A Random Collection of Memories of Some of the Trains in My Life
(illustrated with a random collection of photos of recent trains & tracks in my life)

I've loved trains since I was little. I remember being in a crib at Grandma & Grandpa's house in Eastern Oregon and listening to the trains go by--I must have been 3 or 4 at the oldest. I still love the sound of train whistles. They lived on a farm, and there was a certain part of the fence where I would go climb up and stand there to watch the trains, and wave at the engineers, though they were generally too far away to notice.

When I was nine, my mom, my brother, our cousin & I, all rode the train from Klamath Falls, Oregon, to our cousin's home in San Diego. I remember sitting on my suitcase for what seemed like hours waiting for the train to arrive in K. Falls, and then riding for what seemed like forever to get to San Diego. What a fun trip! I'd love to do it again some day.

There is nothing so poetic as a train track, stretching off into the distance, rife with possibilities...

Around age 13 or so, some of my friends and I used to fool around in the freight yard in Bend. Climbed all over and around and through and between the cars on the sidings there. Goodness knows how we managed to escape being either caught or killed! I never did hop a freight train, although we came close once. There were a bunch of dubious looking men in the open car we spotted, though, and we had the sense to realize that to them we might just look like play toys, and we probably wouldn't enjoy their games.

As a mother of sons (Caitlin never really caught the train bug), I've had trains underfoot (sometimes literally) since Jamie was old enough to put together tracks and zoom Thomas along them--around age 2 or 3, I guess. Colin followed in his (train) tracks, and now Alex plays with the whole collection, though maybe not quite as obsessively as his brothers did.