traveling …

… on the train, from the Amtrak station in north Atlanta to New Orleans on Tuesday, November 2. Which is a nation-wide election day for those interested in political campaign promises of those who will influence policy in the US in the coming years Long before the rabbit hole adventure of the summer, plans were made and tickets purchased. Dates marked on the calendar, with great anticipation, looking forward to an amusing excursion with good company for entertainment along the way.

My personal ‘train travel’ experience is very limited. As a youth growing up in the ‘boomer’ era when travel was primarily by family vehicle, usually in the back seat, with a older brother constantly, consistently harassing a younger sibling. Most travel was limited to driving across south Georgia to summer vacations, occasional forays into north Florida, as well as a tag-along when my mom was sent to get supplies needed for my dad’s self-employment.

There is a tiny little Amtrak station on a corner of Peachtree and Canal Street overlooking I-85 in north Atlanta. With wooden benches that appear to be original furnishings, as they surely have a hundred coats of paint. There were maybe a dozen people sitting, waiting for the arrival of the passenger train when we arrived, an hour early to be sure we did not get left. A fellow passenger reported riding the train was less expensive than taking a bus to his destination from Atlanta. Possible– but it will certainly take longer, than a bus going 80 mph on the interstate.

Interesting trivia about train travel: it is possible for it to whizz along at 140 mph. Nothing we experienced, as we spent a good deal of the time shunted off onto sidings, waiting for a series of railcars traveling in the opposite direction to pass. Maybe out west, or on the wide flat plains of mid-America, but top speed for Tuesday for the eight hours we were traveling between Atlanta and New Orleans was about eighty mph. Of course, during that time we were: eating (being fed off a menu of prepared foods), or napping, or reading, or walking from car to car along with dozens of other travelers.

A great way to go to Mardi Gras without having to plan for a designated driver!

The schedule indicated the train, with dining car, as well as cars for passengers to sit, and roomette, or the option of a more expensive sleeper for those truly interested comfort in it for the long haul. Breakfast as well as a packaged lunch were served in the roomette, which was a tiny space with two bench seats and knees nearly touching. In the dining car for dinner, although it too appeared to be the sort of meal one would expect on a inter-continental flight from a catering company.

The man providing service in our rail car, possibly with the title of ‘porter’, was someone who said he has been doing the work for nearly two decades, very friendly, courteous, well informed. Providing all the attention and answers, specific details about train travel we could ask. New Orleans is his home, but he makes the trip every four days from NO to New York and back: four on, four off. About a twelve hour layover in NYC before the crew will board for the four day return through DC and Atlanta to return to NO. Lots of questions answered: he said it takes about ten people run the route – from engineers and conductors to the people who provide services for paying customers.

The route was interesting and scenic. Lots of colorful fall foliage at the beginning, gradually transitioning to planted pine forests as we rode south across Alabama and Mississippi. A small wild fire at one point, creating dense smoke, but hopefully managed by those men in the pick up trucks on site. A vast acreage of man-made ponds that might be a large turf farm, where an endless supply of water would be needed to keep sod growing year round as it is harvested and replanted. Miles and miles of mixed hardwoods and evergreens in undeveloped areas across four states. It was too dark to see by the time we crossed the vast surface of Lake Pontchartrain, but that will be the start of the return to GA.

There were miles and miles of tracks where new, replacement ties were scattered. Apparently by crews in anticipation of getting the weathered damaged ties replaced with the new ones that will last for decades of trains rattling along that section of tracks. Passing along sidings where everything from newly completed automobiles, to tank cars filled with chemicals, and box cars loaded Amazon goods. One place where rail workers were in evidence had sections of iron rails already attached to the wooden lengths of wooden ties. With the spikes already in place to hold the assembly together. It will obviously take a crane traveling along the tracks to help move these pre-fab, ready to set into place these replacement parts. But will also shorten the amount of time necessary to get the ties in place, as well as the labor required to replace the wood one piece at a time.

There were so many interesting sights seen, glimpsed in passing as we were rattling along at forty or sixty mph that I wished we could circle around to see better: houses, or signs,or vehicles whizzing past. Or even intriguing bits of graffiti on walls, bridges, other rail cars barely viewed without truly reading. Oddities of such unusual qualities but only briefly caught in passing without enough time to really see and digest.

Sitting along the edge of the tracks in a small town in lower Alabama, likely restored by some local train buffs.

book review: “Hunting Badger”…

… by noted author Tony Hillerman, who spent many years living, researching, writing about the indigenous people of the Colorado Plateau. The vast high desert area’ in the southwest US where the four states of Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and Utah intersect at the Four Corners. Hopi, Navajo, Ute and other tribes live on reservations and government land scattered out across the area that has historic significance for the natives: where they associate origin stories and their mythology/religious history with the landscape of mountains and dry, desolate infertile thousands of acres the benevolent ‘white father’ in Washington gave as a consolation prize when the tribes were forcibly relocated.

