august 16, 2008

 

when i stir, the room is painted with a golden hue.  i look out the window and surrounding us are the dry, rugged eastern foothills of the cascade mountains.  the streets of wenatchee are deserted, as though we have been cast onto a hobbyist’s train set.  during the night, the train was divided in spokane with part of it moving towards portland and the better half towards seattle.  i slept through it all. 

 

nikky rises and joins me at the window.  i tell him of the orchards and of the columbia river and of the dams and only briefly, of the time in my life when i lived on the dried slopes of the cascades an hour and a half to the north. 

 

the call for breakfast comes early and we find ourselves across from stephanie and later, her brother greg.  she works for the british consulate in belgium and he as an environmental consultant in north carolina.  there is no mistaking they are brother and sister.  they listen as we tell the story of our journey and upon finding that nikky understands, but does not speak russian, encourage him to change his approach.  in a surprising response, nikky tells stephanie he will start speaking the language once back at his gulag in maine. 

 

they are pleasant tablemates and as we part, i feel the tuggings of sadness, for this will be our last meal on the empire builder. 

 

as with every mountain pass on our journey, the landscape turns from xeric and desolate on the eastern slopes to lush and alluring on the west.  no mountain range demonstrates that change more strikingly than the cascades.  there is an explosion of water and ferns cover the ground between the thick-trunked douglas firs and western hemlocks.  any sunlight that hits the tree tops stays there, for the canopy is impenetrable. 

 

gradually, we leave the mountains and course along the banks of the skykomish river, whose waters are pale blue and choked with the silt loosed by the glaciers of mount rainier.  abrupt topography is left behind and the landscape becomes tabletop flat.  every patch of earth has been tilled or fenced or is covered with cement or asphalt.  roads are choked with autos and the fingerprint of civilization reminds us both of how amazing and “human free” this trip has been. 

 

then, through the ventilation system, the unmistakable smell of tidal flats announces that the empire builder is nearing the end of its journey.  we travel along the puget sound and for the first time, can see the olympic mountains. 

 

“we’re going there too, buddy.”

 

the train arrives at the king street station on time and on a saturday morning when unprecedented heat has arrived in the pacific northwest.  it is 90 degrees and only 10 in the morning.  we thank gol for his service and tip him in appreciation for keeping our cranberry juice glasses full and the communal bathrooms useable, even though I didn’t use them.  he has treated us well. 

 

our journey ends, but our travels have just begun.  we gather our bags and move to the line of taxis in front of the depot. 

 

i tell the first driver “we need to get to the hertz car rental office.”

 

he responds with a broken “i take.”

august 15, 2008

 

the gouda cheese is tasty, but requires repeated dousings with merlot to send to the place where nothing matters.  the wine and cheese party disbands and all in all, proves to be a pleasant experience.  18 hours into our trip and i have yet to meet anyone that i would not like to meet again.

 

over the intercom, the national park service representative describes an approaching monument, erected on the site of a lewis and clark encampment and at the very site where lewis, after a dram of brandy, looked at the looming mountains and said to clark, "how the hell are we going to get around those?"  in response, clark cupped his hands over his ears and went "blah...blah...blah." 

 

it's true.

 

the monument is now covered with graffiti and in disrepair.  it is apparent that the “goodness” of the lewis and clark journey has yet to be fully embraced by the blackfeet nation. 

 

back in room 17, nikky remains glued to the window.  he is excited, without his dad having to ask if he is excited.  at one point, the land below us disappears and we are moving 500 feet above the river bottom.   

 

“nikky,”  i say.

 

“yeah?”

 

“promise me that some day, when you have kids, you will take this trip with them. okay?”

 

“i don’t want to have kids. yuck.”

 

“neither did i and if i didn’t, i wouldn’t be able to take this trip with you. think about that, saw-whet boy.”

 

as we enter the mountains, the brown is displaced by green and the hills are neck-achingly stretched above the reach of our window.  if anything defines the empire builder, its pass through the rockies is it. 

 

our window faces south and so, sunlight still illuminates the thousand foot deep, nooks and crannies of our journey.  nikky takes pictures until his disc is full, i download them onto my computer, then he takes more pictures. 

 

just when the panoramic splendor is tugging us towards complete surrender, we are called for dinner.  nikky drops his devotion to the scenery like a hot potato and is halfway down the hall before i can react.

 

it seems my son’s tapeworm has told its host it is time to eat.

 

our dining guests are a father and teen-aged son from southern california.  scattered throughout the diner car are 4 other members of their family.  they are making the journey from whitefish montana to seattle, then down to los angeles. on the train.  once eric discovers i am from minnesota, he delves into my political make-up, wanting to know what i think about “him” and “her” and “them” and “those”.  upon finding i am of the liberal political persuasion, he relaxes completely.  he spends his days online, making thousands of dollars doing something that i think is illegal everywhere except in chisholm, mn.  

