Metrolink708: Engineer Drama (1) Glen, my first and foremost locomotive engineer, my romance with the railroad, my really cool friend who likes everybody, if you are reading this, know that this essay is about you and the truth must be told at all costs. I’ll shout it from the housetops if I have to, you really are the best. “That’s why she married me,” he says. “I have a unique situation in that my wife lets me get away with answering railroad questions and being the nice guy that I am.” A voice drifts to me over the phone, a female medium range, not high, not middle, not piercing, only present. “Is that her talking?” “She’s making up other excuses,” answers the railroad engineer who started his engine service in 1970 and now sits, stands, lies, whatever he does, in an echoy room in a house somewhere out in California’s desert country. Egotistical? Maybe. There may be some grain of truth in that statement, or it all may be true. I think he has the history to prove his statements, I’m just on the phone listening. This conversation can’t take place from the cab to ground, there would be too many lost words and too serious of a question to be addressed if it is addressed at all. It seems my romance with the rails and the interactions with my first locomotive engineer have come to this and it wasn’t me who had the question, expressed the concern though it was, as is usually the case with these things, me who made the phone call. It is Saturday February 27 about 1:40 pm and all week has been interesting. Monday February 18 is the train travel group. I don’t see Glen. We end up on the phone with Dan Dalke at US Medical Center all saying hello to him. Dan is Curly’s brother, the one who proposed to me at the train station so many years ago, the one who first introduced me to the idea of watching trains long before the death of Rob Sanchez fostered my growing attachment to that hobby, sport, social drama, entertainment, academic playground, emotional drama queen, engineer fascination, economic sustainer, or just plain nightmare. Dan Dalke is the only one left in his immediate family his father dying in 1981 or 1982, Curly dying in 2007 and his mother passing away less than a year ago. Dan has been a sworn train addict for years. Curly used to mention him when I hoped him with his Jewish/Christian outreach table back in the 1980s and 1990s. when Glen’s children were small, when he ran freight for the Santa Fe and then passengers for Amtrak, when I was discovering myself (something I keep doing), and when "Charles in Charge" was popular, and Steve Parry crested his way to fame with that high, strained voice of his that cut through the 80s keyboard and restrained screaming of the guitar that accompanied his plea to the love hungry to not stop believing, Dan was riding trains, living in Portland, Oregon, working for a chemical bottling company. Now he is in a hospital bed dealing with cancer in the back and perhaps in the lungs. Tonight, Monday, while Metrolink trains pull in and out of the station and the patio faithful wonder if Shelley will show up to serenade her engineers with her smile and endless questions, it takes over an hour to get the right room and several calls to do so. Larry the Santa Fe historian is frustrated. Key Rueben the guy everyone knows is frustrated. I am the one who starts it. I make the call and can’t get him on the first try. They call successively. By 7:30 or so or maybe it’s 6:45 we all get to talk to him, on Larry’s phone. I don’t see Glen that night. It doesn’t really make sense to go to the Noël wood restaurant for the pepper jack cheese burger, talk to the group for a while and then sneak off to see Glen and come back again. No, it doesn’t make sense. We are friends now. I know where to find him. I have the coolest locomotive engineer for a friend. It’s taken some work and takes a little more this week but we’re friends and I’m so happy it makes me blush. Two hours of my time are consumed on Monday with trying to get him on the phone, talking about possibly planning a train trip to San Bernardino. A little before 7:00 I head back to the station, just in Time to see 4 as it approaches the tracks, disgorging its passengers, people wearing jeans and t shirts, suits, jackets, carrying suitcases, lugging heavy bags on wheels behind them. They make their way through the archway between the café and the bridge or past the station with its perpetually squeaky door hinges, out to their cars. I thread my way along the tracks, comfortable, familiar with my beloved rails, ignoring the reminders, the pleas, the constant warnings to turn this way or that, stay away from the tracks. I ignore them. The night isn’t that eventful, no one teases me. Janice does ask me what the latest Glen happening is, and I update her, tell her I’ve found him. “Train travel group tonight. Have a nice Monday,” I text to Glen. Tuesday is here and this week is different in that I’ve taken two days off work. Monday I was ready to go to work when I realized that the iced tea I drank the day before kept me awake just long enough during the night to ensure that my sleep patterns have been interrupted. I think it’s PMS time, too. Today I just can’t be nice. I call out and finish the essay covering the last two weeks. Tuesday I don’t remember much about except showing up at the station to watch for trains. The engineer sees me. “How was the train show?” Glen asks. “It wasn’t really a train show. Just a group of people getting together for dinner and talking about trains.” “Where was it?” “Right here at Noël wood,” I explain. “Hey,” Glen says, before