She Likes Trains: The Bag, The Switch Key, And The New Engineer Line up. It has been a good railroad journey this week. It has ended now. Other obligations call. But I’ll be back for more. It only gets better from here. “You never get it wrong!” comes the call from the high idling locomotive with a different kind of bell. It’s a muted sound, one that reminds me of the EMD, only its bell has over tones. This one isn’t as clear, and its definitely not the prerecorded mix on the MPIS or any other engine company that sports this bell. No, this is a different bell. It’s so different, that despite the other clues, I incorrectly tag it as an EMD. I know it’s not, really, but for some reason, I call it that. “Guess I don’t’ come here much these days,” I tell bobby on 608. I approach the engine after the bell is turned off. It seems he or Cary or anyone else rings the bell until the train is stopped. Then, I approach it, waving, calling out. Tonight is the second time I’ve seen this engineer. I haven’t been here for a few months, it seems, or at least long enough to get a question posed by the stock broker engineer with the two girls. “Where have you been? Haven’t seen you in a while.” That’s yesterday, Monday August 27, standing in my spot, the hot, muggy breeze uncomfortable in our August heat wave. Our August heat wave strikes early in the month, leaving little respite during its remaining days. Inside my house typing, or working for a company whose practices are starting to fray on my nerves, I miss most of the heat, except on days when I sneak outside to see the trains, visit the airport, or go pick up work from Cal State Fullerton. Sometimes I sit out at Starbucks, hanging out with my guys, I tell Glenn, my number 1 engineer on Sunday August 26. Sometimes, like now, I stand down by my happy place, the locomotive, and get the engine wrong. I laugh tonight when Bobby says I never get it wrong. I don’ get it wrong the night before, Monday August 27, glenn’s 60th birthday, by the way. Old, wise, experienced, ready to retire, kind as ever. How does he do that? I’m going to have to ask him for help. I seem to be getting more impatient as I get older. Maybe it’s just a phase. Researching my next line of work, I wonder if I have the patience for it. I think I do. I just need arefresher course from the engineer of my dreams. Tonight, standing at 606’s side, the call comes to me. “Over here!” I’m standing in front of the locomotive again, forward of it, on the platform, not on the tracks. Finally, I am in visibility range. It’s John, my extra. “You’ve got the right one,” I say, and this time I do have the right one. It is an EMD. “It’s like trying to pull a whole train with a Volks Wagen!” he quips, or is he serious? Well, ok. I’ve never heard it put quite like that, but if the engineer says it, then those words contain a grain of truth and who am I to argue? No one. I’m the new kid on the block. I’ll defer to the engineer. I don’t call myself an expert by any means. I’m just the middle aged adolescent railfan who has developed a fascination with locomotives and the people who run them. This fascination is either the key to my future or a masterful red herring. I’ll take it either way. I’m learning about three and four tier locomotives, all with different specifications having to do with protecting the environment. But tonight, Monday August 27, it’s the EMD, the F59, it’s the right one, for me, for sure. On Monday and Tuesday, we say goodbye, the engineer pulls the train away. On Monday, the conductor calls my name, I am aware that someone is calling me, but think maybe the hailing comes from down the platform. Well, it sort of does; it comes from within the train. I realize too late that it’s Jared on 606 with John, my extra. He sends me a message later telling me it was him. I’ve figured it out by then. So, I guess other train crews are recognizing me. On Monday, August 27, I meet another trainman. It’s my 608 who tells me the guy I’ve talked to is the engineer. Walking down the platform, I make my way to track 4, sitting down by the entrance. I keep wanting to remind the conductor of who I am. But, somehow, I can’t get his attention. If I have to take this train, some time, I will, just to talk to him. Sitting here, now, Monday, I spot someone moving toward me. I wave. “Hello,” I say. “Do you remember me?” He stops, looks over his shoulder, appraisign me. What does he see? A woman cradling a rather large black railroad grip on her lap, a blac and white sweater and black slacks, a leather and crome watch, braided hair in a knot, bells, switch keys hung around her neck. Those are the physical properties. I don’t’ know what he observes, if anything. I know that he might be the conductor. I never think he might be the engineer. Funny, because that’s always who I’m looking for. When I go looking for the conductor, I find the engineer. But I don’t learn that till later. All I know now as I sit out enjoying the cooling evening is that he doesn’t remember me. He’s not the regular guy, he says, the other one is off. I don’t make the connection that he could be the engineer, because I’m sitting down by the locomotive now, and he comes from that way. When running the train toward