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Dispatches From Dystopia

~ "What man by worrying can add one cubit to his span of years?"

Dispatches From Dystopia

Category Archives: Amtrak

A Wistful Rant

13 Saturday Jul 2019

Posted by David in Amtrak, Railroads

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

#Poetry, #Sexual Imagery

For My Lover

Here it comes, the fish in the visual net.

I have waited for you.

I see by the sleeping cars in the rear that you are 92 The Silver Star, from Florida, bound for New York City.

Your trip ends at the travesty that’s called Penn Station.

Its shattered and pillaged predecessor was broken and carted away to a marsh in New Jersey. Now modernity squats over Mr. Cassat’s subterranean tracks, function surviving, beauty cast aside.

But you, indifferent 92, glide along, bearing the grandchildren of the warriors, now dreaming their own dream of America, their loved ones at the journey’s end, a meal perhaps with familiar talk of plans for Sunday.

Museum? Brunch? Flea Market? Television? Golf?

There could be love tonight, what the coarse, but accurate, would call a fuck.

Elysium, for some, and others a chore, with the wish, under the breath, that the visitor would simply roll off, sleep, then get back on the train.

6:00 AM

15 Saturday Jun 2019

Posted by David in Amtrak

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

#infomercials

I have been up since about four. I can Feel the tiredness seep back into my brain, as I watch the street and rail scene in Ashland on Virtual Railfan LLC on YouTube.

I waited and watched til #98, the Northbound Silver Meteor sped by on its way to New York from Miami. It is a lumbering beast of a train with sleeper cars and a dining car. It usually runs late, anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours.

A little pain woke me up, but not too painful. I wake up and immediately feel vulnerable, so I put my jeans on. I make coffee, sit and watch the trains, or an infomercial about the air brush makeup applicator. I like to watch the women smile as this little paint sprayer magically transforms their faces. Faintly absurd.

I haven’t seen the master of the infomercial, Ron Popeil, in a long time. I wonder what happened to him. Imagine someone, unbelievably rich, who sits at home all day and orders every item sold through the infomercial genre. Absurd? Yes.

I hear another train horn.As yet, I don’t know if it’s a CSX freight or an Amtrak passenger train. It has yet to pass through town. Here it comes. It is #53 Amtrak’s Northbound Autotrain, running nonstop between Sanford, Florida and Lorton, VA. Quite the sight it is.

OK. Back to bed.

Morning, Darkness, Waiting

05 Wednesday Dec 2018

Posted by David in Amtrak, food

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

#Recycling #Trains

Friday Night

13 Saturday Oct 2018

Posted by David in alcoholism, Amtrak, Depression, Exercise/ Fitness

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Tags

#Recovery #Reflection

It is Friday night, almost 2200 hrs. I have the Virtual Railfan, LLC channel on YouTube, watching the automobile traffic go by, before a train appears. The auto traffic has that soft hum of the motors, the thunk, thunk, as the vehicles cross the tracks. There are street lights burning and, occasionally, boisterous college students make their presence known.

The AMTRAK trains are running late; I just heard a train horn, a freight, perhaps. The bright light of the locomotive captures the picture. I was wrong. It is a passenger train. Southbound, running late, but not as late as the AMTRAK website posted it as being. I can see inside the passenger coaches, the passengers seated, waiting for their trips to end, I am certain.

The experience takes me back to the times when I visited my elder son in Philadelphia, where he grew up. His mother was a physician and her practice was in the suburbs. She didn’t hate me or anything. As a matter of fact. She and her then husband found me quite tolerable, as company went.

I would take the train to 30th Street Station and a SEPTA to Abington where he lived. We would knock about all day Saturday and most of Sunday, til it was time to go back. The train ride back involved drinking pricy AMTRAK marked-up beer, watching the East Coast pass by the window, the highlight I think was crossing the Chesapeake Bay near Havre de Grace, Maryland.

Not too many years later, my second wife would go to alcoholism rehabilitation at a near by high-powered inpatient treatment facility. Political types, like US Senators, started their recovery there, along with some Hollywood celebrities. Senators (“R” or “D”) have the same crap going on everybody else has. Don’t let ’em fool ya!

Not too long after she finished rehab, we divorced and after our son grew up, we grew apart. Then she died from cancer. Some days, I dedicate my recovery to her memory, thinking, hoping she will see, from beyond the cremation urn, that I’m serious about being a better man, a more virtuous man,than the one who was married to her.

That train window memory of Harve de Grace wasn’t what I expected to surface when I started this post. I thought about my day, the satisfying water-treading session I had as I worked and loosened some tight muscles. I was not eager to fix dinner, because my muscles ached from the workout, but I did. It was not bad, grilled salmon, baked sweet potatoes, half of an avocado. My wife has been in bed with a kidney stone, so my day, apart from the workout, was looking out for her.

