Amtrak offers valuable insights into Einstein's concept of time/space continuum. Time moves at four speeds, at least: scheduled time, actual time, changing time zones, and dining car times, as the 6.30 p.m. contingent out-sits and out-chews the 7 p.m., 7.30 p.m. and 8 p.m. shifts with stolid determination. We meet some interesting diners. Forty percent of our chance table companions turn out to be missionaries.White Christmas amidst Michigan steel mills passing by, a few enormous casinos in-between. Lay-over at Chicago"s Union Station, where the only source of lunch is a grubby hole-in-the wall Chinese take-out. A barely readable sign under the greasy window boasts: “Zagat Rated” - the American Michelin Guide. I get a “Merry Charismas” email from some Middle-East organization.
“The train is delayed, because there is something wrong with the locomotive. It isnt working”. Eventually passengers are herded single-ï¬le by an employee wearing a Christmas hat with a flickering light bulb to an automatic door to the tracks. It wont open. “The door is frozen - all turn around”. From a deep armchair a transit passenger, Old Testament-like grey beard down to his belt mutters: “The last shall be ï¬rst”.
Night falls. A lady is wearing a T-shirt reading: “Eat Safely Use Condiments”. As we near the Mississippi, the train slows to a walking pace, mile after mile. This is not Amtrak"s fault, we are told over the loudspeakers, as the actual track belongs to the Burlington and Ohio Railroad and “they have been having a lot of problems with their signals”, and so “we are going to be a bit late pulling into Denver” adding, darkly: “Sometimes forces are aligned against us”. Eventually the train speeds up again. Hauled by three engines, the California Zephyr threads its way along canyon bottoms, and eventually reaches Salt Lake City.
Heading for a sushi bar we cross the Olympic Plaza shopping mall"s central square. Suddenly ice-cold water shoots up between our legs, freezing our crotches. Having rushed to safety, we see a tiny sign which we should not have overlooked: “Get ready to get wet This fountain is hard to resist. Kids of all ages (even parents) play in this fountain, and it"s a great way to cool off in the summer months.” Less so on arctic winter days. Google sheds light on the mystery: “A large stone version of the snowflake logo from the Olympics forms the shape of a ground-level fountain, which features shooting jets of water synchronized to the Olympics" theme and other music. The #water dance" goes off every 30 minutes, for 10 minutes at a stretch, though the times in between are just as much fun.” Quite.
On the way to Moab, Utah. The temperature is 16 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 10 degrees C). A road signs flicks by: “Green River Welcomes You. Celebrate our Melons”. Most Moab stores and restaurants close down for the Winter, but there is always Eddie MacStiff’s place:
Arches National Park, Canyonlands Park, small roads and tracks up and down a meandering stretch of the Colorado River. Frozen stonescapes. Another world altogether of magnificent beauty in radiant sunlight or reddening dusk - orange, green, purple layers, snow at their feet, a few tufts of grass and some shrubs breaking out here and there. Rocks take on imaginary shapes - here an eagle, a fat pigeon, Three Wise Men, ancient Mayan ruins, Abu Simbel; there, the Burghers of Calais, some unmentionable shapes, a penitent hooded monk - a 3-dimensional Rorschach test shifting with the shade.
