One of my earliest memories of my grandparents was the train set that my grandfather would set up every Christmas season.  It was a nice sized setup by any standard, and in the eyes of 3- or 4-year-old it was enormous.  It would occupy a huge area in the den next to the television set, and the Christmas tree was sitting in a corner of the layout on top of a small tunnel just big enough for the trains to go through.  There were two locomotives, both Lionel O27 -- one was a Santa Fe FA-1 A-B diesel combo in the Warbonnet paint scheme and the other was a steam locomotive I never knew much about, both with appropriate rolling stock.  He'd run the trains every time some of the grandkids came over, but especially so on Christmas Eve.  The layout was truly a magical thing, especially in the glow of the lights from the tree, and it persists as one of the fondest memories I have both of my grandfather and of my early childhood.

I think this is the reason behind my love of trains.  Not fashionable anymore for anything other than hauling freight and arousing the ire of hurried motorists, trains at one time were the backbone of this nation and to a large extent made possible modern industrialization.  In fact, until post-World War II times, trains were the primary means of continental long-distance transportation; passenger trains still ran until the 1980s when Amtrak -- the government-subsidized passenger trains -- was the only remaining service of its kind left in existence.  Amtrak still runs, and the venerable City of New Orleans is the closest one to my location, connecting New Orleans to Chicago through Memphis.

Many won't understand my love of trains, but there are those of you out there who get a small rush when you see the lights start blinking red, the crossing gates drop, and hear that familiar two long-one short-two long blast of the air horn.  So next time you get caught by the train, look and listen -- a piece of American history is rolling by.