Amtrak to Portland and back

As you look out the window from the observation car of the Coastal Starlight somewhere south of Springfield and north of Chemalt and see the old red Chevy pick-up truck catapulting ahead of you on the country road beside the track, all you can do is sit back and accept the fact that you'll arrive home sometime a little later than you thought possible, and that maybe that's not such a bad thing after all.

Dinner's between remarkable and ok, lamb shanks and succotash, a warm roll with butter, and a small salad, all but the main course served on plastic plates. Chuck, the server, is a little rough around the edges: he brings the wine a few minutes after the main course, for instance, and forgets you ordered water too until he remembers, all the time acting like he expects a tip but not offensively so, more like the counselor at the summer camp for rich kids who's having a good time on minimum wage.

Finally it's night. The sleeper car squeaks but nothing that cramming a hand towel in the crack between the mirror and the sink can't fix. You lie on your bunk bed, your partner on the bed above you, close your eyes and listen; you don't gather your thoughts, your thoughts gather you. Night is the best part of the trip, everything is left to the imagination when it's dark and the train is rolling and you know where you're going but you don't know where you are.

Soon you feel your sleep going around curves, then idling at a small station somewhere in the mountains, then lurching forward trying to pick up speed. The train is testing your new relationship with sleep: that you don't need as much as you once needed but you need more of what you now have.