XVII. THE RAILWAY TRAIN.
I like to see it lap the miles,
And lick the valleys up,
And stop to feed itself at tanks;
And then, prodigious, step
Around a pile of mountains,
And, supercilious, peer
In shanties by the sides of roads;
And then a quarry pare
To fit its sides, and crawl between,
Complaining all the while
In horrid, hooting stanza;
Then chase itself down hill
And neigh like Boanerges;
Then, punctual as a star,
Stop -- docile and omnipotent --
At its own stable door.
-Emily Dickinson
The silent arrows of trains crossing over the landscape in the middle of the night is an image I have never been able to shake. To many, trains are an inconvenience, inconsistent, annoying, and mostly uncomfortable. To me, they are the unsung heroes of travel. With a history as deep and as rich as any one country or peoples, trains have spanned the decades as workhorses for commerce. They have carried everyone from our greatest dignitaries to our struggling families from one pointe to another, traversing mountain passes, bridges, snow banks, hills and valleys, glens and streams. Today I write in honour of the engines that have carried me through and to some of the most magical places on earth as National Train Day arrives. This is my homage. A virtual collage of memories, some now faded, thoughts, photos and findings.
I spent much of my childhood chasing my great uncle Bob down the path from his gardens to the train tracks that ran through Lyons, N.Y. The same line that my great grandfather had worked years before I was born. Uncle Bob spent summers trekking my brother and I back and forth to those tracks as we learned the train schedules and made demands to be standing at our posts just feet from the tracks a good few minutes before the train was due, anticipating that rush of air that blows past with the dinging of the railroad crossing bells and lights and whistles. Our own multi-media show, well before the time of video games and iPhones. As we ambled back, Uncle Bob would be sure to try and distract us from the next ten trips we would ask for that day by offering us pennies for found locust shells, braiding garlic with us picked from the acre of gardens, or playing Oistrakh on the phonograph. Though all of those were noble distractions, the call of the train often won out.
As I grew older, I started to have less time to stand and wait for trains to rush by, and the times I happened upon a crossing were mini glimpses into the recesses of my memory, of summers imbued with the scent of wildflowers and roses and grapes and of my Uncle's and Aunt's parlor. The world of study and music took over those moments of hot summer days standing by the iron and wooden tracks. But as those days became less frequent my traveling became more pronounced and as many times as I could, I boarded a train. There were my first trips to Europe in my twenties. London. Trains into the countryside. Then my thirties with trains throughout Italy. The fantastical travels to the coast and from Rome to Sicily that included the entire train being carried by ferry to the island. Moments armed with little of the language and a lot of frizzante. Sleepless hours of watching the shadows of Spain out large windows from compartments. Tours from the east coast to the midwest with nothing but my violin case and a satchel and sheets of sonatas and chamber music frayed at the edges. And as the years whirled by, novels read, scores studied and learned. Friends made. Consistent. Whether slightly delayed or horribly late or punctually on time, in their own magnificent way they were always consistent. Through moves, and changes and the beginnings of aging, trains are the constant. From the time I was a toddler with my mum and my brother, each of us stuffed beneath a protective arm. To now, four decades later. They have been the only constant. Through heart aches and joys and running away from and running to, they are the comfort. The rocking of the cars. The gentle bumps of the tracks. The changing countryside and weather and clouds. Spinning. A warm cocoon even on the coldest days with the ice building up between the cars and the wheels fighting for traction.
So as National Train Day arrives today, this is my thank you. My thank you to the porters and the conductors and the kind persons I have met crossing the countries of the world. For the conversations, the spontaneous card games with strangers, the solace, the space to read and write and study and listen to great music. My traveling office, my chariot to places with mystery and grace. I can only hope that as my later years find me, I will be finding myself with a friend, a glass of wine and my caftan riding the rails of the Orient Express or through the mountains of Europe.
But for now, in the middle of my life, as my mum did before me with her nana. As my mum did with me, taking the Amtrak train across the fine state of New York to visit my great uncle Bob and his wife and her sisters all those summers ago, now I take the same tracks with my daughter to visit her on her "farm," still hearing the calls of "All Aboard" and reveling in the greatness of train travel and the greatness of all things coming full circle. Someday perhaps she will write her own homage to the engines that take her to great places and grant her the gift of meeting people from all over the world and savouring a few moments of humanity...from a tiny seat beside a window, beside the earth whizzing by.
