1st Shift

I just wanted to say that working 1st shift is wonderful. It's been more than a year and a half since I've worked the normal American work schedule and I can't tell you how much better I feel during the day and how nice it is to have the evening free. I have a hunch it won't last long, but I'm enjoying it while I can...

Be well.

Wonderfully Rainy & Lazy Sunday

I'm coming out of my second long four day weekend in a row. This weekend I took off work to be a part of my good friend’s wedding. Friday was the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner and Saturday the wedding. Both were awesome. But Sunday took the cake for me this weekend. I woke to the sound of the phone ringing. It was my sweetheart calling. Her car had been acting up and she had a lot of work to do, so I spent the rainy day being lazy and hanging out with her while she worked on school stuff. We ate a good lunch at Panera Bread and then went to Java and read a while. Then we took a drive down River Road and the Ohio in a mist was beautiful. Headed to Sojourn and then out for some Boombozz with some good friends to finish of the day... It was just lovely. It's rare that I have a lazy day that actually makes me feel better. I guess it wasn't so much lazy as restful. I needed it.

It's going to be hard to go back to work tomorrow!

Hey Erin Richterburgmeyer

Photographs of my Colorado weekend are up at www.camerapocket.net
Thank you for wanting to see them!

Back home...

Colorado was amazing. I've got to say the highlight was getting Biz Markie's autograph at Denver Int'l before our flight home. But I think it stinks that while I was gone, no one posted anything about the first part of my short story...

I never thought I'd say this because of my love for the mountains, but I was glad to get back home. I was glad to see LB.

Rocky Mountain USA

In less than 12 hours, I'll be on a flight from Cincinnati to Colorado. I'm in Wilmore, KY right now, just outside Lexington staying with my great friends the Irvines (http://www.camerapocket.net/film/TheIrvines.mov). We caught up on all the new goings on in our lives now they are packing and I'm writing this. I'm about to fall out of this chair I'm so darn tired. It's been a long day, but it was super nice... super nice (wink wink).

My Short Story

The following post is a product of my experiments in silence and solitude. On a daytime trip to Nashville on a train last March, I couldn't wait to get into the hotel and watch some college basketball. When we'd stop to meet another train, or wait for a signal to proceed, I'd pull out "The Spirit of the Disciplines" by Foster and read as much as I could. The closer I got, the more felt God saying to get in the hotel and be silent. Rest, think, write... do anything but fill your mind and time with nothing. So, as I sat on the bed in the hotel room, the idea came to me to write the outline to a story about the last 5 years of my life. So, I outlined it that night and began writing it when I got home the next day. It is still unfinished, and unedited... but I want you to read it and make comments and suggestions if you would. Keep it mind, I am just typing my thoughts as I go, so I've not edited a thing but the spelling... and even that might not be done. Enjoy...

Chapter One (1st draft)

It was the summer of 1999. The summer between my sophomore and junior year in the photography program at the University of Louisville, and the summer I worked at the bar-b-q place not too far from the railroad tracks. I was playing drums in a band with two of my good buddies and our first show was right around the corner. We had the idea to shoot some random video and have it playing while we played. The show was only a few weeks away and we hadn’t any ideas of what to shoot. As I was leaving work one night I heard the distant rumble of a train coming into town. I raced down to the tracks just in time to catch the locomotives coming over the road crossing. I watched in awe as what looked like one huge continuous piece of steel passed by at 50mph just 10 feet away from the hood of my car. After the train passed I sat there in the car and images of trains at night projected on the way behind us at the show ran through my head. After that night I started to pack the old family video camera around in the car with me. Brian, who played bass in the band, and I would sit by the train tracks from time to time waiting for any sign of movement on the tracks. I’ll never forget the first night we caught a train on tape. It was a very warm night. I parked my car in a strategic location so we could see a train coming from either direction. We’d look east, then west. We would get so impatience just sitting there waiting. “I think I hear one” I’d say waiting anxiously for a horn blast to confirm my suspicion. “Nope, just a truck” Brian would conclude after a few minutes of silence. Another hour passed with no train. It was getting late, and about the time we wanted to give up the unmistakable throaty chugging sound of a locomotive was heard and seconds later the first “long” of the standard road crossing horn cadence would sound. A frantic scramble ensued as we rushed to get out of the car and find a place for the camera. I ran out to the tracks and put the camera between the rails. We stood back and watched. The engineer gave it some juice just as the eastbound came into view and our hearts raced as the train grew closer and closer. About the time it was too late, the fear of my dad hit me and I wanted to run out and grab the video camera. Just as I took the first step to get the camera out of harms way, the second “long” sounded and I thought twice. “Too late” Brian said, and my eyes were fixed on the camera. It was one of those old full size VHS cameras with the big handle on top. I thought for sure the handle would snag the bottom of the cowcatcher and the camera and my ass would be history. In a moment of extreme tension, we watched the train passed over the camera safely, and I could start to breath again. As the end of the container train came into view and I knew the camera would be ok and the images of what was being caught on tape started to run through my mind. My heart started to race again. Just then I noticed out of the corner of my eye a shadowed figure coming into the light. He looked very young, couldn’t have been much older me, if not younger. “What ya’ll doin?” he asked. “Umm… nothing.” I said. Just as the train cleared he exclaimed, “WOW! Is that your video camera?” “Yeah… we’re making a movie” and then I began to explain what for. He sounded very interested in what we were doing, and we later found out he was had just dropped out of the University of Kentucky’s music program to work for the railroad. He was working a utility job at the mixing yard in Shelbyville and had just helped out that eastbound pick up some cars. “There’s another one behind this one, shouldn’t be too far behind him” he said as I walked over to the tracks to get the camera. We took turns watching the video through the eyepiece. After we each had a turn, I queued the video up for the next train and started to sit down when he said, “Hey, come in here”. He pulled out his switch key and unlocked the door to the small building at “East Shelbyville”. “I’m Joe by the way”. “Oh, I’m Alex and this is Brian.” Inside were a few desks and a computer terminal. He sat down at the terminal and pulled out a book about trains and began to talk about railroad stuff I knew nothing about but pretended I did. “That locomotive was a dash-9”, he said. “Wow, awesome” I followed, wondering what the heck a dash 9 was. A few minutes of chitchat between the three of us and Joe said, “Here comes your second east bound”. Brian and I raced back outside. Just as I turned the camera on and hit record, the locomotives gave us a loud horn blast and the engineer waved. As the seemingly endless string of auto carriers streamed by, I made sure to hit all the cool lighting angles. We hung out with Joe for a few more hours just talking railroad stuff. He continued to talk about train watching and about how he had taken trips out west to photograph trains. He told us about the job and how cool it was. Joe worked on the line from Louisville to Danville, which serves as a major connection between St. Louis and the southeast. This line follows I-64 from the west end of Louisville all the way to somewhere between Shelbyville and Frankfort were it takes a dive south towards Danville. He talked about seeing the beautiful landscapes of downtown Louisville and Central Kentucky from angles only railroaders could see it. We didn’t catch any more trains that night, but we exchanged phone numbers with Joe and heading down to East Shelbyville to meet him turned into a nightly ritual for me. Some nights Joe would call me and take me into the mixing yard with him. The bright lights with the night sky as a backdrop made for great footage. Sometimes, we hop on a slow moving train and ride if for a little while. The excitement of seeing parts of my hometown I’d never seen before and those I had but from different angles made the adventure of being somewhere you weren’t supposed to something more than just getting film for a show. But, by the day of the show we had gathered plenty of film… mission accomplished.

