TRAINS

I have always been fascinated with Trains. My Grandpa worked for the railroads for 40 years. He told me stories that interest me further. Of course there were many more trains years ago. The peak for trains was probably mid 1900’s. I watch intently as we would wait at the railroad crossings. Drivers of automobiles would get upset but not me. I learned numbers by counting the cars that big powerful diesel locomotive pulled. I loved the rocking motion the individual cars made and the clickety clack sound as they slowly rolled along. At nighttime as you drove across the tracks, if there was a train near the crossing the gigantic powerful eye of the mighty train reminded me of a dinosaur coming to devour a little boy, the loud horn would sound saying I’m coming to eat you little one.

                I love to hear the far away horn sound, I find it to be a warm comforting glow in my heart because I smile and think of my grandpa. He always wore an Engineers hat so momentarily I see a vision of grandpa and my childhood imagination.

Once upon a time in this city where I grew up in, trains crisscrossed into the heart right across main street as I ‘m sure they once did everywhere. Now they skim the outskirts like an unwanted nuisance.

Before President Eisenhower committed us to superhighways everything was shipped via railroad. The superhighways slowly eroded the railroads to a mere fraction today.

The railroad was the connecting link to the rest of the world even to the smallest communities. The big iron horse may not stop or even slow down but would drop off the mail and pick up the mail with a unique hooking system. So slowly the railroad industry withers and the trucking industry takes off and blossoms.

Seems ironic, shipping by trains had to be a fraction of the pollution and more cost effective than millions of semi-trucks spewing pollution. In addition the mass transit of people, instead of individual gas guzzling smog producing automobiles. But it seems our new world demands everything immediately the hell with anything else. Who cares about scaring the planet that gives us life, we as uncivilized morons released hundreds of millions of gallons of crude into Gulf of Mexico. Is that acceptable behavior? Who cares we have destroyed some life forever; that’s the price of progress right!

So with the life of one type of economical adventure gives way to another. We now have fast food with drive up windows. Motels, shopping centers, convenience stores and them damn big box stores with everything under one roof a modern version, of the wonders of the world. Damn where did people buy before.

Do you reckon it was the middle of the community called main street U. S. A. where you would park your car and walk to a real shoe store, hardware store, bakery, jeweler and such. Now you can go to one store and fill up a shopping cart where nothing is made in AMERICA! PROGRESS MY ASS. DESIGNED BY THE POWERS THAT BE TO MAKE MONEY AND BECOME A ONE WORLD GOVERNMENT BUT THAT’S ANOTHER STORY.