I can ask anything else. “How is Mo doing? Have you heard from her? She had that surgery.” “She’s having radiation as a follow up.” “Yeah. Mel just retired. That’s a bad way to start retirement. She says she doesn’t feel good” “Yeah. I know. I’ll find out what I can and let you know.” “I’ll have to connect with her,” he says. Now there’s the wave goodbye and he gently eases his train away leaving me happy because I’ve had a real conversation with him. Mo is an interesting person. She knows everyone. She’s 61 and has known Glen since 1998, she says. She tells me things about his kids. They aren’t deep dark things but just enough to warn me a little bit. Something tells me that I probably wouldn’t want to tell her my deep dark secrets. This happens later, I wonder about her discretion. She may keep deep dark secrets, but today we’re having a conversation about how she is doing. Now I walk away and go to eat ice-cream and then make my way to the east end of the platform. I watch, wait, dream, maybe, just relishing the quiet, listening to everyone discuss the usual topics, they can’t stand this politician, this company did that, even my friend Curly gets disparaging treatment when I explain that one day he came up to me and took my hands and said I couldn’t get anything done without them. I mean that I couldn’t get anything done without using them, I suppose. This comment comes as I’m once again reorganizing the bells on my necklace. One guy says this is not a true statement and I should have kicked him. Well he wasn’t always in a chair and you don’t know anything about him, I say, so don’t say anything about him. I don’t know what got into me that night or even afterward. Last Friday Tom brings his brother and sister-in-law to the station, they’re her to escape the snow, they say. She works for a college in academic services helping graduate students complete all their requirements. He does something similar. Her name is Allison, I remember that. Tonight Tom says that they get home just in time for twelve more inches of snow. Glad they enjoyed their short time in the California sunshine just before our little rebellion of a rainstorm sweeps in late Friday night and early Saturday morning. He is the one who makes the comments about Curly, someone he knows nothing about. Soon on this Tuesday I take my leave. After my self imposed work stoppage I must return to the company that pays my bills, solaces me during the following days when I experience the worst of my self imposed Glen drama. Wednesday I do not make it to the station to see Glen’s train. I run some errands, needing to refill two prescriptions, I end up eating at Baja California restaurant, a bean and cheese burrito with beans and rice and an iced tea. It is cheap, it is good, it is hot, and then it is Time to go to the station only for an hour. Looking at my schedule shows me that I have an 8:45 start time on Thursday. Perfect! Just enough time to get up, go to breakfast at the station, enjoy a few trains, see Glen. The thing I remember later is that I didn’t have to do this. Today is pay day but I’m broke. I take money I don’t have, go get breakfast. Unsure of the schedule and just how long it will take to make the breakfast I ask if Ana will hold it but it’s done so I eat it and arrive in plenty of time to see the trains, giving me ample enjoyment of the quiet morning. I’m looking forward to seeing my friend. Maybe we can just say hello to each other and go to our days, him to his and me to work. The train before his arrives. I wave. Then 703 comes along, the bell in the cab car says good morning. There is silence from the cab car. Okay. The bell rings again. I look at my watch. I know this is his train. He told me it was. Okay he doesn’t have to talk to me but he has before and so why should anything be different? Is he here? I’m not sure now. I can’t see his face. I can always wave at whoever is there. I don’t hear the radio. The conductor admonishes anyone standing there to “stand clear” the doors are closing. Suddenly the train is gone. Dark desperation, overwhelming despair, a question, disappointment, anger, confusion all descend like one of those sudden rainstorms that can deluge for an hour or two and then disappear as suddenly as it has appeared. The only problem is that this state lasts for two and a half days in varying degrees of intensity. A month ago Lilian Barber, Rob Sanchez’s friend told me that my mental happiness was dependent on Glen. I told her I knew what she was talking about. Maybe it is. I gather my red bag and make sure everything is in order, making my way out to the bus stop to take the 47 to work. I pick up my phone. “Glen this is Shelley I wondered if you saw me I was there in the morning for 703. I’m in traffic walking to work now. I don’t know if you were there. Hope everything is going well. Take care talk to you soon.” I’m beginning to feel like I’m overwhelming him. I think I’m overwhelming myself though I try not to. I’m the one who said he wouldn’t regret giving me his phone number. Suddenly I’m leaving voice mails and texting him. I’m just annoying, I think. Those of you who love the self analyses part of my writing will really revel in this. Okay, I think, what have I don? Is he here? Why didn’t’ he talk to me? Is this about the train or the engineer? How can someone who talks to me four or five months suddenly not talk to me? He would talk to me if he were here. He doesn’t remember I don’t’ see his face but it’s really okay because if he was there and he didn’t talk to me it’s like it used to be in the pre vocal experience of this