Fullerton, the engineer controls the train from the cab car, opposite the locomotive. he may have gone through the cars to get to the locomotive to take care of whatever he does up there. On Tuesday, Patrick goes toward the locomotive talking to a young railfan with a tripod, the telltale sign of a photographing teenage railfan. On Tuesday, train 640, Pat and Richard’s train, breaks down in Santa Ana and so he returns to Fullerton to run his train back to Laguna Niguel. None of the patio dwellers believe me when I say the train is running late. No, it’s not late, says Bob the ring leader, it’s not due here till 6”30. yes, that is true. But 640 turns into 642, so 642 is now going to be late. Never mind, they find out as they’re waiting for the Southwest Chief, no. 4. This all happens Tuesday. On Monday, the man stops, talks to me for a moment, and goes on his way. I move myself down to the place between track 3 and 4, a bench in a shelter out of the way of hurrying passengers with bags, digging for car keys, or talking on cell phones, or to each other. Heels clump across the stairs, their clicking blending in with the tinkle of the elevator bell, the rolling of wheels across the concrete pathway. It is a regular day at the station, music drifts from the café. The radio station has changed from Coast or KRTH to some selection from Serious. My black railroad grip hangs overmy shoulder, large, imposing, not so full that it can’t be carried comfortably. “There are bags,” says dave about my bag, “and then there are bags!” he’s talking about my grip, of course. It is rather large and imposing; so much so that when I don’t carry it, people notice. Bobby laughs when I say that, it’s mixed in somewhere in a conversation about switch keys and do I have enough of them? I think he’s seeing the keys and bells hanging on my bag and my lanyard. I still have four switch keys. I do have two bells on my lanyard tonight, a Santa Fe and a Union pacific logo on my bag, a railroad crossing gate trinket, some silver bells. Ashley, my five year old niece calls them baby bells. “Do you have any more switch keys?” Bobby asks in one of our two conversations. No, sweet engineer, just these four. Well, his conductor, who by the way is Glenn’s nephew, has a lot of switch keys, says Bobby. I’ll have to talk to this guy and I’ll have to find out how he’s related to Glenn, exactly. Glenn has more than one connection for me to the rails; he lost a friend in the Chatsworth accident, and his nephew has a bunch of switch keys. And, he answers my elementary railroad questions. “There’s a guy here who collects switch keys,” I tell bobby. I’m talking about John, of course, the guy who used to run the locomotive at Knotts Berry Farm. But now, on Monday, as I wait for 608, the man now returns. “Good night,” he calls to me. “Good night.” He stops, looks at me again. “What’s your name? I know some of the guys. I know Jared. I talk to Bobby, and Carey.” Now, he’s interested. “Carey was off today,” he says. I acknowledge that. “I like to talk to the crews. I like the stories.” “There are lots of stories on the railroad,” he says. He doesn’t answer my question about his name. I laugh. It’ strue. “Is Bobby here?” “He’ll be here, soon,” he tells me. “Was it block training?” He doesn’t know. I’m not sure of this on Monday, so I wonder if the 608 crew will be in block training, rules update. He doesn’t’ know. Carey tells me on Tuesday that he took off Monday to go to the dentist. “Are you going back to your train?” I now ask my nameless trainman. He is. “I wont’ keep you from your business.” “Thank you,” he says. “Have a good night.” Ok, now, I sound like Glenn, and every other railroad engineer ending aconversation. This must be standard issue like the rule book, the general code for the operation of trains. You must end every conversation with “have a good night.” The man doesn’t end the conversation that way. He says thank you and walks back toward his train. “I think it was the conductor,” I tell bobby in that Monday night conversation. “That was the engineer. John. The conductor was working,” he says. “John Philips?” No, I’m thinking, it can’t be him. He was on 606. There ismre than one John in the world, you know, miss adolescent railfan. “John Kennedy,” he says. We part company, he pushes forward and te train is now on its way to Ocean Side making all intermediate stops. I smile. Now I know. I didn’t have a chance to get nervous. “I bagged another one,” I tell Dave and the guys sitting at the east end of the platform. “I know you’re just fascinated by my railroad social life.” That gets a chuckle. It is fascinating. It is my own railroad journey. I met another engineer, I have another name to add to my book of engineers. And, yes, I do have one. And you know who is at the very top of the list. That’s right. Line up behind Glenn. He’s the right one, three years after that initial contact. I love talking to all my other engineers, and I want to meet more of them. But there’s just something about him that keeps me coming back for more. I’ll keep coming back as long as he’ll let me. Maybe it’s his passion. He has a lot of that and it shows. I’ve had some good contacts. Eddie asked me once who my favorite