Train Spotting

Train Spotting

By Tim Cooney

Photo by Tim Cooney

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The first thing you notice is the soothing primal rhythm and that all the train attendants have a congenial weariness and a distinct lack of type-A demeanor. While I’m excited to travel the old-fashioned way to Sacramento from Glenwood Springs, Ron, the steward on my sleeper car, admits “it gets old after 30 years.” He comes around to take dinner reservations as I settle in after my 2 p.m. boarding. All three meals a day, bottled water and a daily USA Today are included if you’ve ponied up for a Superliner Roomette, which can range online from $500 to $800 round-trip, depending when purchased.

The people on the train are either typical or inscrutable. Many relive memories, while others in the steerage seats are mostly young, proletariat or Hispanic. The pragmatic-modern décor of the cars reflects the Scrooge-ish congressional funding of a billion a year to support the American train system, and the clean, narrow hallways and sleeper rooms are as efficient as a submarine’s quarters.

Two old gents who boarded in Glenwood with me have separate roomettes. They’re hard of hearing and talk in brief, loud, declarative sentences. “Bathroom down the hall!” “OK, down the hall!” They also have a bottle of whisky, and they, like Harry Truman, only take a little now and again to brace themselves.

There is an observation car with a canteen downstairs that sells everything from cocktails to pralines. Millennial Generation kids sprawl in the swivel seats working their slim Macs; a middle-aged couple in matching RV jumpsuits play separate games of solitaire; and a Trotskyesque man with a goatee and round glasses reads Gunthar Grass’ “Tin Drum.” I remark to a couple that the canteen coffee is bad. The red-faced man with a grey comb-over answers, “I’m retired Navy. How bad can it be? Navy stores palettes of coffee in hot places.” He adds, “You can always tell a Navy man, ’cause he puts lots of cream and sugar in for flavor.” No smoking is allowed on the train, and at each stop it disgorges the desperate smokers.

In the dining car, seating is Russian roulette. Conversations may range from particle colliders to chicken gumbo. In the light of dusk, the angled sun strikes the starched white paper tablecloth with orange tones, and the blue-pinstriped plastic crockery and plastic flowers look real enough. The dinner menu offers beef Bourguignon, half a roast chicken, broiled salmon, an Angus burger or a steamed vegetable medley. I choose the salmon, and for dessert, over-the-top chocolate cake with whipped cream.

I’m seated near the kitchen with a gay couple, two women who say they’re from “Wiscahhnsin.” We talk about the Federal Reserve. Milton, our comfortably paced black waiter, balances up and down the aisle to the motion of the train, moving his head and shoulders in opposite directions the way W. Bush laughs. He says to another waiter, as he hoists a tray of food overhead, “Reckon I’ll go do my walkin’ and talkin’ now.” He is practiced at economizing his words and framing his small talk so that fewer repetitious questions occur. We talk about the Rockies and the Red Sox World Series game three.