $5.00. Unless I use an ATM card, then it’s $5.20 or something. I have cash tonight so I will pay for the burrito combo in cash and enjoy it. It’s still early; there will be time to get to the station and see Cary and Bobby. Here is where I decide to call Glenn. His phone rings. I guess I’m so concerned that I forget to be stressed or maybe I’m just stressing about something else instead of whether or not he’ll talk to me. I wan to know if he’s okay. It’s my overwhelming priority. “Where are you going, maam?” someone asks. Glenn’s phone is ringing. “I’m on the phone,” I say and the person goes away. “Yeah!” Its Glenn! He sounds good. He doesn’t sound tired! He sounds like Glenn, gruff, kind, busy, definitely not sleeping today. “Glenn!” The speaking of this man’s name is a cry of desperation on my lips. “yeah!” I’ve wondered what I’m going to say. Glenn is home from work because his train hit a person on the tracks. I don’t’ quite know what to say. Today I’ve imagined this call. What will I say? Are you home? Are you in Lancaster? My first engineer hits a man in Sylmar and I’m devastated, again. Is he okay? I know he’s fine, physically. The AP report says no one was hurt on the outbound Metrolink train. I call my dad and tell him that Glenn’s train hit someone and it was in the Pacoima area near the Sylmar station. Are those two places related? Yes, he says, in the mountains is Sylmar. I knew this is the right train being talked about in the paper. There can’t be two accidents in one day in the same area with the Metrolink train can there? Maybe. But I doubt it. This is Glenn’s train. “Are you okay?” I ask shamelessly. I got him on the phone. I’m pacing the parking lot, feeling each piece of concrete under my feet, noticeable in the black shoes I wear, thin soled, silver buckles on the front, close toed shoes. The temperature is perfect, maybe seventy-five degrees, calm winds, it has been windy earlier but now it’s fine. “I’m fine,” says my number one engineer. He is fine. I don’t remember what I said? I think I just let it gush out, shameless. “York train last night? You weren’t on it? It wasn’t you?” “I’m on vacation!” says my sweet magical petulant engineer, my gentle Glenn, my teacher, my love on the rails, the right one. He’s on vacation! This man who wouldn’t take a vacation day after Thanksgiving in 2009 and who doesn’t miss work, a man I saw every day for six months when I could make his train and that was a good deal of the time back then, has finally on vacation. His vacation couldn’t have come at a better time! He wasn’t on that train! “What happened?” Relief suffuses my voice, I don’t care what he thinks anymore. He knows I have a crush on him and if he doesn’t he’s so sweetly not me that he’s perfect. He’s going about his own business not stressing about me. “where are you? Hawaii?” “I’m at home,” he says and it does sound echoy on the phone. It sounds like he’s moving something but I don’t know. “DO you know Harvey? He goes to Ocean Side. I took off to help him move.” Glenn is so far out of my world he’s still perfect. And he hasn’t’ been on that train! He didn’t have to remove his coat as the Brotherhood of Locomotive engineers paperwork discretely puts it and submit to a drug test. He doesn’t have to hope he has enough liquid in his system to provide a good urine sample so they see it’s not his fault. He doesn’t have to wait three hours in case he can’t provide the sample, he doesn’t have to wait through an investigation, answer questions, be delayed, get a ride home, and take three days off. At least he doesn’t have to take three days off for a fatality. “I haven’t met him yet,” I say in reference to my aquaintance with harvy. I know Bobby and Cary.” “Oh,” says my gentle engineer, low, quiet, confident. “They would have paid me for the rest of the week,” he says now in reference to the fatality. “I was better off taking vacation. What happened?” He wants to know what happened last night. “Train 221 hit someone in Sylmar. A man on the tracks! That’s what the AP said,” I tell the Antelope Valley line train 221’s seasoned engineer. “I was at home and I got the message on my phone from Twitter. Metrolink has a Twitter feed, I get train delays and such things. They sent a message saying what happened.” “What was the time line on the message?” my engineer asks. He’s curious. I think of the irony of this following conversation a little later. I’m the one who calls and asks questions, I’m the one who waited patiently to get a response from him, asked for his number, writes everything down he tells me. I finally meet a locomotive engineer, go talk to him on one of his trains, not from behind glass, he tells me how to run his Train, and tonight, he asks me what happened on his train. What a relationship! What a turn of events! I explain to him that I got the message at 8:13 but I don’t’ know what the delay is when getting the message from Metrolink and what time the train gets into the station so I don’t know what time the accident happened. “That makes sense,” says Glenn the engineer in his signal calling voice. The time line on the message I get makes sense to the forty year veteran of the railroad. “I don’t need any more of them,” now he says, talking about the fatality. “I’ve hit seven people; five suicides and two accidents. If it’s an accident I feel bad. If it’s a suicide I just get pissed off.” Ah my engineer in his sometimes brutal honesty. I don’t think I’ve ever met a man like this. He is just sometimes brutally honest and sometimes I’m not sure he knows how to respond to something. He is a sparkling jewel and he has missed fatality number 8. “This is the seconde time this has happened to me,” he