I find it interesting how quickly attitude can shift, from staunch resistance to getting up from my leather recliner and going to the Y, to just plain leaving without a second thought. Depression is a subtle paralysis. I think we think depression involves some high drama, like standing on a ledge, prepared to jump. But really, it’s an accumulation of little behaviors and attitudes that add up to huge self-hatred. At least that’s what it’s like for me. Breaking the cycle is doing simple little things as a matter of habit.

Deluge Continued. Aftermath.

18 Friday May 2018

Posted by David in Amtrak, Bloggers, Exercise/ Fitness

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

endorphins, Retirement

The pelting rain woke us up around Three AM. It seemed relentless and intense. Nature is like that at times. I had trouble going back to sleep. I finally went back to bed about Four Thirty.

Now I am up again, drinking coffee, enjoying the delightful endorphin high brought on by yesterday’s swim.

We have localized flooding and generally nasty travel conditions, bad enough to close the schools. Hard to believe the school year is almost over. Hard to believe the outdoor pools open next weekend. The hot weather has made a couple days pretty uncomfortable already.

I’ve read a blog I follow(Hello Olivia), enjoyed a comment from Jade on yesterday’s post, looked at some headlines, reset the clocks after a power outage. I’m waiting for AMTRAK #84 NB to stop in Ashland. It is running late.

These little simple moments of langor and quiet are why I retired. Madison Ave types would have one think we retire to take canal cruises in Europe or go bungee-jumping in New Zealand. No. We retire to call the time our own.

Saturday Night

28 Sunday Jan 2018

Posted by David in Amtrak

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

#Cafe Du Monde Coffee and Chicory. #Croissant

I’m sitting in my chair, watching the Ashland Train Webcam from Virtual Railfan LLC. A long freight is moving Northbound, hauling what I think are empty coal cars, but who knows in the dark. Amtrak #97 Southbound Silver Meteor also passed by. Kind of cool to see both.

I had a swim today, 2500 meters (1.55 mi). I went to the grocery store, purchased croissants and Cafe du Monde Coffee With Chicory. I plan to have those as part of my leisurely breakfast as I go through the Sunday New York Times. Sounds kind of cool, but that New York cosmopolitan sophistication is gone, at least for me. Last week’s Entertainment Section had a long article on drag queens. I guess when the great stars of musical theatre, the Ethel Mermans and Carol Channings are dead and gone, the Times is hard-pressed to report on something. Make that anything.

My wife is at work. I am a little unsettled, not knowing what to read, watch on the TEE VEE, or do that is constructive. So I sit, drink my decaf, watch the trains.

All in all, the night noise picked up by the microphone in Ashland is comforting, perfect for a bit of introspection.

A Shift In Perspective

15 Monday Jan 2018

Posted by David in Amtrak, Autism Spectrum Disorders, Gay/Straight Dichotomy, Gender Identity

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

#perspective, #trainspotting

Most of you know that I am, through the miracle and magic of YouTube and the Internet, a trainspotter. I sit in my chair and watch the tracks in Ashland, Virginia, just 15 miles or so North of Richmond on the CSX North/South main line.

Well, this morning, the folks at Virtual Railfan LLC, moved the web camera. At first, it was a little disorienting. It took me a while to comprehend the change. Add to that an occasional shift from a view looking South to a view looking North. The camera can also zoom in.

I had gotten used to the way things were, tbe ancien regimeĀ“ of glorious yesterday. We joke about our curmudgeonly resistance to change in Richmond

How many Richmonders does it take to change a light bulb?

Three. One to change the bulb and two to talk about how great the old bulb was.

So what’s the take away from this?  Pespective is critical. Like the movie Rashomon, where the same story is told from different viewpoints, my perception is different from yours. My sons’ autism affects both of them differently and each of us could be seeing the same event completely differently.

I also think about Annette, my deceased butch lesbian cousin. She was loving and lovable, and her take on the world was not my take. At the same time, I could fully appreciate her insights. It is unsettling to see that world views are simultaneously different, distinct and, yet, compatible. At least they can be, if we let them.

The old view.

The new view.

Night Picture

16 Saturday Dec 2017

Posted by David in Amtrak, cooking, Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

lesbian fiction

It is the middle of the night. Back pain has me awake. There will be no trains to watch till after 5:30 AM.  The Silver Meteor , #98, Miami to New York ,is running late. Then again, it usually runs late, from a little to a lot.  Amtrak tries. They really do.

But for now, as I take a break from reading Behrouz Gets Lucky by Avery Cassell, I decide a selfie is in order. I turn the camera around, so I don’t take a mirror image. I doctor the picture a bit. I look at myself and say, “What the Hell, I’m 66.”