 

i choose the salmon, while nikky chooses everything else.  when it is all over, he opts for a piece of cherry chocolate cake the size of a bean field.  as is my wont, i opt for a serving of haagen daaz vanilla ice cream. 

 

we bid good-bye to our dinner guests and return to our sleeper.

 

daylight allows another 45 minutes at the window and then, without debate or complaints, we begin our second night on the empire builder.   

august 15, 2008

 

with the sun beating down on the streaking empire builder, the temperature in central montana reaches 90.  nikky and i return to our room and just as he is about to speak, i ask him “shhh…did you hear that?”

 

“hear what?”

 

“that song.”

 

“what song.”

 

of course, he hears nothing for it is only i that can hear the siren.  she is calling for me.

 

“nikky, let’s go walk the train.” 

 

there are 12 passenger cars hooked up to the two engines and while the sleeper compartments have narrow hallways and cloistered compartments, the coach cars are fairly open.  people in coach are in varying degrees of comfort, with some reading, some sleeping, some looking out the window. 

 

when we arrive in the lounge car, there are a number of side-facing, floor to ceiling windows and for each one, there are two chairs and for each chair, there is a body.  when two chairs open, nikky and i sit and immediately understand why the chairs were vacated, for in the chairs next to us, two hirsute women with pungent body odor (think: compost pile) are spreading a can of tuna on bread.  their sandals are off and feet propped up on the glass and my son is only ten and not ready for the truths i will have to reveal and soon after the olfactory discovery, nikky and i are on our way back to room 17.

 

the siren lied to me.

 

an hour later, i am invited to the wine and cheese party, where i sit with three, including a retired librarian and her husband, and a practicing librarian (what are the odds?).  even with me at the table, it turns out to be a pleasant group. 

 

one by one, the attendants present a bottle of washington wine and a plate of minnesota cheese and collectively, all at the table emote wine snobbery; pretending that bouquet and subtlety and fruity and ethereal are words we regularly use. 

 

the wine party proves to be a pleasant diversion.  at the end, the attendant holds a trivia contest and i win, meaning i get to take one of the partially empty bottles back to room 17.

 

the siren can wait.

 

i open the door and nikky points out the window.

 

“wook.” 

 

pressed against the glass, everything has changed.  rivers lay in the bottoms of deep canyons.  outcrops of boulders rise from the ground.  to our west and south, the rocky mountains stand as daunting, impenetrable silhouettes of granite, daring us to approach. 

 

“that’s where we’re going buddy. are you having fun?”

 

“this is awesome, dad.”

 

“boy, it sure is.”

august 15, 2008

 

whatever moisture there was in the early morning landscape is gone.  after breakfast, nikky and i return to our room.  the topography has changed and where hills meet, the bottoms are gouged deep through the sterile gray and red soil.  when water comes here, it does not do so gently. 

 

while our room ensures meals and treats and an attendant’s attention and a lower tiered connection with the traveling elite, it does not remove us from the use of communal bathrooms.  had i upgraded, we would have had private facilities - to the tune of 500 dollars – which is a pretty steep price to pay for going to the bathroom in a closet.  for nikky, it means nothing.  for me, well, it just means i’m not going to be able to use the facilities for the next 24 hours. 

 

just as nikolai announces he is (again) hungry, the call for lunch is made.  it will, however, as the message states “be an abbreviated seating since the crew needs to turn the diner over for the highly desired empire builder wine and cheese party…for our first class travelers only”. 

 

take that!!! coach class.

 

after allowing the lunchtime crowd to dwindle, i send the golden one to the diner car to place us on the reservations list. 

 

as a paternal aside, nikky has sometimes confused the l’s and w’s during his excited urges to communicate.  at one time, his name was nikowai wane and that he reawwy wiked wwamas, but now, mostly, he is nikolai lane and the shortcomings of his youthful enunciation have been addressed. 

 

after 25 minutes, the invitation arrives over the intercom: “johnson, party of three…archambeaux, party of 2…and finally…wane, party of two.”

 

“nikky, say lane”

 

“lane”

 

“you need to pronounce your l’s, buddy.”

 

“i did.”

 

“okay, let’s go eat.”

 

we arrive at the diner car and i tell gary, the diner car foreman,  “lane”.

 

“oh, i didn’t call your name.”

 

“lane for two?”

 

“no, i called wayne.  you are still looking at a 10 minute wait.”

 

at that very moment, nikolai delivered the first effective glare of parental disdain in his life.  i apologized to gary and on our way back to room 17, to my son. 