was. “Glenn,” I said. “But, James took you to dinner.” And, he did. I have to make contact with him, too. I will. This railroad journey is fascinating. And on Saturday, August 25, maybe the festivities start, culminating in Tuesday’s adventures, with a short trip to the station to meet my father. We then take a trip to the Brea mall to eat at the Red Robin to celebrate my sister’s birthday. But, before that, I trek down to the west end of the platform to finally have a look at the new bridge built from the parking structure to the station platform. The bridge extends over Commonwealth, or is it Lemon? The signal has changed, too, on Santa Fe Avenue. It is a beeping, talking signal installed there now and audible from the top of the bridge. I know the company that installs those, its name excapes me now. But, I know the signal type. They are rather useful. There are audible signals that are annoying. These aer not annoying. They’re unobtrusive and useful. And, sometimes, they’re actually necessary. There are several of its caliber installed by Cal state fullerton, and State College and Chapman, a corner I used to frequent, but maybe I cross more now that I’ve moved away from it. The structure is a three story affair, and now people can traverse directly across the bridge, steel fencing protecting the pedestrians from either accidentally or deliberately falling over its side. It is a cage, you walk between the two fences straight onto the platform wher I used to meet Glenn’s morning trains when I could make it. Now, the high planters greet the passengers as they stroll onto the platform and make their way to their various train meets. The bridge has been open since May, 2012, but this is the first time I’ve crossed it since it opened. I’ll have to take a trip down here on one of my aditional days off, when the weather is kinder, to see if anything has changed at all. I can’t wait for aditional days off from my job over the next four months. I’ll make my usual trek over here with a book and my bag, to wave and smile and say hello, and make up, or learn new stories. The prospects are endless here. The trip is short on Saturday. I spend time talking to Jim, the locksmith. His attitude is mainly negative tonight, maybe he’s just frustrated. If we didn’t have Stevne, he says to me, I’d divorce her, or kill her. There’s another man I know who was recently peeved with his wife and daughter. It must be in the water. He was annoyed because someone had lost his keys and he had to find them. I think Jim’s complaint was financial. “You asked me earlier how it was going?” he says to me as I approach after observing one of the Saturday trains, leaving. “It has been better.” I understand that. And, my response is always, it gets better from here. Somehow, it usually does. Hope Glenn found his keys. Yes, it was Glenn who lost his keys. I have lost a set or two, and I’ve had a few financial complaints. But, they’ve always gotten better. Maybe the train station is the place to make things better. It seems a lot of people who come here are frustrated. Maybe the train station is just the place to get stuff off your chest. It’s my creative haven, my respite from too high prices and thwarted expectations, a place to dream, and plan, and day dream, too. A place to meet interesting people, observe the show, and wait. It’s a place to show off my red nail polish, and get engines wrong, meet new engineers, and hang out with old ones. It’s just a place to make things better. “Psychology,” I overhear Larry, the former oil executive, say once to Dennis, a relatively new guy on the block. It’s a place to solve problems. It’s a place to meet young, extroverted railfans like jack, who must be age eleven or twelve. He makes his way on Tuesday along the entrance to the track that holds the late night Laguna train. He warns me of the approaching end of the ploatform. “Are you the tour guide?” “No” “Do they pay you to state the obvious?” “No.” He’s a nice enough youngster. “What train are you waiting for?” he says now. “No train.” I make my way across the ramp to the benches by the locomotive stoppingpoint. “I know the engineer,” he says. Ah, so here’s another one. “pat?” “He’s on this train.” “This train is late. Mechanical issues,” I say. He consults with someone. “Train 640 broke down,” I now reiterate. Indeed, train 642 is late. It comes in , bell clanging. Tonight, pat is on, and he and jack meet up. Jack says pat lets him on the front of the engine. “Don’t tell the railroad that.” I don’t know if he made it up or not. “If he does that, he could lose his job. The last guy that tried that got killed.” He doesn’t say anything about that. Later, after the crew departs, he goes off to photograph number 4. I head over to my 608 Tuesday train meet. This is where we begin our tale, right here at this spot. It’s been adventurous in between. Bridge inspection, getting the wrong engine, the bag, the switch key, and the new engineer. It’s all good, punctuated in between with a conversation with my number 1 engineer. Line up. It has been a good railroad journey this week. It has ended now. Other obligations call. But I’ll be back for more. It only gets better from here.
Copyright © 2012 Shelley J Alongi |