"Our journey really began several days earlier, at the ticket window of a small station in the country, when the agent showed signs of cracking under the paperwork. 'It's hard to believe,' he said, 'that after all these years I still got to write the word "Providence" in here every time I make out one of these things. Now, there's no possible conceivable way you could make this journey without going through Providence, yet the Company wants the word written in here just the same. O.K., here she goes!' He gravely wrote 'Providence' in the proper space, and we experienced anew the reassurance that rail travel is unchanged and unchanging, and that it suits our temperament perfectly--a dash of lunacy, a sense of detachment, not much speed, and no altitude whatsoever."
(E.B. White, "Railroads." The Second Tree From the Corner. Harper & Row, 1954)
These words were written in the beginning days of commercial air travel. The days of cross country rail were no longer a necessity. The continent that was born through rail is now rusty and only remnants of the tracks remain. What was the way of life became only a faint nostalgia. America had changed from rail to air and interstate highways.
A similar thing happened when the telephone was exchanged with the internet and then internet 2 opened the internet to everyone. There is a nostalgia but one day all that will remain is empty rusty tracks.
And how about you?
There is a story about how wine was carried in the Roman Empire. At that time wine was kept in leather sacs. As the wine fermented the sacks expanded. They had to be flexible but as the wine aged the wineskins hardened. These hardened wineskins could carry the old wine which had a special flavor but if kept longer would become vinegar. It has its purpose but new wine must be put into new wineskins. If new wine is put into old wineskins the wineskins will burst.
This is not a new teaching but unless we change we will lose what we have worked so hard for. There is a place for old wineskins, maybe a museum. But we must grow one more step in the understanding of love and acceptance or we will become like rusty railroad tracks.
Riding on the City of New Orleans
Illinois Central Monday morning rail
Fifteen cars and fifteen restless riders
Three conductors and twenty-five sacks of mail
All along the southbound odyssey
The train pulls out at Kankakee
Rolls along past houses, farms and fields
Passin' trains that have no names
Freight yards full of old black men
And the graveyards of the rusted automobiles
Good morning America how are you?
Don't you know me I'm your native son
I'm the train they call The City of New Orleans
I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done
Dealin' cards with the old men in the club car
Penny a point ain't no one keepin' score
Won't you pass the paper bag that holds the bottle
Feel the wheels rumblin' 'neath the floor
And the sons of Pullman porters
And the sons of engineers
Ride their father's magic carpets made of steam
Mothers with their babes asleep
Are rockin' to the gentle beat
And the rhythm of the rails is all they dream
Good morning America how are you?
Don't you know me I'm your native son
I'm the train they call The City of New Orleans
I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done
Nighttime on The City of New Orleans
Changing cars in Memphis, Tennessee
Half way home, we'll be there by morning
Through the Mississippi darkness
Rolling down to the sea
And all the towns and people seem
To fade into a bad dream
And the steel rails still ain't heard the news
The conductor sings his song again
The passengers will please refrain
This train's got the disappearing railroad blues
Good night, America, how are you?
Don't you know me I'm your native son
I'm the train they call The City of New Orleans
I'll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done
Song written by Steve Goodman and ironically copyright owned by Sony
ありがとうございました
감사합니다
Thank you
Now let's compare Arlo's version with Steve's original:
Can anyone listen to Steve Goodman without smiling? Chicago was never the same. He sings his own song with gusto. It loses Arlo's meditative mellow prophetic voice but in it's place we find Steve's vibrancy in the original version and sit back and smile. We reminisce at times past and hope for our nation's future.
peace
@mineopoly