 

when wan…i mean lane is finally called, we are seated across from greg and heidi.  he is a soon-to-be-retired archeologist and she a registered nurse.  for some reason, they live in oklahoma.  he has worked as a consultant for big oil and formerly, was a teacher.  she is pediatric nurse-nice and immediately engages nikky in a narrative of his travels.  they are on their second trip on the empire builder this year.  they love rail travel; love to meet interesting people; love good conversation. 

 

perhaps as retribution for his father’s earlier dismissal for diction, nikky announces from center field “my dad has a really bad fungus nail.”

 

meanwhile outside, the earth is parched with no clouds to distract the sun.  the hills have grown larger and towns more infrequent.  we travel next to highway 2 and speed by cowboy pick-ups and rented rv’s on our journey west.  

august 14-15, 2008

 

try as i might, sleep is fleeting.  after nikolai and i resolve the debate over who sleeps where and who is the owner of the stanky feet (it is him…neither my feet nor feces smell), he crawls onto the upper bed and within minutes, is sawing little kids’ logs. 

 

below him, i prop myself on a pillow and watch the train speed through the minnesota night.  where it moves atop ribbon rail, the ride is smooth and rhythmic.  where ribbon rail gives way to older track, every train ride in every hollywood movie comes to life. 

 

it is over the clang of the track that i hear the siren song of the lounge car.  she calls for me.  i know she is a temptress.  a very naughty temptress.

 

“be strong, owlman,” i tell myself.  “be strong.”

 

i finally fall asleep as the train pulls into fargo and awaken as the empire builder moves at sunrise through the potholes of north dakota.  i missed the grand forks stop; despite its prominent position in my history and despite a visceral urge to be awake when we arrived there. 

 

the potholes teem with the summer’s production of waterfowl and shorebirds.  all move in unison away from the train as it approaches.  every tall tree near the water is occupied by a red-tailed or ferruginous hawk.  a badger scurries back towards subterranean safety.  the landscape is rich and in the early light of day, a magical blend of gold and green and brown. 

 

“is this heaven?”

 

“no.  it’s the empire builder.”

 

over the intercom, the first call for breakfast is sounded and while not hungry, i know that a missed meal for the golden one means several hours of illogical behavior.  he stirs, i ask if he wants to eat and he springs to life like a jack-in-the-box.  a very hungry jack-in-the-box. 

 

it seems, however, that every other sleeper car passenger is hungry and so, we are placed on a waiting list.  after a half-hour, our name is called and we move through the narrow halls to the diner car.  given the tables sit four, nikky and i are seated with a retired couple from grand rapids, michigan.  laura is a retired teacher and ford a retired dentist.  laura recently took up playing the tuba; ford the banjo.  he was a bomber pilot in world war 2 and recently underwent triple bypass surgery.  they are train aficionados and have moved freely on the rails since their retirements.  they never fly, which is ironic since they are on their way to seattle to visit their son, who is a manager at boeing.  they are pleasant and engaging and understand the significance of this journey for nikolai.  this journey, afterall, will remain with him forever. 

 

i opt for the greek omelet (berry berry good) and an endless stream of coffee.  nikolai chooses french toast and sausage and bacon and juice and toast and hash browns and eggs and whatever is left on my or laura or ford’s plate and deep inside, i can only hope it will get him through to lunch. 

 

after breakfast, we return to the roomette and find that gol has turned the beds up and reconfigured the chairs and table.  friday’s edition of the grand forks herald and cups with ice and cranberry juice rest on the table. 

 

the excitement of last night has been replaced by a lack of sleep and despite the coffee infusion, i feel sluggish.  we look out the window as eastern north dakota and its wheat and sunflower fields are replaced by the scorched brown, rolling hills and oil wells of the north dakota badlands. 

 

we are moving towards the west at 80 mph and as north dakota passes, the window becomes the compelling center of our journey. 

the summer is gone, as is saw-whet boy.  i haven’t blogged in a while and soon, will blog no more forever.  our trip to washington and oregon was an amazing journey of reconnection and discovery and relief (no owlman progeny were discovered).  sadly i was unable to recover any of the brain cells i deposited in the pacific northwest in the late 70’s.  here’s the story…

 

august 14, 2008

 

the golden one and i are sitting in the amtrak station, waiting for the empire builder to pick us up for what will be a 38 hour journey to the emerald city, seattle.  our presence at the depot is the culmination of planning and patience, with the goal of rest, relaxation, and reconnection, sprinkled with a bit of serendipitous discovery. 

 

for me, this is a return to my roots; my first train trip since 1980 but one of many in my lifetime.  for nikolai, this will be his first train ride that lasts more than an hour and has nothing to do with boston. 

 

the décor of the station suggests “seedy motel”.  the luster of the walls has been lost to repeated scourings to remove graffiti; the carpet is stained and the reason why god invented shoes.  the bitter taste in my mouth can only be apprehension.  for nikky though, it is all new.  he is wide-eyed and can’t believe he will soon get to sleep on a train. 

