Why I Love the Train

As I write this I am on Amtrak’s California Zephyr heading to Colorado to spend the week with my daughter and her family.  My granddaughter is now three months old and I haven’t seen her for eleven weeks; since she was three WEEKS old.  I think about how I don’t even really know her at this young age, having put so much time between visits.  But I have a vision of one day taking the train to Colorado to get her, and then riding back home together where we will put on plays, cook, sort through closets, garden, and dance together in the kitchen while singing Kenny Loggins songs.  My daughter calls this “Grandma Camp”.  

 Air travel is great if you need to be somewhere on time, but if you are looking for a quiet, relaxed travel adventure I don’t think you can beat the train. I love the train and I hope that some day I will be able to share it with her.

So here are “Eleven, I Mean Twelve Reasons I Love the Train”:

1.The Crew.  The first person you meet when you get to the train station is the ticket agent, but the BEST person you’ll meet is the Conductor.   There are many behond-the-scenes people as well as a few others who work with passengers, such as the dining car staff and the fella who sells you your coffee in the snack car, but the Conductors keep track of where you’re sitting, so they keep track of YOU.  This is good to know because of #3.  (Don't read ahead, just wait until you get to it.)  

My Pipe Dream

Two years ago I traveled to Spain to walk the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage.  I'd first heard about this pilgrimage while watching the movie "The Way, directed by Emilio Estevez and starring his father, Martin Sheen.  I didn't know why, but the Camino immediately compelled me, called me to go, so I went. In the two years that have passed, this journey continues to teach me and bless me.

I kept a daily journal on my six week walk, and after returning home I continued to write, filling in every detail of every day.  After a year and a half I was finally ready to published my journal; an account of the spiritual and physical journey that started with the Camino but continues even today.  I didn't set out to write a book only to document every blessed moment of the Camino, but the story took on a life of its own and I realized it was one that needed to be told.

It was on Wednesday, December 18, 2013, that I received the first 100 copies of my book.  I was excited to open the boxes and hold it in my hand for the first time.  It had been a labor of love. There is nothing that compares to witnessing raw ink on a page that transforms itself into a story unless it is your own story, and that night I held mine.

I quickly pulled out 25 or so copies and began inscribing them for those people who had been such an important part of my journey; my dear neighbors, my children, brothers and sisters, coworkers, old friends and new Camino friends, all of whom had become my life-blood, my touchstones, and all of whom I love.  Inscribing them was a gift I gave to myself, for each message I wrote reminded me how blessed I was to have each and every one of these people in my life.  The Camino taught me many lessons, but I believe this was the most important.