Obsessed With Trains

One time, not so long ago, well actually when I was three and living in Littleton Colorado, I ran away from home. I made it over the railroad ties in our backyard, past the craw-dad pond and the sledding hill where Chris and Cate played. I crossed the red ant hill unscathed, and I think I crossed the canal. Highland Drive was out of sight when I arrived at the end of the rainbow in my little world: the train tracks. I couldn't believe how cool those big trains were as they steamed past, blowing their loud whistles. The coal cars and the hay cars, followed by oil cars and other truck cars. I must've only been a few feet away from the track, my front-row seats that cost nothing. This was the best day ever.

Unfortunately, my mom and dad didn't think it was very cool. I must've felt my mom grabbing me and hugging me long before I heard her yelling at me for running away because I was still listening to the caboose clickety-clack through the crossing. I couldn't believe they didn't share my enthusiasm for such direct interaction with the train Gods.

After we moved to Salt Lake, my favorite cousin, Grandpa Bill, was relegated to entertaining me everytime I visited as he ran the electric train in circles for hours in a row to quench my train-thirst. I don't think it took more than ten seconds for the train to go full circle, but it didn't matter. I sat on his three-legged, wooden stool staring at the train until he either told me the train was broken or just broke it himself.

Needless to say, I was more than enthusiastic when Sadie expressed her first interest in Thomas the Tank Engine last year. She is basically a chip off the old block. If we enter a toy store and it has a train table set up, she's not leaving. She hated Chris and Jari's house (because we've abandoned her there while Abby and I went on a few dates in the past) until she discovered they have a train table. Now visits to the Chris Cannons can't come soon enough. Same with cousin Todd's. Train pieces = entertainment.

So Sadie was very pleased when she came down into our basement last September to find a wooden train set up on a table, with several Thomas engines ready to go. (Just took us six months to write about it!)

Here is her reaction:



While Toots and I can at last enjoy a few moments of peace while she's preoccupied, I confess that I will probably be in the basement more often than Sadie...