“[…] but a world that might have Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster is clearly superior to one that definitely does not.”
― Chris Van Allsburg
Every year, on Christmas Eve, a train travels the world, stopping at every door and under each window. Children lie awake, under thick duvets, holding their breaths for rustling snow, creaking wheels, and the ringing, silvery bell of the Polar Express. Heartbeats.
Some say it is not real. They are wrong. And hard of hearing. The train appears. The passengers scurry out of bed.
“All Aboard!”
In snowman pyjamas, onto the train, by glittering starlight. Holly red seats, velvet warm. Oak panelling that smells of holidays, night sky through the glass domes. Chandeliers one can, and is allowed to, swing on.
Window view. The moustached conductor solemnly punches golden tickets. Those appear magically. The beverage cart follows. Fine china cups trimmed with gold, adorned with dancing polar bears, steaming with hot cocoa, rich and thick as melted chocolate. Spills are okay. The bell rings, sings, one final time. Huff, puff, whistle, tchoo!
goes the train.
On a journey over mountains “so high it seemed as if we would scrape the moon;” through boreal forests teeming with rabbits, reindeer, wolves; across an sea of sparkling ice; to a city, finally, where people are kind, wishes come true, and magic is real.
Once upon many, many years ago, I heard that bell. The world from my window was wild, wide, expansive then. “Each and every dandelion reverberating with possibility.” My animal crackers did backstrokes in my cocoa, it was so creamy.
I rode that train and grew up. I rode others, to Edinburgh, Rennes, Brussels, Barcelona, Caux, Coney Island. A nameless village on the Dutch-German border. By mistake. There are none. To the last stop on the Red Line; I fell asleep. To closing time, countless times, at Luna Parks. To the North Pole, again and still.
I still hear the bell, and there is still a worldful of trains to ride. There are daily trains from Paris to Berlin, Budapest to Vienna. Third-class Trans-Siberian sleepers from Moscow to Beijing, or – why not – all the way to Vladivostok.
The Orient Express, California Zephyr, the Heart of Wales. The breezy Riviera Rail, Japanese bullet trains. There is a train that lines the Indian Konkan coast, one that unites North and South Vietnam, one that rides down Peru and one that climbs Tibet.
There are trains with gilded dining cars serving champagne and oysters; trains with no doors, no toilets; trains with aquarelle panels. There is a train along the Wupper river, hanging upside down, and a secret underground car from the Waldorf to Grand Central Station.
There is a train to Hogwarts for those who look for it. And for those who listen, there is always a train to the North Pole. Once upon last week, I rode it.
The world was still wild, wide, expansive from the window I shared with two pairs of little hands pressing against the pane. Two matching snowman pyjamas, one in white and one in blue. Cocoa stains. It was okay. Droopy eyes, silver bells.