The Furious Spinner

Finally fell to sleep about 5:00 a.m. I awakened a few hours later to the sound of sirens. Fell back to sleep. Awakened again to sirens. I had never heard so many sirens and police cars. Something was up in the hood. On our way to Portland an hour later, we heard an Amtrak train had derailed near Home Valley, which is about five minutes east of where we live, near Linda's house.

We went to visit a friend on her houseboat near Sauvie Island, about 20 minute northwest of Portland. I hadn't been to a houseboat 'burb before. My friend calls it her floatopia. Maybe a dozen homes floated on either side of a dock on the north side of Sauvie Island. It reminded me of homes along the ocean, only there weren't any beaches. While we talked inside the floatopia, the water streamed by the house, reflecting the changes in the weather. The clouds grew darker, then lighter, then darker. It rained. It stopped raining. Birds came and went from her feeder. The houseboat rocked slightly when someone went by in a boat. It was quiet and peaceful.

We got home just as it was getting dark. We drove to the train wreck. The road had been closed for most of the day, but now it was open. We stood—just the two of us—in the dark and the rain watching as huge machines moved the engine off the tracks (or onto the tracks). Three cars behind it leaned against the embankment. We had heard no one had been seriously hurt. I hoped that was true. Spotlights illuminated the tracks, train, two huge yellow CATs, and workers dressed in orange, making it all look like a movie set.

We stayed until we were shivering from the rain and cold, and then we went home. 0 comments

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All photographs and written material copyright © 2003-2008 by Kim Antieau unless otherwise indicated. May not be used without permission.