December 15, 2011

Rachel got off the plane. That's never happened to me. And I've been left standing at a few gates, waiting. Another reason I'm not fond of airports.

December 15, 2012

Among my many failings, despite my cynicism increasing with age, experience, and solitude, continues to be a belief in the fundamental good nature and intent of people, that we're more alike and seek the same means and ends, that the errant, even inhuman examples aren't indications of failing normalcy and, with attention and honesty, progress. I hope.

That said, what the fuck is going on? Children are innocent, defenseless, undeserving of such random aggression, wanton violence, and selfish, reckless hate. Whether adults, earnest or wayward, have their heads up their asses, in the ground, or preferably in the real world, the possibility and unfortunate candidacy of children as victims to reprehensible and inexcusable actions like today is a definite evil, an event and thought that cannot be allowed and must not be ignored, politically, sociologically, individually.

We protect children. If they hurt, get lost, are harmed, suffer, it's our fault, our responsibility, our duty. What in this world is more important than children?

June 20, 2015

These are things in which, aside from the success of my children in their lives, I have complete confidence. These are my hands, shown here at forty-two. They've become thicker and stronger as hands from my many years of heavy labor, nearly unrecognizable to my own eyes as the slender and manicured sets of fingers from my many years before of playing piano.

These are hands that will hold yours, both together and singularly. Their fingers know a delicateness to comfortably entwine with yours, their palms know a warmth to cover yours in cold conditions. They will convey a confidence I don't really have as I lead you around the dance floor; they will insulate the nervousness I may have as I carry you across the threshold. Despite their digital heft, their fingertips will caress your hair as you fall asleep now and at ninety; because they are emotional extensions of my soul, my passions for you will be demonstrated in their grip, their caress, their seemingly independent desire. They'll feed you as I care for you through illness and recovery, they'll dress you and tend your every need with dignity and understanding through more dire convalescent times. Tracing your exciting lips broadly opened as you laugh, massaging your exhausted feet resignedly limp as you relax, wiping the trails of tears from your eyes and drying your cheeks as you cry, testing the limits of their own strength as your own hands squeeze them for dear life whenever we brave a new rollercoaster (actually, that might be me squeezing yours.)

These hands will bring your body to mine as we explore each other in nights of passionate intimacy, and as we console each other in moments of ultimate pain and loss. These fingers will play music for you as long as they're able, cook for you for as long as you're willing to pretend I've got a knack for it, tickle you until I get tired of hearing your melodious laugh or your exasperated command to stop, and carry you to bed every time and from anywhere you fall asleep.

These hands that I've had and used all my life are actually your hands, and, with your permission, I offer them to you, along with everything they've done, can, and will do, and the man attached to them, heart, soul, mind, and body. I humbly hope you'll accept them one day, Miss Whoever You Are.

May 21, 2012

The tranquil and existential nature of railroading is, for me, at once a leisurely reflection and an analytical study of the soul and substance of this humble, impassioned and beleaguered proletarian poet, and an amazing vehicle for observing the indescribably awesome wonder of the multi-hued climates, and the historically textured, emotionally threaded tapestries of land and sky.

In my travels, there have been valuable lessons, rousing laughs, a few close calls, and songs, so many songs, of course. But her, the one I'll never see again - I see her always in every cloud and star, selfishly relish her in the blazing heat, tenderly caress her in the biting cold, regretfully miss her as the leaves turn, wish for her with all of who I hope to once again be, as I sail into the black.

And every day, another train...

May 15, 2011

Very early this morning, I saw a flirtatiously happy and sharply-dressed young couple crossing the brightly-lit downtown street, holding each other close, their fun night out ending or maybe continuing, the soulful urban jazz beats of Manteca and Fourplay spun on late-night radio by a sirenic voice named Amparo, reminiscent of my brief fleeting nights at a dimly-lit, now-defunct jazz station in El Paso so long ago.

May 6, 2012

I just finished watching "One Day", the newest addition to my list of timeless films, songs, books, and even memories. This is a hell of a statement for what would be simply dismissed by many as just another mediocre love story, but isn't that just it? Are any of us truly so special that our life and love experiences, whether successes or failures, both pleasurable and painful, aren't really just easily dismissible stories to others but ever so much more to us, that they shape us, move us, transform us, challenge us to learn and feel, to hate and hurt then love and try again?