engineer. It’s really okay if he doesn’t want to talk to me. Just as long as he is there it’s good. I know his name. Remember I first went to his train because I knew his name. Deep down, honest to goodness John Brown or whoever, I’m disappointed that he didn’t talk to me. I try to tell myself I’m not but I would be lying. Sitting at work I think of this. Will I go to the station tonight and see him? Will he not be here? Will he talk to me? I’m very good at working myself into a furor. I don’t know what to think, really. I think I’m most disappointed in myself for being so dependent on this two minute interaction. This is where I am when I get back to the station. “How is it going with Glen?” Janice asks, or some such question. I sneak into the café just to see if they are here. “are you going to walk by us?” Janice asks. I sit down and then she asks me about Glen. I explain the situation. She tells me about her Lexis lunch, her friend from work brings her to the dealership while her car is being serviced and they eat cheese and crackers and some such things. Shirley rolls her bag in the café as I go to find my friend. “he already drove,” she says. “He’s not going to be there.” “That may be,” I say, serious. Janice explains what happens. Standing there at the marker for the train I wait, judging the distance with the bell. “I’ll see Mo tomorrow,” he says. I’ve also explained in my voicemail that I haven’t had a chance to ask anyone how Mo is doing. “I got to the station later last night and I didn’t see any of her contact people.” “Where?” I ask in reference to him seeing her. “In Fullerton,” he says, something about a ride but I’m not sure which one he is talking about. He seems quiet, as if he doesn’t want to talk to me; maybe he’s listening to the radio. “Were you on the 703?” I ask. “Yeah.” “Did you see me?” “yeah.” My questions are timid. His answers are hesitant as if maybe he feels badly about not responding or he’s trapped in another one of his famous Glen corners. I seem to push him into corners without knowing it. Maybe this is how he always is with people and situations. I think he is very nice and sometimes he just doesn’t know how to respond. He has his own reasons for responding how he does. I am not the keeper of Glen’s mind. That might be a scary job. “I’m not going to call out if we’re only going to be there for a minute,” he says petulantly. I’ll just leave it to say that he said those words however he meant them. However he meant them, I feel injured, perhaps for all my own attachment reasons. During four months of conversation I’ve never heard him respond like this. What does it mean? I am, I have discovered throughout my relationship with a locomotive engineer, my attachment to the rails, my desire to be his friend, that perhaps I’m trying too hard, or that I just want something so much that I’m reading double meanings into everything. He’s up there going about his day I’m not part of most of it. I am the one who is doing all the work. I’m not worried so much about that but when something doesn’t go as I expect it to I get unduly worried. Tonight, now, I step away as if injured. “Okay,” I say, “no worries.” It’s really okay. He doesn’t have to talk to me ever. He never had to start talking to me it was fine. But he did and I started talking back and now here I am five months later expecting something I don’t get and my whole day is affected. I turn away and walk parallel to the tracks. I think he says goodbye or alright and rings the bell. He’s left the star struck teenage rail fan on the platform at fullerton, distraught, desperate, apologetic, worried, wanting to be comforted by the engineer, it’s okay, it’s all fine, don’t’ worry my star struck railfan I still like you. Yes, he does. He’s going about his day, and at least in all this, at least he remembers my name. I head back across the bridge and go to the café. “Well, what happened?” Janice wants to know. “I,” I say, “well, okay here’s what happened.” I lean forward, dramatic, I’m sure, my bells clang onto the table. Here where I’ve made my first phone call to Glen, the place I’ve called home for months witnesses another railroad engineer drama. “Here’s what happened. Oh the drama!” I explain what happened. “I’ve been bitten!” We sit there. Bob takes it all in. Remember he’s the one who toll me months ago that if I wanted to meet an engineer I needed to go to the engine. Well I went to the engine. Now I’m experiencing engineer drama. Is it Shelley drama or engineer drama? “Trouble in paradise,” I say. Janice says something about meeting the 608. “No, I’m not going to go over there,” I say, looking at my grilled cheese sandwich and my chips. “I don’t’ wan to rush through my chips.” Janice says something and I don’t’ remember what it was but suddenly I just start laughing and I say that I’m going over there. “That’s why Glen is upset with you,” she says, making me laugh. “You have too many other engineers!” It’s funny! I’m talking to Carrie now. I’ve seen the new engineers twice on the 608. Glen’s girl is cheating. I’m two timing my engineer. I walk out of the gate laughing. Laughing I take the stairs and find the spot where the 608 pulls into the station. “Be careful, you’re by the railroad tracks.” “I know that! What makes you think I don’t know where I am! See this cane?” I trail the safety bricks. “It works.” “It’s fine,” the man says ad suddenly we’re talking. He’s an Indian guide. He and a passel of children probably all between about eight and twelve years old are flocking along the tracks looking for the lights. They’re headed for Tustin. “Did you ask