train tracks

Ok.  I admit it.  I grew up next to the train tracks.  I know that is a supposedly a bad thing, but I am really thinking my life in Glen Rock (twist, twist) taught me more common sense than I realized. 

The news a few nights ago had yet another story about a person who was walking, talking on a cell phone, and got run over by a train.  How the Hell do you NOT see the train tracks?  You know I do, and not only do I see them, but every time I cross them, in car, or or feet, or even on a bus (especially on a bus) I expect to look up and see a massive engine barreling down on me. 

I used to think this was paranoid behavior, but I realize now that it is not.  I have walked the tracks, crossed the tracks, and survived.  And it did not take much sense at ALL.  Hello, LOOK when you are anywhere near train tracks.  They are easily noticable, big metal lines and gates going down a nd red flashing lights too.  Hard to miss.

Of course, if you walk on the tracks as though you were a train, you are a sitting duck.  You simply cannot hear the train barreling down on you, and when you do hear it, you are about 10 feet away.  It happened to me once.  And I got lucky, as I threw myself and my friend over into the rocky pit and we were a bit scuffed up but we were not flat as a board.  First time Sue was thankful for that!  (yes, she was flat)  (she still is)

So, if you are listening to your iPod or MP3 player or talking on your cell phone or texting on your Crackberry, please remember that you are not alone in the world, that there are trucks, trains, cars, bears, cougars, endless ways to die when you do not know what is lurking behind you. 

Sometimes I am thinking I am not so paranoid.