Behrouz Gets Lucky is an entertaining read, about two masculine presenting lesbians who fall in love with each other. Doggone it I love Love. I don’t care much for TV love shows.  I’m partial to Fred and Ginger kind of love stories. Substitute Rita Hayworth or Judy Garland for Ginger. Then again, if dancing is not your thing, Bogart and Bacall are perfect.

“You know how to whistle,don‘t you Steve? You put your lips together and blow.” 

MrsCorC? has a hair appointment in the morning. I will go swimming while she gets clipped. Maybe.  I may just sleep.

I made bread in the bread machine motivated by nothing more than laziness and reluctance to shell out $3 or more for a loaf of marginal stuff. Much as I like the convenience of the bread machine, it’s time to knead my own dough with my own hands.  Maybe make my own scones or beignets. The catch is to bake for somebody else, like my AA buddies. Why the Hell not? Perhaps it will assist in managing my hours a little better.

So where is this picture, you ask?

Here. That vein on the left side (right side?) looks kind of imposing there.

New Guilty Pleasure

10 Tuesday Oct 2017

Posted by David in Amtrak

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

#trainspotting

The folks at Virtual Railfan LLC have installed a webcam in Ashland VA. I can now do transpotting from the comfort of my Danish Modern leather recliner.

This is AMTRAK #94 headed to New York and ultimately Boston.

Botticelli. Barbeque. Brunch.

29 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by David in Amtrak, Art, food, grafitti

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Tags

BBQ, Botticelli, grafitti

It was one of those weekends that couples with no children dream about.  Just time together. At The Muscarelle Museum of The College of William And Mary, a travelling exhibition of works by Sandro Botticelli and his contemporaries was on display.*  Mrs CorC? and I drove down. The exhibition is not huge, filling only three rooms.  I was humbled by my ignorance and my arrogance, thinking I know  what classical Renaissance art is about; that I know what it is I see when I look at such a painting. Sure I can identify The Madonna or The Christ Child, but there is so much more. The contemporaries of Botticelli probably had an understanding and derived spiritual and aesthetic truths from such a painting  than I cannot see.

After touring the exhibition and, of course,  buying the poster, we decide to head back to town. We agree  barbeque is in order from our favorite purveyor of slow-cooked pig flesh, the Hogshead Cafe.   Part of the Southern folklore of barbeque is that a true barbeque joint is small, nondescript, and almost one step away from being closed by the Health Department. The Hogshead is as clean as the proverbial whistle, but it is small and not particularly flashy, decorwise. The barbeque tastes great.  We are partial to this dish called barbeque nachos, consisting of your basic nacho makings coupled with lots of barbeque.  Yummy and a prodigious amount of food.

Sunday comes. We both succumb to the “I don’t wanna get out of bed” syndrome.  Before we know it, a brunch opportunity has presented itself.  We decide the Henry Clay Inn on Railroad Avenue in Ashland, Virginia will satisfy our brunch-related hankerings.  The nickname for Ashland is The Center of The Universe.  I have no reason to believe that it is not  The Center of The Universe.  It is just that cool of a place.  Railroad Avenue is called Railroad Avenue because the railroad tracks of the main North-South rail line of the whole East Coast run down the center of the street.  It’s all part of the experience. We sit on the porch of the Inn and enjoy our brunch.  Two freight trains pass during our meal.  Both are southbound.  No Amtrak trains pass by.  A glance at the Smartphone app revealed major delays on all the North-South trains going through Richmond.

What always amazes me about freight trains is the graffiti painted on the box cars, just as I am astonished at the graffiti painted on abandoned buildings. Whether we like it or not, graffiti is the painting genre of our time, as representative of late Twentieth Century- Early Twenty First Century America as Botticelli’s works characterized Florence.  Graffiti has an energy to it, a declaration for humanity that a lot of modern art gracing museum walls lacks. So juxtaposed with the quaint bourgeois gentility of Ashland with its charming pastel-painted houses roll these magnificent graffiti murals.  That both represent America is indicative of our genuine diversity.

The cherry on the ice cream sundae that is Ashland is the town “Character”.   This particular chap rides a Fifties-vintage bicycle with fenders and balloon tires. He just cruises on his bike around town, passed the artsy cafes and coffee houses, circling Randolph Macon College, the town’s claim to fame. He wears outlandish outfits. Sunday’s outfit appeared to be inspired by the miniskirt. One might call him a “Flamer”.  But What the Hell, it’s Ashland.

*Note:  This exhibition will be in Boston at the Museum of Art from 15 April through 5 July. This is the only other stop on the American tour.  Those of you living in that neck of the woods should consider going.

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