My mug of coffee steams like a sentient being and hums between my palms. The clerk smiles when I place a dollar tip in the jar. She has a purple streak in her hair. I wait my turn at the fixings table. The woman in front of me adds one Sweet’N Low and a shake of non-dairy chemicals to her cup and selects a wooden stirring stick from the open container. After vigorously swishing her brew she discards the little stick in the trash, its purpose on this earth completed. I step up and add a generous dose of half-and-half to my cup and stream the raw sugar from two paper packets into the mug. I reach for my own personal wooden stirring stick and as I gaze into the swirling ink and ivory I fall into a vortex of memory that smells like morning and horses and hot greasy steel …
I used to work on an excursion train that ran from a small town to a national park every morning and then returned in the afternoon. It was a glorious steam train that belched fire and gusts of steam and snorted smoke like a dragon and pounded down the iron rails like a fury barely contained. My job was to dress up like a cowboy and stroll through the cars strumming my guitar and singing cowboy songs for folks that came from all over the world to ride the train and see the wonders of the national park. On a good day everyone had fun and spirits ran high and appreciative listeners would stuff dollar bills in my vest pockets. Every day on the train was an adventure. Would there be a famous person riding? Would the train hit a car at a crossing? Would someone suffer a fatal heart attack and would I have to sing “Oh Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie” with a corpse at my feet? Would a Russian mail-order bride get exotically drunk and provide the drama of the day?
On the return trip a desperate group of mounted outlaws would appear alongside the train and give chase firing pistols in the air. I was singing once for a single mother from L.A. with boys aged about 6 and 10. When the shots rang out the boys dropped to the floor and crawled under the seats. Their mother said apologetically, “We hear shots often where we live.” The shots were the signal for the train to slow and stop and allow the robbers to board. It also was the sign for the musicians to wind up their programs. I would find a corner and observe.
The job of train robber appealed to a strange cross section of folks. The attractions were obvious. Where else can you cultivate such an anti-establishment persona? Dress down in greasy leathers and shave only seasonally, strap on serious hardware even if it is loaded with blanks and behave in a threatening manner to God-fearing citizens? They would burst into a car with noise and bluster and the women and children would shriek as they shouted “Gimme all your money!” They were a rag tag bunch of misfits from various backgrounds. A few had been policemen, some ex-military, electricians and school teachers. Most of them had some history with horses, although a few were meeting them for the first time on this job. Galloping a strange horse alongside a rattling groaning monster became a baptism by fire when the engineer lay on the whistle and explosively vented the steam. I eagerly watched to see whether a new robber could sit his horse. Sometimes this impromptu rodeo was the best part of the show. Horse and rider would gallop behind a grove of junipers, but only the horse would emerge from the other side.
If I ever knew his Christian name, I’ve forgotten it now. Muley was a Vietnam vet and the war left him with a funny eye and a scarred face only partly covered by his wild growth of beard. He dressed in slick leathers, dusty canvas and a tattered hat. He was so authentic looking that he traveled in his own little cloud of dust like Charlie Brown’s Pigpen. He was a kind and gentle man but he looked fierce and capable of the unknown. Once while he was three sheets to the wind, he attracted the attention of the town police when he rode his horse the wrong way down the center of the one-way main street. The robbers might have a dozen cars to plunder so they would move pretty quickly. Muley marched to the beat of a different drummer and often trailed the main group of desperadoes by a couple of cars. When the train management decided to give feedback cards to riders to evaluate their trip, Muley came out of the bathroom with a roll of toilet paper and proceeded to pass out squares. “Please fill out this form and tell us about your experience.”
One day, I sat in the bar car as the main pack of outlaws blew through like a Monsoon squall and left everyone looking a little bewildered in the aftermath. Then the door opened and Muley stepped into the swaying car like William S. Hart taking a silent stage. His legs were stiff and bowed and he took abnormally high steps. In each hand was a drawn pistol. He spoke not a word as he mimed stalking unseen prey to the bar. He directed his focus upon an open box of straws. He took unwrapped straws from the container and stuck one in each ear and one in each nostril. He began a slow deliberate promenade all about the bar car looking intently into each face. He returned to the bar where he removed the straws from his ears and nose and returned them to the container. Muley looked neither right nor left as he strode stiffly out of the car.
The rich smell of coffee alerts me like snapped fingers to my surroundings; the muted conversations and house sound bouncing down from the ceiling. I finish mixing my coffee and tap my stick on the rim of the cup. Without a glance I place my stirring stick back in the jar with its less experienced fellows.
