My second cross-country rail trip was again spurred by the goal of attending Liberty Con in Chattanooga. I had been to D.C. last year and contemplated what I wanted to do for my side-trip this year. First I planned an extra day in Chattanooga since I didn’t get to do any sight-seeing last year. I had taken the hotel’s give-away brochure of things to do in Chattanooga last year to help plan that. But more on that later.
I decided on a side-trip to Cooperstown since I’ve always been a big baseball fan, so I started plotting. I decided to hit Cooperstown first this year. So, armed with 2 destinations and a date for one, I gave a quick glance to Amtrak’s routes and called their representative. Highly recommended BTW. Last year I tried to book online but found myself frustrated by the unwritten rules that the reps knew by heart, but that only left me confronted with the terse, “Route not available,” each time I tried and failed to have my way with the trains. Since I’m no Zamyatin—a Russian author whose character in one of his novels viewed train schedules as holy writ and meditated daily on their elusive mysteries, hoping to discern the secrets of the universe—I went the old-fashioned path and consulted the oracles of Amtrak.
After performing the appropriate ritual of pressing all the sacred phone buttons in the proper sequence, I was granted an audience, and I offered my meager trove of information. In due time, the priestess of Amtrak was able to elaborate my vague goals into a detailed itinerary. There were a couple of connections I thought might be tight. Both involved returning to Mother Railroad after my side trips to actually see Cooperstown and Chattanooga.
Little did I know, fate had other plans. I was scheduled to depart the Old Town Station at 2 pm on a typical sunny Friday, so I arrived about 1pm. My connection to Chicago in Fullerton didn’t leave until 6:30 pm, so all should have been good. As I sat in the SD sun chatting with a friendly Blonde, we got a text from Amtrak telling of a delay due to trespassers on the tracks between us and Santa Fe Station. The next alert said repairs were needed. Visions of luddites attempting to force the rails apart by brute strength ambled through my mind.
In the end, two trains’ full of passengers rode north on one actual train at 4:15 pm. I queried the conductor about my now very tight connection, and he assured me that my connection was guaranteed, and the train would wait at Fullerton for us. I also discovered my disregard of my environment had left me a massive sunburn. We arrived in Fullerton before our connecting train and were instructed to go to the other side of the tracks. That involved climbing 40 stairs with our luggage on the girder bridge that spanned the tracks and descending on the other side. Ten minutes later we were told to reverse course. I guess we looked like we needed the exercise.
Last year I had meandered the train in search of conversations, but this year I didn’t need to go anywhere. My seat-mate Greg was an ex-radioman from the Air Force who had taught himself, first the ins and outs of radio repair and then the underlying electronics, then the programming logic until now he had gone beyond that to building web pages powered by Cold Fusion. Ahead of us was a man of many names (Carl Anthony, but he answered to either as well as Tony). He was headed to a family reunion in Kansas City and wanted to see a museum dedicated to the Negro Leagues. I stashed that information for another trip. Behind us was Jackie and her ADHD 8-year-old who we all razzed because he alternated between sleeping and exuberant outbursts that seemed aimed at annoying his mother, but overall a good kid to tolerate a 47-hour train ride.
Across from us was the unfortunate but still cheerful Rhonda. She had fallen asleep on the train from Fresno to Los Angeles and had her purse stolen, leaving her with no money, no credit cards, no phone, no ID, and no tickets. She had badgered the Amtrak personnel in LA enough that they found her name and gave her replacement tickets after at first insisting she was already on the train. She had replaced her purse with a large green trash bag and cadged a few supplies from Amtrak folks who took pity on her.
Behind Rhonda was a large Special Forces guy who said he mostly worked for the CIA, being places he wasn’t supposed to be. He mostly just watched and listened to the rest of us. To put it mildly, Rhonda had lived a colorful life. She described herself as being a former “biker chick” with a few trips to Sturgis under her belt. She had also married and lived in Alaska for a few years. She entertained us with a couple of self-mocking renditions of “Help Me Rhonda.” As the journey grew longer, Greg, Tony, and Rhonda grew more desperate for the rare and deceptively named “fresh air breaks” that were scheduled to happen every 4 hours or so. (Greg and Tony were vapers, and Rhonda had managed to score a half-dozen cigarettes and a matchbook from some sympathetic stranger.) I agreed with Greg that Amtrak should stock emergency nicotine patches for the dopamine deprived victims of an uncertain schedule.
By day 2, my sunburn was visibly peeling, including from the top of my very sparsely haired head. Finding amusement in our varying forms of distress, we tossed one-liners around like we were fugitives from a 2nd City open mic night, even harassing the good-natured conductor on his occasional passes through our car. Eventually Tony got off at Kansas City, Rhonda headed for Arkansas, and we arrived at “Sweet home Chicaga” as the the conductor announced in his best Dan Akroyd imitation, where Greg and I shared a meal before heading our separate ways. He, home to New Orleans, and me off to Utica NY to rent a car to Cooperstown.
Musings of a Restless Mind 