The station survived to see its second century. These pictures were taken on a cloudy day in late 2006, and you can see the forlorn FOR RENT sign in the window. The station was restored at great expense in the 1990s, and had a few incarnations as a restaurant and brew pub. Good beer. I had one my last meals with my Mom here; we sat in the part of the restaurant that had once been the waiting room. I don’t know if my Mom ever took the train, frankly. It never came up. My father had left from the station in the forties, on his way to engage in the unpleasant necessities then underway in the Pacific Ocean. I remember he sat with his back to the tracks. Didn’t have to worry about missing the train this time.
Amtrak still stops here, early in the morning. I’ve disembarked from this station at 3 AM many times, and it’s something everyone should experience. You can’t help but feel as though you’ve been pitched back fifty years. To climb off a train into the middle of a city in the heart of the night is to step into a place removed from the 24/7 always-on world; the streetlights blink yellow, the buildings are dark, the neon signs extinguished. If it’s a short stop the train pulls away while you’re still on the platform, and you feel the ground tug beneath your feet, as though you stood in the wake of a great ship. The train clanks and huffs away; the crossing guards cease clanging, and the arms swing up. It’s silent again, but you knew if your ears were good enough, you could still hear the rails sing.
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