 

just as my angst is rising like the phoenix bird from the urban ashes, however, i discover the total and complete bliss of rail travel:  if you have a sleeping room, you are traveling first class.  first class means your meals are paid for, your car attendant brings you things you don’t want, and perhaps most importantly, you are invited to the amtrak wine and cheese party as you speed across the desiccated plains of central montana. 

 

interestingly, and heretofore unbeknownst to me, those benefits begin at the station.   

 

at the ticket counter the agent writes a numerical code on my ticket, then directs us to the back of the terminal, towards a pair of sliding glass doors.  i punch in the number and magically, enter the first class lounge.  when the doors close behind us, the stains and detritus of the common people are but lurid memories.  we have just become members of the traveling elite. 

 

the first class lounge is clean, with comfortable couches and chairs and a big screen t.v. that is fixed on the olympics.  unlike the main terminal, it is possible to get up from a chair in the lounge without having the chair get up with you. 

 

within minutes i feel the viscous fluids of snobbery coursing through my veins. 

 

me. 

 

the owlman. 

 

traveling first class. 

 

i look through the glass doors and immediately feel the urge to drill in anwr, raise the taxes of society’s unfortunates, and start an unprovoked war.  

 

for the golden one, his summer without t.v means he must make up for lost time and so, sits transfixed in front of the screen while enjoying hand-squeezed carrot juice. 

 

in the main terminal, there are cock fights. 

 

with each pressing of the security code, the first class lounge moves closer to capacity.  entering are family groups and couples and moms and dads and retirees.  over the next 38 hours, we will come to know most of their stories. 

 

the empire builder arrives 10 minutes early, which in railroad lingo means it is only 8 hours late.  since we are going all the way to seattle, our name is called last.  our attendant grabs our bags and leads us to car 732, room 17. 

 

the roomette is small, but functional and clean, with awaiting beds turned down.  i can’t sleep though, because this journey along the infrastructure of my childhood has left me completely invigorated.  nikky, meanwhile, can’t sit still.  he has waited since february for this day to arrive and now that it is here, sleep will be all but impossible.  i summon gol, our attendant, and ask him to put the chairs and table back into play. 

 

as soon he is finished, the whistle blows and almost imperceptibly, the train moves forward on its journey to the pacific ocean. 

there’s nothing like a d.r.e. to get the blogging juices flowing again.  don’t know why that is and given my history, i might have to make a weekly d.r.e. appointment to sustain any blogging productivity but the truth is, even that might not help. 

 

i have done nothing owl-related in nearly a month now and as occurs every july after the days start their quickening, i wonder aloud what my strigidaen function will be and perhaps more importantly, how long i can sustain it. 

 

growing old has its benefits, but retaining youthful vigor and passion aren’t among them.  there isn’t enough time in a day, not enough days in a week, not enough weeks a year to get all the things done that i need to do.

 

owling is no longer something i need to do.  there was a time when it was but as priorities evolve, i am more and more inclined to allow the halcyon nights to nestle within the synapses of nostalgia; reconnecting when I want to and not when i have to. 

 

don’t know if that makes any sense.

 

maybe.

 

maybe not. 

 

i remain content knowing that whatever i do (or don’t) in the future, i wouldn’t trade the past 22 years of owling for anything.  okay 18 years…the past 4 have sucked. 

 

i have started to get things in order for the onslaught of saw-whets and what should be an up tick in boreals this fall.  whitefish point banded a number of boows (i think around 60) this spring and so the population is geared towards making a visit to the center of the universe.  i mean tofte. 

 

one never knows until one finds out. 

 

the golden child and i are having fun, albeit fun that is centered on our humble five acres.  we are splitting and stacking 10 cords of birch and maple, which will easily keep us warm for two winters.  unless nikky leaves the door open. 

 

we are busy with fresh chard and peas and broccoli and lettuce and beet greens and all that is occurring outside of our (still) unfinished greenhouse.  our tomato crop should be bountiful and soon it will be fresh cucumber and tomato salads galore. 

 

I like summer.  I love winter. 

 

is that wrong? 

 

we are soon to take a trip on amtrak to seattle whereupon our arrival we will visit friends and relatives and i will begin an earnest search for all those brain cells i lost during my earlier tenure in the pacific northwest.

 

being a railroad brat, i gave nikky the following sage advice: “look buddy, the nice thing about train travel is that if you can’t find dad, you just march right up to the bar car and that’s where he’ll be.” 

 

actually, not.  we have a sleeping room with a table and chairs and a spittoon and so, it should be a great adventure. 

 

and dang it, i am running out of stuff to talk about so i guess i had best make another appointment at the clinic. 

 

so there. 

it has been a while since i graced this site.  nothing other than a full plate of things to do, places to go, people to see. 

 

the first wave of passen