Who eats at bad food places? Shhheeewwww.

I can now say in all honesty, I don't like working to Nashville. My engineer was as cantankerous as ever. He was short with me in every way. If it wasn't silent in the cab, he was explaining to me that I didn't belong out on the road. Railroaders can be like dogs. They mark their territory, and if you come close watch out. One way you know you are not invited is the "Shhhhewww". "Shhheeewwww" is the classic railroad heckle broadcast over the radio right after the unwelcome new comer gives instructions over the radio. I avoided the "Sheeewww" this trip, but I'm sure it was by the skin of my teeth. We worked early early into the morning on Wednesday. Slept only a few hours. It's so hard to sleep when the sun is up. Had no choice but to eat at Shoney's. I ate bad pancakes and scrabbled eggs with the cantankerous engineer and two of his not as cantankerous buddies. As they made trip after trip to the buffet, I watched a line of old or boring or old and normal and boring folks line up outside the door to eat bad food. I looked out the window to see gas stations and fast food places lining the busy suburban street with its many stoplights and billboards advertising legal help and either beer or cigarettes. I did get to take a nap though. The return trip was a little better. After a few more short remarks from the cantankerous engineer, I reminded him that we shared a classic railroad moment together and that he was the one that gave me my nick name. See, it was one day last year when he and I had a trip together. We had too much train for the engines we had, and the engines couldn't pull the train up the hill coming out of the Cumberland River Valley. We stalled our first try and we backed down the hill for another run. We tried it again and failed again. He got out to inspect the sanders that lay sand on the rail for traction. They didn't work. We tried again and got a little further, but still stalled. He said the only way we'd make it is if we had sand on the rails because the wheels would just spin. We both knew the only way it could be done. So, I said LETS GO! He started to pull again, and as he pulled I'd go from the top of the engine were the sand is kept, grab a hand full of sand, run out in front of the train (going about a mile an hour, maybe two) and sprinkle the sand on the rail and then back to the top to do it again. We did that for about a 1/3 of a mile and we made it up the hill. As we started to pick up speed, he looked at me and said "great job Sandy!" After I reminded him, he seemed to warm up to me. But it was too late. We were almost back to Louisville.

Worry is the devil

I'm in unfamiliar territory. Strange things are happening all over my world. Strange may not be the right word because these are good things... for the most part. I just associate the word strange with bad things. The most pressing is that I'm leaving on a train for Nashville in a few hours and I'm unsettled about it. I haven't worked my way down there in almost a year and I know I've forgotten some vital things. I think I’ll be ok until we hit the Nashville Terminal. This is the yard in Nashville and it’s a vast network of steel rails and switches that I’ve not seen for a while. To make things worse I’ve got an engineer with a short temper, and I'm afraid that this trip may be a bit nasty.

Of Asaph is playing our first show in almost a year with only 3 practices to prepare us. Plus another huge situation, which is indescribable, keeps my mind racing back and forth with different scenarios and outcomes and the knot in my stomach reminds me that I’ve GOT to trust God.

Because (say it with me...)
worry is the devil