By Barbara Ledford Wright
A rose-colored sunset painted the sky at the railway station in Georgia. Snow covered the ground and continued to pile up. Great diesel passenger trains rolled day and night.
When my husband, Randy Wright, was a little boy, he loved watching the long trains. Living in the South, he remembers the time he and his parents boarded a train for Christmas in Chicago. The folks dressed in their warmest winter clothing while they waited to board.
Eating inside the train was like going to a fine restaurant. Fresh flowers were as much a part of the serving as the ever-full silver coffee pot. Randy pressed his nose against the window, and the full moon splashed light across his face.
The three climbed steps to the observation dome. They found the Big Dipper in the sky, and Randy exclaimed, “I think I’ll get me a drink!” Everyone laughed.
The whipping of the steel rail made them sleepy. In their compartment the porter pulled down their beds. He chuckled and said, “Good night, sleep tight, and don’t let the bedbugs bite.”
The rocking motion put them to sleep, but later an ear-piercing horn roused them. Randy jerked up the shade. The locomotive screeched to a shuddering halt in a coal mining town.
Some miners peered in at the three wearing their pajamas. Randy’s mother squealed, “Get that shade down! For heaven’s sake, we can’t have any sleep or privacy.”
The Capitol Limited rumbled out of Georgia and through Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana — all the way to the Great Hall at Chicago Union Station. Traveling by the rail path was an adventure Randy never forgot about living in Georgia.