Conversations With Glenn: Something About Trains
Shelley J Alongi

 

Yes, my Number One Engineer, I’m moving to Texas. But, someday I’ll move to Montana and I’m taking you with me. And, somewhere between here and there, we’ll say a little something about trains.

"Texas?”
He gives me that surprised, oh I thought…
“I thought you were moving to Montana?"
So, how many times have I texted him that I wanted to go to Montana? Whenever I get frustrated I always say “I’m moving to Montana.” Or, on the voicemail: I swear, I’m moving to Montana!

Well, my number one engineer, someday I’ll move to Montana and I’m taking you with me.

But, tonight, I say I’m moving to Texas. From Texas to cats, the new route, the daughter-in-law and railroad bags. Somewhere in all of that rich stock there is something about trains. I’ll take it.

Working in my room, I stop and listen as my phone rings, a strident high pitched bell that cuts through the clutter of gadgets and conversation and people and music wherever they are. I’ve changed his ring tone from the soft tinkling chime to this because somehow during the last few calls I’ve slept right through the insistent chiming, the score check, the here I am since you said you can’t wait to talk to me call. Now, I pick up my phone and prepare to go out into the fresh air of the city where I spent my childhood.
Tonight, the conversation begins on a familiar note, and this time I sigh. I imagine him settling back in his truck, travelling his new route, and listening. Now, I think about my answer. How do you tell someone you’ve just been through the closest to hell you ever want to be? And, the best part is, I have the attention of this veteran railroader, my number one engineer.

"How much time do you have?"”
Does he want to know the whole story? Remember, this conversation can go anywhere.
I relax and walk through the hot, stuffy living room and enter the kitchen I grew up in.

"I don’t' know how much time."

"That's all of us I think."

"You heard?"
"What?"
"I'm leaving."
"Where are you going?"
On my journey through the living room, wearing my Apple ear buds, I ask the question.
"You're retiring? Have you put in a date for retirement, yet?"
"No."
I’m not sure what he’s talking about here. What’s he leaving? No, he's not retiring. Is he leaving the cats? The state? The wife? No, he wouldn't do that. Just don’t’ leave me number one Engineer.
Suddenly, between the living room and opening the kitchen door to take in the quiet street scene and pace the sidewalk with its old houses, brick fences and sometimes brown and overgrown lawns, a whim:

"Lancaster?"

"Yeah."

Why do you make me work for such nuggets, Number One Engineer? My term of endearment, my question that I don't ask. Why don't you just tell me these things? And, I suppose his absences make sense now. A few times, listening, I haven’t heard him running train 208 in the morning. I have heard older and younger voices. It turns out he has been training some students. He rarely misses work, and when he’s gone the air waves are quieter. I remember when he went to Riverside and didn’t tell me. That was so different. I didn’t know he would be gone and he didn’t tell me because really he’s not accountable to me. Looking back quickly though as I absorb the news, his information makes sense.
"Well," I'm enthusiastic, if a little sad. "Where are you going?"
Maybe he’s coming to Orange County? I can only hope.
"Ventura."
There goes my illusion.
And, then, my first thought is Chatsworth and the tunnel. The Ventura County line is where the Chatsworth accident occurred on September 12, 2008 when the then Metrolink 111 was struck by the Leesdale 6512B, a Union Pacific local, killing the Metrolink engineer and 24 commuters, including one of Glenn’s personal friends. Should I go through the tunnel with him on September 12? I didn’t know when he said “she likes trains” out the cab window that he had a friend killed on that train. It’s ironic, bitter sweet, and to me, priceless. It just adds significance to meeting him. Now, he’s working that line.

Time has passed since tonight’s conversation. I didn’t go with him on September 12 through that tunnel. But, the thought crossed my mind and it was a strong temptation. But, in many ways, I’m passed that, now. I don’t need to go through that tunnel. My railroad interest is firmly grounded in other things besides the Chatsworth accident now.
 
"I'm on duty at 4:25 in the morning."
"What train number?"
"102 and 117," I think. Ventura. I start in Ventura. I stay at the Vagabond."
"Do you start in L.A?"
"No."

Why did I just ask that? Now I'm like the people on my phone at work...not listening. But, I heard, I promise I really did.

Why did he choose Ventura?

“It's not as much money.”

“Why did you leave Lancaster?”
“I was sick of all of it...the conductors, the passengers, the boss.”
Sounds like my job on some days.

And, I have noticed on the radio something a little unusual. It seems the student engineers, or maybe it was only one, called the signals so quickly you could almost not know where they were. It was as if they were in a hurry to get through the signals.
“That was part of the problem,” he said. And, then, I tell him Jared tells me all the things he has to do to be qualified as an engineer. Do you have such strict standards with Metrolink? I certainly don’t know everything.
“They just want to know they know what they’re doing,” he says.
And, then, I have to ask, you know, because Jesse was his conductor.
"What about Jesse? I like Jesse."
Silence from the engineer side of the phone, driving, hands on wheel, concentrating?
"Jesse is just Jesse."
"Well, you know Barb, your dispatcher. She’s going to miss you. She has a crush on you."