says. “Once I was supposed to run 4 and I took off to go to a Rolling Stones concert. They hit someone out of Montclair.” “I guess when you run a train forty years the chances are pretty good you’re going to hit someone,” I say. “The odds are against you,” he says. “That delays train 223.” “Yeah they called buses from L.A. to Lancaster and….well I don’t have to tell you, you know the whole story.” I think I’m going to tell the Metrolink engineer who has been working on the commuter railroad for maybe eighteen years what happened last night? “Well it’s not fair to you guys.” The engineers would be a wreck if they thought about every suicide that happens in front of a train. I can’t blame Glenn for using the anger coping mechanism. “It’s not fair to you guys,” I say again. “It’s not fair to the family, the crews get a long night and the people who are commuting get home late.” “It costs them a lot of money,” he says. Number 4, the train to Chicago he was supposed to run so many years ago, was delayed for hours, he says. “It’s not your fault. It gives everyone a long night. Wonder what time that crew got home last night. I’m sure it was late.” “It was,” he says. “Well one of the trains was at Sylmar, train 223 maybe? I’m not sure what that was.” “Train 222 meets us at Cylmar,” he says. Train 222 goes from Lancaster to Los Angeles. Glenn knows his train meets, much like Rob Sanchez should have known his train meet on September 12 2008. “Oh that’s what it was,” I said. “Well I was thinking poor Glenn I’m so glad it wasn’t you!” I really don’t’ care if he hears all the drama in my voice, if he picks up on it. I’m just selfishly glad he wasn’t on that train. “I know it’s not fair to you guys but I’m just glad you weren’t on that train! I was thinking now Glenn has to do paperwork and a drug test.” Then he says something informative and sort of relieving at the same time. “We don’t do a drug test only if it’s between two trains.” “So if you hit a person, no drug test, if you hit a train there’s a drug test?” “yeah,” he says. I keep repeating back to him what he says because I think he’s on the speaker phone and his words are cut off sometimes so I have to repeat what he said to make sure I get it right. Of course I’m going to write it down so I have to get it right. About this time a call comes through and he says let him take it “real quick.” “It’s okay,” I say. “I can go.” “Okay,” he says. “Bye,” “Bye,” he responds. I’m satiated; I’m so happy it wasn’t Glenn on that train. I sit down and enjoy my meal. By the end of it I think of something. Glenn has missed three fatalities. I finish my meal and drink my ice tea and find my phone. “I’m so hapy Glenn wasn’t on that train” I say to my Facebook page. I pick up my backpack, my Disney bag with the mickey heads, dig for my wallet. Glenn’s phone is ringing. I’m going to call him and tell him about this because he just has to know, if he’s forgotten. Juanita, the waitress and cashier takes my money. “Hello.” It’s Glenn’s short, crisp response, the one I like, the one that sometimes makes me think he’s sleeping. “Glenn, it’s me,” I say, “I wanted to tel you something. I’m sorry.” I don’t know why I say I’m sorry. “That’s alright,” he says kindly, “what’s up!” Sometimes maybe it’s worth apologizing to Glenn to get him to talk like that; he sounds so kind, so forgiving. Wonder if he’s like that with Karen, or the dogs, or the birds, or just love sick star struck middle-aged adolescent railf ans. I don’t know but I’ll take it! He’s listening. I think sometimes I just get so caught up in talking to him and thinking about what’s going on that I worry for no reason. He just is in his own world; he’s really okay with it. Maybe Lilian is right. Maybe he does enjoy someone having a crush on him. I do get all excited about things; Lilian said once that rob was just intrigued with how the teenage railfans were intrigued with trains. Maybe it’sthe the same thing. I am intrigued with the trains and to talk to someone willing to talk to me about them is a feather in my cap, I think. Railfans know things, engineers run trains, they know what’s really going on. I’m sure there’s lots he’s not telling me, but for here, for now, he’s listening. “I wanted to tell you while I had half the chance,” I say. “You said you missed two fatalities, but you’ve missed a third one. The day that you left Riverside, the 91 line before you went to Lancaster, that following Monday I was standing on the platform trying to get the engineer’s attention and they pulled out of the station and they hit someone at State College. ON Friday I was distraught, he’s leaving,” I’m dramatic, “but on Monday I was really glad you weren’t on that train.” I think he’s smiling. I don’t’ know. “So it’s the third time you’ve missed a fatality,” I continue. “Knock on wood.” “I’ll remember that next time,” says my engineer, amused. “That’s what I wanted to tell you. I’ll let you go,” I say. “Enjoy your evening,” he says. “You, too,” i gush. “You take care.” The thing that I remember is that when I hung up the first time, I didn’t tell him to enjoy his vacation. “Enjoy your vacation,” I say, “you take care.” And then I sound demanding. “You turn off that alarm!” He used to tell me out of his cab window that he was going to turn off his alarm on the weekends. “Thank you,” he says, his kind voice surprised. I’m not sure what that means but it’s the first time he’s ever said that to me. I think I’m getting less nervous when talking to him. I think this year is going to be a good Glenn year. I know one thing. My engineer wasn’t on that train and I’m the happiest love sick, star struck railfan in the world.
Copyright © 2011 Shelley J Alongi |