All Aboard! Riding the Rails is a Reunion I am Relishing
It has been five years since I rode Amtrak. It has been ten since I really rode Amtrak. Five years ago, my husband Andrew and I took a relatively short (in train time) trip from the Twin Cities to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The longer trip, five years prior, was from Washington State to Connecticut. Yes, I rode Amtrak all the way across the country.
At this point, I could interject about my flying issues, but that is not what this blog is about, so I won't. I will say, however, that I have flown in recent years; Atlanta to San Francisco and back, New York, Washington, Minnesota, Texas. But lately, the skies have not seemed so friendly to me, so I'm in a self-imposed grounding.
So when my Dad announced he would need hip replacement surgery, and I had the vacation time at work, the clickity-clack of my old friend the train echoed in the back of my mind. Typically I drive to Washington from my home in San Jose, Calif., so that I can have the convenience of my car. But knowing this trip was more about spending time with my Dad than personal leisure, forgoing my driving freedom seemed a minor sacrifice.
I think it is fair to say that passenger/leisure train trips of anything over three hours aren't for everyone. My mom tried to like them, but her frequent need for a cigarette made riding the rails a little too restrictive. Andrew gave Amtrak his best effort on our short leg from the Twin Cities to Milwaukee, but its romantic allure was soon lost when the train was two hours late in arrival, and he realized we could have flown to Milwaukee in that time. And herein lies the key to earning your conductor's cap. You have to be patient. You have to be flexible. You have to be adaptable. You have to be able to share. And you definitely have to be able just to LET GO.
If you can do a combination of just even a few of these things, you will be greatly rewarded, in my humble opinion. For the train offers a travel experience like no other. It is more personal and less commercial than flying; less tiring, and less stressful than driving. Train tracks run through parts of this country that planes and cars never see. Whether it be through metropolitan cities of LA, New York or Chicago, or the Rocky Mountains or rolling hills of the northern plains, Amtrak provides a window to it all. I have traveled through thousands of people's back yards over the years, only to wonder what each home's personal story must be. Who is the family that lives there? Why do they have three trucks? Who decided to paint their house that shade of purple? And how long, exactly, do they have to drive to get to their nearest Target store?
The residents of those homes are the characters I wonder about as I voyeur into their back yards. But then I meet the characters on the train who are riding, reading, eating, or sleeping, right alongside me. I already share a common bond simply choosing the train over the plane or car. And that bond lends itself to talk about life at a deeper level. Not that I enter into deep conversations of personal transgressions or spiritual awakenings, but there isn't an exchange of that nervous banter that can exist in an airport or on an airplane. Sure there is some chat about the details of one's current journey and learning about Bob's three grandchildren, and why he is proud of them, one also learns their names and why he is proud of them. In short, if I had to choose one word to summarize leisure train travel, as I experience it, it would have to be Americana.
In the thousands of miles that I have traveled Amtrak over the years, three experiences stand out in my memory. I'll start with one of the most unfortunate first. I got mugged, yes, mugged. Not a violent mugging, mind you, but my wallet was stolen right out from under my nose. Long story short, a man misrepresenting himself as having a physical disability took advantage of my trusting ways. When my guard was down (I was giving him space for his disability), he reached down in my large bag, grabbed my wallet, and ran. I had just boarded the train, so he must have cased me out. The train was still at the station, and he ran from the scene before Amtrak staff could even attempt to search for him. Of course, I was panicked. I had no money, no ID, no credit cards. I called my mom on the cell phone and had her cancel all my cards, and Amtrak staff said they would provide my food for my three-day journey home. And then the nicest thing happened. Fellow passengers who witnessed this horrible act gave me $40. When I asked them for their address to send them a check when I got home, they said, "No way, we have children at home, and if this had happened to one of them, we'd want someone to help them out." The kindness of those strangers is what stays with me from that trip, not the violation of that unscrupulous mugger/pickpocket.
Another prominent memory I have was passing through Chicago's Union Station at rush hour on a Friday afternoon. Union Station serves the Amtrak service and all the commuter traffic for the Chicago Metro. It was such a strange scene. I remember the Amtrak boarding areas crammed with passengers waiting patiently (many of them several hours) for their trains, mixed with commute passengers who would be hard-pressed to wait several minutes to board a train for their ride home. The juxtaposition of friendly and frenetic is something I will never forget.
Lastly, there was a woman I met from Australia while on my Washington to Connecticut trip. At the time of her travel (several years ago now), Amtrak offered coach-level continental travel packages for international travelers at a very deep discount. Something like a month in the states, on and off the train wherever you liked, all for around $300. While I don't remember her name, what I do remember is our conversations. She was a single mother of two children. She had gone back to school to get more education in her occupation and had come to the United States on vacation. We not only talked about who we were and what we liked to do, but we also had time to talk about what made us who we were as people and what goals and hopes we had for our futures. We enjoyed the opportunity our travel on Amtrak provided to share the threads of our shared humanity. We exchanged our personal contact information and were snail-mail pen-pals for several years after.
These are just a few of the life experiences I would never have had, had I not heralded the call of "All Aboard!" For on Amtrak, it truly isn't just about the destination, but the journey itself. And oh, what a journey it is.