this beautiful lady what time the train comes?” Suddenly I’m surrounded by three guys all talking to me. “It comes at 704,” I say. Suddenly Curt is on the stairs caring his bike. “Janice said you were over here,” he says. He is panting. “You wanted to see the engineer,” I say. Later someone tells me he sees the guys around me and he wants to come over there. “She’s the Queen Bee,” someone says. I’m standing on the former place where glen plied his railroad engineer magic and now the holy ground is being invaded by Indian guide leaders talking to the engineer’s girl. Which engineer? Any of them. I’m the fullerton Engineer girl I guess. I don’t’ know anyone who talks to Metrolink engineers. “Have a nice trip,” someone says, the bell clangs, it is my sweet FP59, the first time I’ve noticed the engine type in a day or two since I’ve been so traumatized by Glen’s defection. I did notice his bell but never had a chance to tell him he had the right baby. Carrie brings that bell and engine into the station and I’ve said hello to him and waved as his friend approaches. Now here is the engineer and the train. I stand and wave. “hello,” I say under his window. “He’s right above you,” says curt. “I don’t’ need the train I just came to say hi to you.” We stand there, the train comforts me, those hissing sounds, the air capturing water from the lines and making me fall in love with that engine again. Those sweet gentle sounds. “Have a good day ma’m,” I think I hear the engineer say. He throttles forward and the 608 is gone. “You don’t’ need me anymore,” Janice says once. “You don’t need me to help you find the engineer. You know where the markers are.” Yes, I do. But it’s still her fault glen talked to me. The diffident little girl standing almost between the bridge pillars talking to no one, only wondering about Glen the mysterious engineer now has the mystery shed, the engineer has been exposed, and now here is another one. It’s a bit of a fragile experience standing here remembering Glen saying “are you standing here in the rain?” Or “how come you had a stressful day?” It’s fragile remembering the first tentative phone call, the hours sitting and listening to the whine and hisses of the FP59. The bell signals the nameless engineer’s departure and I turn and walk away. “He looks like a stock broker. He looks very polite like he doesn’t like trains at all. He has gold rimmed glasses. I saw him wave and smile at you and then pay attention to his control panel, and then he stuck his head out the window and said something to you.” Curt is the engineer spotter. He likes to tell me what the engineers look like. He’s the one that told me that Glen has a mustache and glasses. I had a crush on Glen before I even met him, from the moment I heard his name at L.A. Union station back in September, 2009. Now I’m talking to more of them but somehow the magical part is gone. Glen is my magic. I stand there each time more familiar, wondering if I can do this again. Each experience is different. But Glen is my magic. It’s a good thing that no one is at the east end of the platform tonight. The place is absolutely deserted. I sit down there in tears again. How long will this go on? So dramatic! It’s been a very emotional attachment to my first engineer not so much romantically for him but to the rails to my first engineer experience after Chatsworth My mind drifts back to the morning and him not talking to me. I remember that Friday night when I stood there all alone and he pulled 608 in and said “are you standing in the rain?” That magical night I stood on the bridge in the rain. Now my tears are rain. It’s a step on the journey through the railroad experience for me. Sometimes I swear I hate trains. I don’t think I can live without the magic of this one engineer. It’s the strangest thing. I’ve never had this experience before. I’ve put so much time and energy into the investment it feels like, one moment knowing he’s there and not talking to him like the crumbling of a marriage, one made up in my own head. Either I am too attached or I have a serious hormonal thing going on because I never cried this much about the accident that got me here in the first place. I came out of my shell and met an engineer and now he doesn’t talk to me for one minute and I’m crushed? This is really crazy. I’m stressed about money, too but tonight it’s just more about breaking the spell, I think. Curt comes over and talks to me about the Olympics. It is a nice distraction. I get up soon afterward and take my bus home. I’ll have to get through tomorrow. I can do it. Glen snapped at me today and now the magic seems to have been cruelly ripped away. But the trains still call, the rails still call, it all calls, it will just seem emptier now. Friday is a good day at work. I am almost tempted not to go to the station tonight. In my own state of confusion I’m not sure I want to see my number one engineer. I’m not sure I’m up for the bad band or the people telling me to get away from the tracks. After work I go to FedEx and fax my W2 to my dad’s wife. I decide to go to the station. If anyone is running away it’s me. I arrive at 5:00 pm. Howard and Clarita stop me in the archway. We talk. Mo arrives. We see her walk to the end of the platform with Mike, her friend. She is wearing a cap. She has lost her hair from the chemo and radiation treatments. She comes back. We say hello. “I got a phone call from Glen yesterday,” she says. “I hear.” I don’ know why I say that. Glen says he’ll see her he doesn’t mention anything about a call to me.
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