This is my standard joke.

"She calls your name in the morning. Well, the other day she said Charlie. Your replacement."

"She works the Ventura sub. She doesn't have long to go. She's in her fifties. I work with John out of San Bernardino.”

Priceless engineer information.

Pacing the sidewalk, I’m heartbroken in my own kind of way. When can I listen to him? Where? I’ll need to investigate this one.
"Well, you won't call me Queen of Bells or say good night to me anymore. I'm going to go into mourning.”
“Well, I'm going through Semi Valley. Is there anything on the coast? We're channel 400. Old S P. then something about 96."
Later, railroadradio.net helps me out. Someone in their omniscient brilliance sets up a Semi Valley Chatsworth scanner and two months later, someone finally makes this iPhone friendly. Now, as long as conditions are right and the tech gods aren’t caught up in some kind of dispute, I can once again listen.

And, then, we talk about bags. Sometimes, I’m not sure how this conversation gets from one subject to the next. But, the flow is natural even if it looks a little sporadic on paper. Somehow, I want to tell him something.
“I want you to carry my bag and see how heavy it is. You said yours were heavy but I want you to see if yours is as heavy as mine.”

"There's no room at Ventura."
For what? Your bags?
“Yes.”
He says he leaves one in the locker or the car and one with him. There was more room in Lancaster to leave his stuff, he says. Why I find this so fascinating, I don’t know. I think I just want to know what he carries. Thinking back lately I’ve decided I haven’t asked him any specific railroad questions, so I’ll have to add that one to my list. What specific railroad equipment do you carry? It seems that passenger crews would carry the rule books, but does he carry a flashlight? Anything else? God knows I carry enough stuff with me not even related to the railroad, unless you count the flashlight, and old railroad keys. I think anything he does train related or not just fascinates me. Maybe that’s a good thing? I don’t know. I’ll take what I can get, really.

And, then, it’s on to a discussion of Ventura.

“It's almost as if they got funds and threw this station together, East Ventura.”

“I've never seen that one on the list.”

“Montalvo,” Allan explains later.

But, tonight, walking down the street, talking, I don’t know that.
I turn around having reached the small street corner which leads to the world outside our housing tract, and return to my childhood home. The conversation continues.

"I'm beat."
Pacing the sidewalk I grow up on, remembering roller skating, taking my first bicycle expeditions, falling and scraping my knee almost to the bone, I now hold my fancy phone, talking to my Number One Engineer, but not about trains.

“Why?”

I always want to know these things. I guess if he’s going to volunteer this little nugget I can ask.

"I worked the PTC train."

"What is that?"

"Special."
Is he talking about the positive train control train? PTC scheduled to be installed by 2015? Were they testing it? But, somehow, I don’t ask. I’m more concerned about his physical well being. Trains will come later. He won’t always be around to ask, or at least I’ll have to wait another three months if I don’t ask now.

"Are you ok? I mean are you groggy?"

"I thought I was going to fall asleep last night, driving."

"My dad did that once when he was twenty."

I think it's cute when he says he's beat. Not sure why. Imagine rubbing those eyes...my imagination. It's not fun to be that tired, I know that.

"I slept till noon today. I had my grandson."

"Oh. Well, what did you and your grandson do?"

"His mom was in the hospital."

"Is she okay?"

"She was dehydrated. She was getting sick."

"Ok."

"She's twenty-five years old and she was getting sick. Then, my son told me what he was doing. My son came clean."

"Okay."

"Guess what?"
I think about this for a minute.

"Is she pregnant?"
"Yeah. So, my grandson is spoiled rotten. So, I'll have to spoil another one rotten."
I've decided if he gets a granddaughter he will be hopelessly adorable. He’s already that anyway.
And, then, he proves just how adorable he is, at least in my eyes. Walking outside still, pacing in front of the white picket fence, yes, we have one, he asks the question.
So, where are the kitties?”
I always just think it’s so nice when he asks me about my cats. I know he’s a dog lover and not so much into cats though he did say he does like them.
I’ve told him that the cats are now living with friends at the Ritz, I like to call it. As soon as I’m settled I’ll get them back. So, now, I explain that it’s not practical to have them here.
“You’re going to have Texas kitties?” he says. “You know there’s nothing there but critters and cowboys. The humidity sucks.”
Yes, my love. I know. I’ve been there before. And, they said bring the cats. So, on my way to Montana I think I’ll spend some time in Texas doing what I’ve wanted to do. And, perhaps the best part is I’ll be living near a railroad track. That is worth all the humidity. I’ll manage that.

Yes, my Number One Engineer, I’m moving to Texas. But, someday I’m moving to Montana and I’m taking you with me. And, somewhere between here and there we’ll say a little something about trains.

 

 

Copyright © 2014 Shelley J Alongi
Published on the World Wide Web by "www.storymania.com"