A well planned heist has occurred at a casino on Indigenous property, with carefully thought out sequence of cutting power to the building, going in when there will be ample small bills for the thieves to circulate without notice. A smooth getaway, even though it brings a vast array of public safety men to track and trace the criminals.Men: in positions of authority, who think they know it all, and you cannot tell them anything: BIA, FBI, State Police, DA’s office.The hold-up guys disappear into the rugged terrain, leaving a damaged vehicle, but little evidence of where they could be hiding.

Hillerman’s characters work for the Navajo Tribal Police. Joe Leaphorn is recently retired, a mentor for Jim Chee. The two accumulate clues other law enforcement men overlook: why was the vehicle abandoned, how did they disappear without a trace, how long have they been planning the heist. Leaphorn is a veteran of years of law enforcement, a man who believes there is no such thing as a coincidence. Using maps that depict the geography and landscape of their native lands, Leaphorn looks for patterns, as things repeat over time – as well as listening to the elders and oral history: stories that repeat, handed down from one generation to the next.

voting, part 3 …

… as a teenager, barely old enough to register: Wanting to express my opinion so badly, I actually went to the county clerk’s office in the court house on my birthday to complete the paperwork and be ready when the next opportunity came along. As a hard-headed, argumentative, oppositional teenager, a person with an abundance of opinions about the way the country should be run. Given the chance- what sort of mess would we have been in had my ignorant self been in charge, right?

Here might be a good place to insert the confession of walking around with a forged driver’s license in order to appear old enough to purchase alcoholic beverages. Without a single nod to scruples, or even the tiniest measure of guilt: changed the year of birth on the paper-and-ink copy of the permit that would prove me of the age to be in the liquor store and buy the beer those under-age patrons were not allowed to purchase. In another century, during the era of hand-printed paper (about the weight of card stock) where the GSP officer who was doing the driving test completed the form. The man in the uniform would fill in the blanks, handing over the small slip of paper to the grinning sixteen year old. No photo attached, nothing laminated, no copy on file, just tuck that little ratty little piece of colored paper to slip into your wallet that would prove you’d done the work to pass the test.

When old enough to register to vote, as a college student, living in dorm space far from the county of residence, I had to get an absentee ballot. Available now for nearly any half-baked reason: or none at all as some states send written ballots in the mail to every registered voter who is a resident. In Colorado, for instance, where I have realtives – who report everyone who is is a registered with the state to has received a printed ballot. In addition to being able to appear on election day with proper documentation and be allowed to vote.

Not so easy for Tennessee voters who have to meet criteria like being over a certain age, living out of state, being in the military, handicapped/disabled or one of several other claims that would disallow attendance on election day. Curious now, all these years later, to know how many of the eighteen and nineteen year old students far from home actually cared enough to request and return the absentee ballot.

That paper ballot received as a student in middle GA at a small community college, also required a signature by a witness to confirm the vote was done by the person it was addressed to. It seems like the ‘official’ who had to sign was maybe the comptroller? A person with some degree of authority, for sure.

The ballot, for a once-every-four-years general election was huge: bigger than a double page spread of the average newspaper. Filled with candidates for local office, as well as county-wide, state and national positions. Wishing now for precise measurements, but really having no frame of reference for the size of the paper the detailed options of candidates was printed on, only that it was so being quite large. It might have been the poor-quality newsprint found in actual newspapers, something that is getting scarcer by the day: it’s all on line, provided by the internet, or on electronic devices. With that sheet of printed paper fully opened, completely unfolded, it seems like the size was a wide as my arms could reach – and now: on a little tablet for the voter to easily access, make a decision and put a slip of paper in a slot as they walk out the door, back into the world.

voting, part 2 …

One hundred percent of my choices: Females running for office at local, state level.

… should be a ‘rite of passage’, although it seems like many who are eligible are not interested, shirk, don’t care about what goes on enough to register and express an opinion when the opportunity arises. Which is interesting as there are so many ways, opportunities for people to get the relatively small task accomplished: it only has to be done once and the voter is established until there is a change of residence.

You have to be a citizen: proof would be a government issued photo Id, or that certificate you would be handed when you swear and are naturalized, giving up your citizenship of another country. You also have to be a resident of the state in which you are attempting to register: GA, TN, FL -which that government issued ID would also prove by having your address along with name, birth-date, etc. And you have to be eighteen years old.

Lots of options for getting oneself on the eligible voter list: You can register when you go to the DMV and get a driver’s license. You can register at your local library. You can register on line. You can register at the County Clerk’s office in the courthouse. You can register at the Health Department. You can register with the Human Services Department, or the Department of Mental Health. You can register at Public Safety, or at the Veteran’s Affairs office. You can actually pick up the form you need to complete when you are still in the courthouse after swearing your allegiance to the US: complete and mail it in to the county clerk’s office, and receive the little card that proves you are now officially a registered voter.

