Around the U.S. By Train – Part 5

By mid-afternoon, the Crescent is approaching Birmingham, sweeping through a series of long, graceful curves. Twice, looking forward from my roomette, I see cars scoot around lowered gates to cross intersections ahead of us. It’s a dangerous, incredibly dumb thing to do, and it’s a practice that kills almost one person a day somewhere in the country.

Birmingham is a large city. I can tell because, for the first time since leaving New Orleans, there’s a lot of graffiti, which is pretty much a big city phenomenon. The entire side of a factory building is covered with multi-colored scrawls, but one stands out … mostly because its lettering is done in neat block letters: TIME IS NOT REAL.

The Crescent has crossed into Georgia and just after dinner – my choice was vegetarian lasagna, tonight – we arrive in Atlanta for a thirty-minute refueling stop. There is a lot of milling around on the platform: people getting off, people getting on, and smokers who have seized the opportunity to step off this non-smoking train and light up. I dash up the stairway to the waiting room to have a brief reunion with an old high school pal and his wife, residents of Atlanta who have come to the station to say hello.

Underway again, I manage to get in a solid hour of reading before drifting off. Conditions have to be near-perfect for me anywhere else, but I sleep like a baby on a train. Why do you suppose that is?

Morning comes and I head for the dining car. Moments after I order orange juice, coffee and an omelet – hold the grits, please – the steward appears and seats three youngsters at my table. Good looking kids, all of them, but they’re shy, even wary, not expecting to be having breakfast with a total stranger. Little by little conversation builds, however, and I learn that I’m breakfasting with Jazzy, who’s 9, and her brother, Rico, 13. Their cousin-companion is Alexis, also 13. All three are from Calhoun, Georgia, and they boarded the train last night in Atlanta.

By the time the Crescent has us somewhere between Charlottesville and Culpepper, Virginia, they’re talking enthusiastically about their great adventure – an overnight train ride to Washington and a visit with relatives. The trip was the idea of their grandmother who, I discover, is seated at the table directly behind me. “I want my grandkids to see our Capitol,” she says firmly. “And the Black History Museum, too.”

Meanwhile, the three youngsters, fascinated by their first experience in a rolling restaurant, are sawing away at slabs of French toast and expanding on their plans for Washington. The two boys bob their heads and grin when I say the Air and Space Museum is a must-see.

Back in my roomette, I once again have my scanner tuned to the Amtrak frequency so I can listen in on conversations among members of the operating crews. We pass a freight that has been moved to a siding allowing us to get by. Its engineer watches us go by, on alert for any mechanical problem, then speaks into his hand-held radio: “Lookin’ good on this side, Amtrak.” The Crescent’s female conductor chirps right back in a syrup-thick accent, “All right! We ‘preciate that. Y’all have a safe trip, now, heah?”

Two hours later, the Crescent glides to a stop in Washington’s Union Station. As I head off down the platform, I catch one last glimpse of that proud grandmother, happily trying to count heads and bags and backpacks as the three grandkids frolic around her.