We are none of us unique in these regards, yet each emotion may be uniquely felt and, if we're lucky, shared. And for every vacant, worthless, seemingly endless moment of loss and despair, there's another moment of surprising, fulfilling, unexpectedly eternal joy and gain. If there wasn't, we would stop living, for our bodies are natural, our responses automatic and self-providing, and our minds could not continue if they knew this wasn't a fact of life, a reality.

I woke up this morning, and so did you. So there must be something worth living for, bad or good, as we hope for the good and learn from the bad. There must be something to this life, at once unique and common, for all of us.

04/17/13

A predictably calm, purple-hued dusk in Socorro, New Mexico, a predictably rollicking ride over undulating tracks through rural neighborhoods, on a southbound train typical of many I'll continue to ride these next twenty years, the comfort of home and hearth and a late night cheeseburger in the paradise of far east El Paso, Texas.

A handsome, evidently well-suited and loving young couple, well-dressed and happy, comfortably astride their respective ponies on an evening trot along the sandy embankment that parallels our track, she on her gray paint, he on his of caramel brown.

We roll through one of a hundred road crossings, blowing the locomotive horn in established pattern whether the crossings are private or public, though often throughout our territory they're equally isolated and free of traffic, day or night, winter and summer, except of course on honky-tonkin' Saturday nights in Las Cruces and Anthony.

This particularly usual evening, at this particularly usual time, however, the horn surprises the horses, the girl's gray one especially, and the startled animal rears up, throwing her rider through the air before springing into a hasty gallop alongside our iron horse, down the dusty path they were just enjoying the evening on. Not even the cloud of dust and the commotion caused by what happened could conceal from my fellow crew member the image of the young girl falling onto the ground, meeting it with her head and neck. The young man on horseback gave chase to the bolting horse, with her saddle loose and flapping under her, endeavoring to overtake her and bring her under control. Just as he catches up, nearly alongside, his own horse jerks suddenly as if to avoid colliding with his gray partner, which throws his rider directly into the dirt, landing on his side and tumbling, the two horses together but still running indirectly and about each other in that same area, two police cars serendipitously approaching at high speed on the street not far away.

A series of images my engineer and I witnessed the evening before last, though not at all like the typical images we share on such a ride during such an evening. The quickness of it, the terror so quickly kindled in an instant and the madness that follows just as instantly in the seconds that follow, but that burns so slowly for what seemed like minutes at the time, and what repeats slow motion-like in my memory now, impervious to dousing, immune from just taking deep breaths and hoping the handsome, happy, young couple are alright, that their lives aren't irrevocably changed by the path their ride took them on that tranquil evening in their home, that becomes one of the more frightening even tragic moments during my time on the road.

April 12, 2012, 2100 hrs

Tonight we nearly collided head-on with another train, stopping fifty feet from impact. I saw my children playing on the playground at Album Park, a once-beloved girl I kissed outside a radio station I deejayed at, and myself on my 12-speed riding to my grandparents' old house. Funny, it's true what they say.

April 12, 2018 RANDOM QUESTION: After Starfleet established successful communications with the Tamarians, do you think they'd maybe upgrade their universal translators to detect just what the Tamarians mean when they speak? Or do you think they'd need to brush up on their metaphors?

Data referenced understanding the grammar of a language as essential to the deciphering of the imagery reflected in the Tamarian's method of speech and thought conveyance. Picard later certified that to Riker by referencing his own review of the Homeric hymns, a hallmark of our own historical, epic literature. These examples would lead me to believe, if hope, that realizing greater success in achieving true communication between peoples, or in this case species, can be reached not merely by literal translation of words but by the meaning of what makes up those peoples' or species' beliefs and by extension characters. The suggestion commonly attributed to native Americans of walking a mile in another's moccasins is apt here, as there really would be no other way than this desired activity to learn who and what another person is all about.

January 12, 2019

Just this side of sunrise, needle just this side of E, driving up Lee Trevino in east El Paso, eyes just this side of dozing off but reopened by the ache in your heart that's just this side of forlorn, your spirit just this side of hopeful, however, as "With Or Without You" repeats on the tape deck and you're just this side of foolish thinking you'll see her again when in fact she's just this side of gone forever...

And so went another Friday night turning just this side of another Saturday morning in 1990.