On the Canal Line

Every Friday and Saturday I walk down to Veterans Memorial Boulevard and wait for the bus that comes at 8pm.  I board the bus and am sometimes the only white face.  After 20 or so minutes we arrive at the cemeteries at the base of Canal Boulevard in Orleans Parish where I wait for the Canal Street Car to come and take me into downtown New Orleans.  When it arrives I am never the only white face, although sometimes the only white face with anywhere to actually go.

The Canal Line was completed after Hurricane Katrina and comes with a unique line of new red cars.  Occasionally one of the green cars traditional to the St. Charles line will be used on this route, and vice versa, but the red and green cars both have their usual niches.  I prefer the green cars-- the red cars have been made wheel chair accessible at the expense of aesthetics (although I suppose practicality is more important than beauty), and their seating arrangement, in turn, resembles more a usual city bus than a trolley. 

None of this is really the point-- instead, over the past two weeks I have seen two (2) things on this car that have moved me.  As follows:

An elderly black man, worn and withered by age, boarded the trolley and sat on the bench-style seats near the front.  Several stops later another, much younger black man boarded with his son, around three or four.  They were standing in the front of the trolley, next to the elderly man, paying the fare, when the car started with a jolt.  The boy stumbled, almost fell.  The elderly man, in a natural, habitual way, caught and steadied him.  The father, distracted by the operator, hadn't noticed the boy nearly fell nor that he was caught.  Once finished in the front, they went and sat down.  That was all.

A woman and her son boarded the car.  The boy was about 25, 26, challenged-- wearing a pink 'Hannah Montana' sweatshirt designed for, I assume, a pre-teen girl.  It was two or three sizes too small, but seemed to make him happy.  It was his mother though, that I found the most appealing-- she was in her mid-forties, with the worn, weathered beaten-down face of someone whose lived a hard life of loving something very deeply that was tiring, time-consuming and difficult.  I watched her until they departed, both of them waving goodbye to the driver with drama and excitement.  I assume they ride that route often-- it is possible they do not.

Sometimes I ponder how I can feel such cynicism and despair at one time and such love and appreciation at another.  I usually shrug it off-- it's a wonderful life.

On Missing Trains

Of all the stories posted here-in, this is perhaps the one of which I am least proud.  Stories of drugged and drunken exploits come with moderate bragging rights, travel tales have their own appeal, but this is a tragedy of hubris and stupidity of which I am ashamed.  To begin, some back ground information:

The Amtrak passenger train City of New Orleans passes through Newbern, Tennessee on it's north-south run from Chicago to New Orleans.  My family live a bit more than an hour from Newbern and when traveling home for a visit this train is the most comfortable, most cost-efficient and generally the easiest mode of transport.  I have ridden this train several times and boarded and exited at this station each time.

So, poised to board the train early in the morning of December 26th me and my father (a semi-driver for more than 35 years) arrived at the station, watched a few freight trains pass, and ascertained that the the tracks to our left headed north and the tracks to the right headed south.  We were so sound in our knowledge that when an Amtrak passenger train came rolling up at precisely the time my New Orleans-bound train was scheduled to arrive, that we watched it stop, watched passengers deboard, and watched it roll away certain in our sense of cardinal directions and positive that that train had come from New Orleans and was headed to Chicago.

Newbern is an unmanned station, so there was no one to ask as to how late my train was going to be.  We did however ask one of recently exited passengers from where she originated.  When she said Chicago, I stared at her disbelievingly, then stared at the tracks and realized that we had been wrong.  I had missed the train, or rather, mistook the train, which is probably just as bad.

Deeply shamed, me and my father were.  We studied the tracks for a while and decided that even if we were wrong, we were wrong in the most logical way and that our wrong assumption was the easiest assumption to make.  We drove away, cursing the silly train for traveling north to south in such a haphazard way.  Pride cometh before the fall-- I boarded the train later in the week and arrived safely back in the Crescent City.

The City of New Orleans

For the time being, I've gone home.  I left Tennessee via train on Wednesday and headed down to New Orleans.  This is the first time I've trained for such a long distance in years, and, whenever possible, will be my choice in modes of travel.  There's lots of leg room, the seats are large and comfy, and this train in particular wasn't particularly crowded-- hopefully that's the norm.  

Apparently, however, despite the imminent fun of Southern Decadence, I've chosen a bad weekend to visit-- with Hurricane Gustav, the weather is going to get bad.  We'll see.  I didn't know of this until I was on the train halfway here, but probably would have come anyway.  

Anyway, I've been offered a position with New Orleans Boutique Hotels similar, although not quite the same, as the position I held right before my departure.  That is a stroke of luck-- now all I need is to find a room somewhere in the Marigny or the Quarter I can rent for a month or two.

It's great to be back-- to see the old haunts and the old faces.  To stay out past two and eat great food.  Plus Southern Decadence is this weekend-- God knows what trouble I'll get into then.  But anyway, I think I'm staying here through Halloween.