Graduation hadn’t been but a couple of days, yet already it seemed ages ago. Life was blowing thru the young man’s hands as he stood on the back balcony of the train. The passenger cabin was far enough back from the engines to smell the burn of coal in the air.
He wasn’t Pampy back in these days though. To the world surrounding his young eyes, he was Sol. His smile was not as innocent as it was before the war, and he looked and felt much older than he really was. The swift gust of air and the depth of blackness of the tunnels put a grin on his face. Traveling by train is always a bit more of an adventure. The tunnel passed and Sol made his way back into the cabin. The windows were down, so the fresh air of the oncoming mountains filled the cabin.
He was nervous, and his fellow passengers could sense it. The man sitting next to him was a shoe keeper from Paris and had seen the apprehension in young Sol’s eyes, “Détendez ! C’est des vacances!” he would say, telling him to realax, enjoy the vacation!
The sun was shining and the air was getting cool. Sol’s ears popped incessantly for the next two days. His eyes gazed out to the tops of what began the French Alps. He winced up at the sun out the window, and with another sudden gust of air and pitch darkness, a grin spread across his face. “C’est des vacances…” he told himself… “…c’est des vacances…”
rocks... blocks... & roadstops... 