TrainStories

                                                                        Jerry 1
Man, now I’m thinking way back here. remembering all the nuts I have worked with. All the crap we’ve had to deal with over the years. Lol I’m gonna write you the story of one Jerry Garcia. No, not the Grateful Dead singer. Lol Garcia is not his last name. I have forgotten it over time. Jerry was…or is I guess…I think he’s still alive. Lol Jerry is Portareckin, Vietnam veteran, father of 8 I believe. We use to run together on the City of New Orleans back in the mid eighties.   Jerry worked the first two coach cars and I worked the second two. We ran together on and off for about 5 years. Mostly New Orleans. Back then Amtrak had all the employees rooming together at the hotels. I always got Jerry.   Jerry was a nice guy but was really a victim of his own misadventures.
This one trip in particular Jerry and I were in New Orleans when they were hosting the worlds fair. 1986 I believe it was. It was the last day of the fair so we went to check it out along with the French Quarters. We were at a hotel that was right there, right in the middle of the Quarters. Well we had us a good ole’ time. Drinkin’ and walkin around. Lookin at all the people and things. We got back to the hotel around 10pm totally exhausted. Jerry had a pint of rum with him in the room so we were sippin’ on that and shootin’ the chit. I went to bed and Jerry stayed up drinking and watching TV. He fell asleep for maybe an hour when the fireworks started going off.    The room was totally dark but the shades were open. I remember hearing the loud explosions of the percussion fire works. You know the ones. The big bright flash with the loud as hell boom. Anyway, it woke me up just enough to peep out my half closed eye and realize what they were. The fair was closing down and they were signaling it’s closure with fireworks. We were so close that the whole room lit up and the windows rattled when they went off.
The room had two double beds. Mine was up against the window and Jerry’s was on the other side next to the wall. I was laying on my left hand side wishing these fireworks would end so I can get back to sleep. I was half asleep, half awake. Ready to go back to dream land when from Jerry’s side of the room I hear a banshee scream. I just about died right there. My heart went from sleep mode to jackhammer mode in no time. My whole body stiffened waiting for what, I don’t know. I turn my head and roll over on my back half expecting to see some ax murder hacking Jerry up. lol But my head got no farther than half way. Something big and dark was flying through the air towards my bed. I’m frozen in fear. As this “thing” was flying over my bed it was screaming…”Gooks in the tree line!!! Gooks in the tree line!!!”
Jerry hit the sliding glass door that lead to the balcony (how it never broke is beyond me) and laid in a heap next to my bed. Jumping up on to his knees he leans onto my bed and assumes the firing position.
I’m laying there frozen. The only thing moving are my eyes and there as big as baseballs. Lol Do I dare talk? What in the hell is all this??? Am I dreaming?? I finally work up the nerve to utter a sound. The first thing I say is “Ummmmmm…….I think there gone now. You scared them away.” The way I figured it he about had me scared to death so if there were any “Gooks” in the tree line they had to be at least as scared as I was. Lol
It was then he looked at me. I’m like “Oh shit” lol. But I could see his goofy gaped tooth grin spread across his face. I was never more relieved to see another man smile at me, I’ll tell Ya. Hahahaha…. I asked him if he was ok. After he said he was I asked him if it was ok to turn on the lights. He said sure. Up to this point I had not a clue as to what just happened. I just wanted to make sure I was talking to the same Jerry that I went to the fair with.
Once the light was on I could see he had that look of embarrassment on his face. I asked him if he had a nightmare. “Something like that.” he said. We stayed up and talked for awhile. I wasn’t ever going to sleep again I believed. Lol Jerry told me that night about being in Vietnam and some of the awful things he had to endure. That sometimes he dreams he’s back there. He has what I guess we’d call “Sleeping flashbacks”. The fireworks set him off. Making him think he was back there. He said this has happened before but not often. I asked him if there was any kind of help he could get and he just shrugged and said, “How do you erase memories?”
Really makes a person think just how lucky we are after all.
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