Remembering where I was when hearing President John Kennedy had been killed in Dallas Texas, causing vice-president Lyndon Johnson to step into that position. When Johnson was elected, I was not old enough to register. Which seems fitting- as all the men (WASP) who have been there in the white house since have not been qualified to judge a pie-eating contest. Although some have appeared corpulent enough to have been participants….

voting …

It is safe to assume the American Civil Liberties Union paid for the air time to display this banner across the metro Atlanta area.

… where the citizens express their opinions. This banner was seen in the sky over downtown Decatur on Friday, Oct.30.

Overheard a couple of people talking today about voting next week – discussing the fact that historically the option to vote prior to the actual election day in November was not a choice. You either requested an absentee ballot, or showed up on election day.. One of the pair had received an absentee ballot and actually returned it, hoping it would be received in time for the vote to be included in the totals. The other was planning to go someplace nearby, often a community center or a church that will open a fellowship hall to the public, for twelve hours to be used as a polling place.

Listening to the talk about going to vote next week, on Election Day, caused some reflection about the first time I voted in a national election. Most high school students by the time they are ready to graduate are of the age to register to vote. That does not mean they will do it: No guarantee they will take their ID and go to register to be eligible for casting a ballot in local, state, national elections – just that they are eligible, and need to take that first step.

If you don’t vote, you don’t get to complain, right?

It is more than likely my desire to become a registered voter was influenced by seeing the value my parents and grandparents put on exercising their rights at the polls. When just a small kid, there was an awareness that both of my parents were involved in the process. My mom went to the courthouse, expecting to be there at the central polling place for the county for twelve hours. From the time the doors opened for the first voter at 7 am, until the last voter had the door closed and locked behind them at 7 pm.

When those doors were closed behind the last voter in line, and the ballots secured: my dad would hand off children to my mom who went home after an exhausting day on that hard marble floor. He would, along with several other citizens would start the process of counting votes that had been deposited in the ballot box over the past twelve hours. Boxes would also be delivered from a number of precincts across the geography of the county, most were located in small country churches. Buildings that remained open for those hours when people who lived out in rural areas on farms would stop their work and take the time to go and cast a ballot. Each one counted, tallied, added together, with results reported to the capitol in Atlanta, where statewide numbers were totaled.

did not see …

… the latest version of the footwear that is universally agreed upon as hideous: the newest crocs can be purchased already decorated with girl-y flowers! There are all kinds of additional trim that has been designed to add on to those holes across the front: cartoon characters, plastic jewels for adding color and sparkle, personalized photos of family, pets, any subject of your choice. But recently seen in the internet: these with the colorful posies already applied, ready to open the box and hit the streets!

We thought the floral design was printed on – but it looks so much like actual embroidery, it’s hard to say: it almost appears that part that has the specialty detail added is a separate piece that was sewn on. More cushy on the inside, on the top of your foot as well. It is hard to believe there are people who work in jobs that require hours of being up-right who have the tolerance to wear them all day – but who knows?

You will also notice, the shoe appears to be more waterproof than the older, standard model: no perforations around the edge of the sole. Good for keeping socks dry, but not so great for people who want ventilation, those who go wading or wear them at the river/beach. For some, it might just be standard, daily foot-wear. For others, with a long history of employment that requires being vertical for hours: there just is not the support feet, ankles, legs, muscles, tendons, ligaments need to maintain health.

book review: “Code Name: Sapphire”…

… by Pam Jenoff. Jenoff is an attorney, a law professor teaching at Rutgers University. Living in New Jersey with family, she finds time to write, as an author of a number of best-sellers of historical fiction. Judging from the titles of other books she has published, many have to do with events during the WWII era in Europe. It seems reasonable to think that once you start doing the research, digging into events recently declassified and made available for public perusal, there are any number of directions a story could take.

The two main characters are Hannah and her cousin Lily. They are both Jews, living in Europe in 1942. You see what’s coming, right? Terrible terrible things that happen to millions of innocents due to the demands of a psychopath who wants to take over all of Europe. Hannah is from Germany, after loosing all her family, hoping for asylum in America. The US refuses to have the boat come into port, it is diverted to Cuba, then sent back to Europe. Hannah cables her cousin, whom she has known since childhood, to meet her when she disembarks in Belgium.

Lily is a native of Belgium, feels safe from the Nazis, a mother of a young child, wife of a beloved medical professional. The Nazis slowly put more pressure on civilians, citizens of Belgium, forcing Lily’s husband to quit his practice. Hannah begins to volunteer as a Resistance worker after a chance encounter with Mateo, then meeting his sister Micheline, the head of a cell. Micheline’s code name as the organizer of the group of Resistance workers is ‘Sapphire’, thus the title of the book.

