found drama

We are in our living room. It is ours, and yet I do not recognize this place, this cock-eyed curiosity of a room. Perhaps our living room from Barre – the floors certainly are reminiscent of that house – but it is bent and crooked. And a railroad runs through it.

When we discover the railroad, The Boy is excited. He can see trains whenever he wants! They will practically come to visit him!

Except, these rails run right through the middle of our home. So hazardous.

And sure enough, it isn’t long before we hear the far-off horn of an on-coming train. The Boy is excited but we notice that he has set up his toy train set all over the living room floor. Right across the tracks. I grab The Boy to keep him safe while A. swoops down and tries to sweep aside the train set. It is almost futile gesture, and rather than get all the pieces off the track, it seems as though the pieces are simply re-arranged. We trade places: she holds back The Boy and I (looking down the railroad to note the train’s progress) get down on hands and knees and try to dismantle the train set (much to The Boy’s protests) and cast the pieces aside in an effort to save them.

The train seems to take forever in coming down the tracks – it is fast but still seems slow, and always inevitable – and for every piece cast aside, it seems another one is drawn to the tracks. As if there were some kind of magnetic force drawing each wooden piece. And as the pile of saved pieces (far off in the corner) grows, so does the pile stacked atop the rails. At last, the train is perilously close and I cast myself out of its way.

About Rob Friesel