Man, you were young, I cannot recall how much so, maybe your fourth trip around the sun, but I do recall it was getting late, we should have already been home for dinner, and fall was upon us. I vividly remember though the grey light of evening blanketing the valley coupled with fog thickening from the cool air mixing with the warmer waters of The River. I can see you now back then as I sit here in the fireplace room and write this, not as perfectly clear to me as you are right now, sitting on the adjacent couch being warmed by the fire, but all the same. I can recall watching you then running across the rocks of the tracks, up and down the embankment (yes I let you play around the railroad tracks without hesitation nor reservation when you were four, but have difficulty with you playing “electronics” as I so aptly named TV and video games when you are 8) but I digress.
You are an observant person, learning so much through life’s
long list of rights and wrongs just by paying attention to your
surroundings. Each time you point out
something you see, hear, or smell, whatever it may be, I feel so proud because
it demonstrates your heightened awareness in and of life. What happened to us on that day all those
many years ago is about just that- paying attention.
And so, as you brought to my attention, the signal lights to
the north were green. We choose to wait
a bit longer in hopes of seeing a train. It had been only a few years since we
watched them put in the siding rails. We heard the rumble of the diesels with
the distinct sound of freight car clatter and blare of horn to the south off
the valley walls. Knowing the difference between rumble and horn of the CSX
line from that of the passenger line across the river is something you have
come to perfect.
We waited and watched and watched and waited and saw the
outer tracks polished steel rails to the south seemingly light up as they do,
reflecting the powerful distant beacon of
train coming from around the curve.
In the path of track, a mile or so away the light shines and glistens
off the rails alerting us, and the observant, to the approaching train. Filled with excitement, both you and I
hurried towards our parked car and in doing so you looked north and said
“another train” as the gleam of light shone on the inside rails.
I could not believe it; we had seen both sets of rails used
before, but never before and consequently never have since, seen both freight
trains coming towards us simultaneously.
That moment I can still feel as I write this- the chill in
the air, the smell of fall in the Hudson Valley Highlands, the sounds of real
life surrounding us as we faced the river.
We heard from our left and from our right the low reverberations of
diesel pistons churning, the electric murmur united with a harmonic bend of
motor and random hiss of pressure relief valves tapping and spewing off and on
out of time.
We stood still as our heads were swiveling from left to
right, north to south as both diesels crept towards each other, ever so
slowly. Though on separate tracks, each
headed closer and closer to one another crawling towards us, perfectly marked
and safely away right where the meeting spot and crossing would be, us in the
middle. We were aside the tracks as the
trains were no more than two hundred yards apart when the blinding single beam
from each went dark. The main light blackened leaving only a few stark
auxiliary head code numbers lit. That
sight and soundscape will stay in my minds eye and memory- two trains slowly
rolling with only the secondary safety ditch lights on, amidst the fog with the
backdrop of The River.
As soon as the lead engines had just passed one another, in
almost perfect unison directly in front of us, each headed in there own
directions, the lead engines each fired
up there main head lamp light on and throttled up, scattering light and glare
through the fog, coupled with the low growl of turbocharged diesel erupting
into roars. A moment of sheer and raw power from them and for us so
unimaginable we stepped a bit closer to one another. This is not a miss-remembered experience that tends to take place
with time and embellishment, this is
what happened.
While the sounds of the locomotives faded into their
respective directions and the wail of the horn from the southbound train
subsided from echoing off the canyon wall to the east, each train finally
passed and we took our last looks at FRED (flashing rear end device) lights
blinking far off into the night. We did
not speak, we just got into the car and headed home to see mom.
As long as this stumbled introduction and this story has
taken me to get through, the actions I attempted to describe here in that
episode took less than half as long to happen.
It was gone in an instant, but lives on in memory forever. This story is real and what happened can
never be described as accurately as it unfolded and transpired, not at
least by me, but it did happen once, at
that one moment, at that one time, in that one moment in time.
I hope you can look back at this and laugh Joe, or at least
smile.