Hannah gets entangled in a relationship with Mateo, only to later discover her cousin Lily knows him from a past relationship. Plot has twists and turns as the Resistance plots to help downed airmen escape, travel across France to freedom in Spain. Germans make more demands, limit movement, as the civilians and especially Jews are confined, deported, taken to work camps.

The book is a set of CD’s at found at the library, although available in print. It is a well written story, with much detail about life in dire circumstances, horrors of work camps, deprivation, brutality of Germans. The author has other books in print that focus on this era, including “The Orphan’s Tale”. Having worked in the Pentagon, and served as a diplomat with the State Department, she has devoted time to reading and researching life in Europe during the WW II era.

book review: “The First Eagle”…

… by Tony Hillerman. This author, deceased, (1925-2008) wrote a number of books that follow the same characters, a pair of law enforcement workers who live in the southwest US. The copyright for this title printed inside the front coveris1998. The number of books listed here by Hillerman numbers twenty, although there are likely more from his prolific pen over the years. Googling indicates the total is near thirty, including some non-fiction, compilations and books for youngsters.

There is a large population of Indigenous people in this area, where they live on property set aside as reservations for the Native Americans. As usual, the US government provided these tribes Hopi, Navajo and others with land that is practically useless: rocky, mountainous, infertile, dry sandy desert, unsuitable for growing crops or sustaining livestock. Though the terrain is harsh, often foreboding, the natives acclimated to lack of rain, stony landscape, desert conditions, they carry on with traditional ways as they have done for centuries.

Details about the land, people, life-styles demonstrate the authors’ knowledge and familiarity with the indigenous people: relationships and genealogy, acknowledged to keep families intact. Influences of ancestors, historical oral traditions passed from one generation to the next as the elders teach and train younger tribal members. Prayers and blessings observed by the traditionalists with the goal of maintaing their folk-ways and ceremonies handed down over the centuries.

The geography of the landscape with hundreds of miles of barren lands, mesas and mountains at the edge of the horizon, rough unpaved roads leading to remote homes, hogans, abandoned farm/ranch land prove the author’s love for the raw land and inhabitants.The retired Joe Leaphorn, and the acting Lt Jim Chee take on another in a series of challenges. Traveling to remote trading posts, abandoned homesteads, climbing rocky cliff faces, following nearly invisible tracks across the rocky landscape in search for evidence.

Actually not the first time I read this book. But reuniting with the main characters was like rejoining old friends. I might not have read all his books, especially the few published as non-fiction, but think all ones with the pair of law enforcement men are familiar enough to be able to guess the outcome by the time I would get half way in.

book review: “Catch Me If You Can”…

… by international scoundrel and thief Frank Abagnale, with the assistance of Stan Redding. The book was copyrighted in 1998, optioned to become a movie and languished for years before actually becoming a screenplay, with Tom Hanks cast as the FBI Agent tasked with the capture of the as the pursuer of the blatant impersonator. Cast as the imposter, ner-do-well was Leonardo di Caprio as the man who became known internationally as one of the most daring con men in modern times.

Abagnale was a high school drop-out. His parents separated, he chose to live with his dad,while siblings stayed with their mother. Starting down the slippery slope when using a gas credit card of his father, to fund his outlandish life-style, he assured his dad he would pay the debt. But found a life-style of excess to be so tempting, he became addicted to luxury, always having cash on hand, beautiful women to woo and escort, living in style in New York City, unable to reign in his desires.

Surprising to discover how easy one might slip into another dimension, impersonating people with education, skills and experience he had no knowledge of: becoming a Pan Am co-pilot, with all the benefits that accompany such a position of prestige. He hitched rides across the globe, endeared himself to other employees, took advantage of their payroll with bogus, doctored payroll checks. Eventually having checks printed for his personal use, taking them to banks, wearing the uniform of the pilot, letting people assume he was a pilot. Kiting checks across the US and Europe, bankrolling a lifestyle he could never afford. The true definition of ‘paper hanger’, as he used the stolen uniform, false identification to enjoy the life of wealth in exotic locales across three continents.

The book is about the size of a paperback,less that three hundred pages.

At the end of the publication, there are several pages of questions posed to the author, with his responses. If you believe what is printed, you will find him repentant, having mended his wayward behavior and happily settled into a family lifestyle. Hard to believe someone who spent years jet-setting from Miami to the Mediterranean and partying with the beautiful young airline employees who traveled the skies would be content as a husband and dad. Although he was recruited to work with the Treasury Dept., and also an in-demand public speaker, for him to settle into a life of raising a family some where in the mid-west does seem like a stretch of the imagination. Abagnale is also the founder of a secure documents company based on the east coast.