Plain Trains and Automobiles

Growing up I can remember only 2 different train trips with the family. One was my mom demonstrating she was a real warrior. She moved us from Washington to Michigan on a train without Dad. I have no idea how she did it, but we all made it in one piece. The real funny thing for me is that I remember sitting in the regular coach car as we pulled into the station and we were all staring out the windows to try and see our dad. Don’t remember seeing him. But I guess it worked out, after all he was around for a long time.

The second time there were more of us and our dad was with us. I remember we had a stateroom with the really cool beds that pulled down out of the wall. I remember pulling into a station, somewhere and Dad telling Mom that he would get off the train while it was stopped and pick us up some sandwiches. We were excited about that and we kept staring out the window trying to catch a glimpse of him going into the station. We failed, we were looking backwards along the train and he probably got off and on more towards the front. Well I didn’t know that, so when the train started to pull out of the station and my Dad wasn’t back, I immediately jumped to the conclusion that we had left him at the station. He was gone forever, there is no way he could catch up and he would never find us again. So I start telling Mom that Dad isn’t back and we need to stop the train. Mom looks at me like I am an idiot and tells me to hush up. Well I stopped talking and I thought I would replace it with some good ole fashion sniffling. That went over well, as you might guess, until Dad magically appeared back in the room, hurray he was saved!!!

The last time we moved was from Michigan to California, Dad had a job at an Airplane company so we had to drive out. This was in 1963 so the family station wagon was a boat, but it had that cool 3rd seat that faced the back. This is of course where my brothers and I preferred to sit. So Mom and Dad had to go cross country in a station wagon staying at cheap hotels. And the best memory of that was breakfast one morning, Dad went to the liquor store near the hotel to pick up some cereal and milk for us to eat. Unfortunately, the liquor store was out of milk, Of the white variety.

So Dad brought us Rice Crispies and Chocolate Milk.

And yes it tastes as bad as it sounds. But we were at least able to get to California in one piece. My last memory of that car is the day it pulled into the driveway of our house for the 16 years in Garden Grove.