I swear to you the train is better than a movie. I brought some movies and shows, the Sims on my laptop, and three books to keep me occupied, but my looking out the window/eavesdropping on passengers combo is proving to be way more fun. To accomplish this, I gave up the darker cramped space of the regular cars a while ago. I’ve been trying to strike up a conversation with one of the literally thirty members of the Pennsylvania Dutch community, but I’m shy. I’m sure they’d be friendly, but… joking aside, I feel weird without a bonnet.
In the observation car I’m joined by an enthusiastic teenage boy who talks so quickly I can barely eavesdrop on his conversation with this girl who’s coming back from Lollapalooza in Chicago. I’m not that uncool — when I finally found out Lollapalooza was in Chicago the same weekend I was scheduled to be there, I kicked myself for not managing to get the earlier, cheaper tickets.
…Well, maybe I am old. They are now discussing the joys of crowd-surfacing. Um. Please put me back on the ground. Thank you. They don’t listen to the radio — so not hipster. Because you absolutely never hear Zeppelin on the radio. Like, ever. Also, Junior over here apparently missed his smoking break — we’re not talking Camels — because he was playing his guitar. Damn! These two are highly entertaining.
“Once I sewed my hand together,” says he.
“I have the back of my neck pierced,” says she.
Earlier I made friends with a grumpy middle-aged woman in my car and we commiserated about how unnecessarily insistent the train people had been. Over the loudspeaker they kept telling us to make room for more passengers because the train was fully booked. This was really pissing the woman off. “It’s like, we know how to ride a train, you know!”
One the train from Colorado to California I had dinner in the dining car, and they sat my little single self with a couple and their mother. (I say “their” mother because they both kept referring to her as “Mother.” This is confusing for me. The man and woman were clearly married — wedding rings, grumpy remarks to each other, and all. However, are you siblings as well? Do you share a mother? Is this matrimonial match even legal? I was tempted to join the fun and ask if you would please pass the butter, thank you, Mother, but I controlled myself.)
For the second half of the Zephyr, my seat buddy is Travis from Pittsburgh. He’s friendly and keeps to himself. He’s listening to indie-sounding music with giant headphones perched over his shaggy black hair while reading Love in the Time of Cholera and I’m seriously wondering if I’m sitting next to John Cusack from High Fidelity.
I listened to two men, one with a British accent and the other from Germany, discuss travel in America and Europe. I listened to a novice train rider from Buffalo talk to a seasoned traveler from somewhere in Utah. It surprises me how many people are taking the train most of the route. Back home, it seems that you take the train for three hours from Albany to New York, or you go out to Buffalo, or maybe even Philly, but you are never just on the train for days. Turns out many people had made this trip before. My dining compadres were from Utah were just taking the train out for a day or two to Granby, CO, just to get away. “It’s such a pretty trip.”
The views really are stunning, so it’s not surprising that some people are riding the train just for the purpose of seeing America. What better way to do it?
Now the loudspeaker is announcing that the assistant conductor will shortly be having story time in the observation car for the children on the train. I can’t help but smile to myself. We traveling Americans, we wanderers, we certainly are a friendly bunch.
