Take off your hat, I want to stand up.

Chapter 2 I love the train.

  Chapter 2.

My bike ride to meet the morning train

1956, was a good year. I had reached personhood and with that a certain sense of independence. It was spring, a clear blue sky, soft warm, gentle breeze and the smell of dirt, real earth in the air. I wanted to go out and explore. I opened the heavy front door with the giant unyielding brass knob, it twisted this way and then it opened. I pushed hard on the frame and bent the door back. There in the corner of the veranda was my green trusty three wheeler it had one good handle grip and one half frayed grip, there was a red, white and blue streamer in one handle piece, non in the other.

I tried to put it into a riding position, it would not go. I thought I could take it out to the front and ride on the sidewalk, I opened the door, struggled to get the nose out the door, pushed, pulled, I was trapped between the door jam and the bike squeezed like a marshmallow on a stick. I tried to open the door wider, my skinny arms held no power to lean against the weight of the front porch door. I got on the back of the bike put one foot on the floor, both hands on the steering bar, I pushed forward, head down, eyes shut, when I pushed with all my might I clawed and scrapped the bike out the door and onto the front steps. The bike crashed down as I let go, it rattled to a stop, I was successful.

At that exact moment I heard the peal of the train engine, as the engineer blasted a hoot on his horn, short but strong. This was a familiar sound to my ears as we lived a good block from the crossing. The train was as regular and normal as the clouds moving passed a window curtain, or the dust in the air stirred by a busy street.

I formed a thought, I would go and greet the train. I slid my bike up to the gate, pulled the latch, swung it open, maneuvered the trike out the gate, it pulled fast after me as the spring latch hungered to close. My bike swung in an arc toward the edge of the curb, I thought I had lost it, but no I caught it up and pulled back as if I was reigning in a nag. A car speed by, tires humming inches away from my front wheel, this surprised me to no end as I did not take into account the busy street traffic on Pasqua.

The direction was north, the train was hobbit like slow, crawling to the rail road crossing, I hopped on the back, one foot sticking to the back space between the wheels, my other foot paddling the cement walk, accelerating at each stride forward. I was happy, joyful, I was going to make it to the corner to wave at the train guy. I could now see him, he saw me and laughed with his eyes. He smiled and pulled a long, sharp note on the horn.

Good, I turned and looked over my left shoulder, mom was coming too. She was waving and hustling, head down in determination to unlatch the gate. She wanted to wave at the train, same as me. I loved my mom in that moment of shared purpose and common direction. Naturally I put my head down and peddled faster, to get to the flashing lights to hold up my arms and wave.

As I stopped to smile, mom caught me, do not ever do that again, she scolded, you could have been killed. Mom always went to the n' th degree in any type of harmful scenario, it was always the crib of death that awaited any stray from the path of safety. Safety usually stayed at home with mom, until permission was granted following a weighing of the situation, circumstances and possible outcomes. This pattern she followed as if Dr. Spock had been behind her with a flat pad and discerning judgmental look, a pursed mouth and short incriminating pencil marks in the margin of her motherhood vulnerabilities. Dr. Spock was the go to standard.

The train man looked on, smiling knowingly, kids loved the train, he loved the train, he went to work each day with joy in his heart, he was the train guy, almost better than Santa. The clickity clack, smack of the wheels on the rails muffled into the distance.

The train slipped off, into the distance.

Exhausted, mom wheeled me home, flung away the bike, lied down to take a nap, me with her. I never saw the bike again for two or three years, it represented harm and failure. To me I did not notice it was gone until it came back. We moved to Rosemount a new neighbourhood in a slower traffic subdivision, across town.