Signs, signs, everywhere signs. I think that was put in a song once. Ha ha. I feel as though they’re there for suggestion. Unless you were one of those clueless people who keep earbuds in and don’t realize there’s a 50 ton freight train heading your way. Well, that wasn’t me today. No earbuds in, and well aware of my surroundings. The part about ignoring signs is correct. That much I’ll admit!
I was out and about performing a few jobs today, and had some time to kill. Now what should I do with that time? I stopped at a small park in order to eat my lunch, and noticed some railroad tracks. It’s been forever since I’ve walked along a set of tracks, I’d have to go way back into my childhood days. I mean why the heck would I want to do it now?! It looks dirty and uninviting for the most part. In some weird way I am right about that comment. You’ll see after a little more reading.
At first I felt myself strolling along trying to catch a rhythm between the railroad ties. Walking on these gray loose stones was not fun so I found myself planting my feet firmly on the wood between the rock. That’s all I noticed for a while.
Gray boring rock between each and every board along all sides of the tracks. For far as the eye could see nothing but rock.
When I was done obsessing over the endless rock clusters, I did notice the United States workforce hard at work putting in straight lines and quality craftsmanship. Here’s a good example;
Then curiosity got the better of me and I started looking up now that I gained my rhythm. I looked each side and noticed green foliage, littered with pines and weeds and scrub oaks.
I began to look a little further into the woods. I observed a shopping cart. A red shopping cart! I must’ve been walking for a half a mile from the road, and began thinking how did the shopping cart end up here in the middle of the woods!? I’m not going to dwell on it. Moving on.
After seeing the shopping cart and looking a little bit more towards my west, I noticed a patch of prickly pear. Prickly pear is New Jersey’s only native cactus. It’s evergreen and has yellow flowers at some point, I just do not remember when they bloom. This one looks like it has already bloomed. I don’t touch them anymore, because once I did and ended up needing to use Elmers glue in order to pull out all the fine, fiberglass like shards in my hands.
Then I really started to notice some neat stuff and some weird stuff and some what the heck is that stuff. It’s funny once you start noticing a couple things you start noticing everything. What do we have here?
HMMMM… A dart!! Cool, who’s playing can I join the game!? I love a good game of darts. What I like to do while I’m playing darts is drink beer! Does anybody have an ice cold beer they could give me?
Yep. Looks like drinking and darts is been over for quite some time. Appears to be Budweiser and an old tin type can with an aluminum top. Yeah this game has been over for quite a long long long long long time. This is one of those things I thought was kind of cool. You could still make out that it was a Budweiser can and the rusted kind of smashed into the rock look, was sort of industrial.
I guess the beer money may have ran out, because I found this here wallet lying in the rocks next to the tracks. Can you believe it! They didn’t even leave me cash, preload credit card, or bitcoin! I can’t blame them, it looks like my wallet some days. Empty and pitiful.
I’ve had enough for one day. Time to turn around and head back to where I came from. Oh no! I don’t remember how I got here or which way to go. I hope I have cell service and my maps/directions app works. Oh wait a minute, what’s that I see you up ahead. A cell phone tower! There is a God! Thank you!
Thanks for joining me on the short adventure down the tracks. Probably my last for a while. I was sweating like a pig, tripping over the stones and Wood, and Stumbling because my footing never felt right. The fact that I always had to keep looking over my shoulder for a train wasn’t a good pleasant feeling either. I think I’m done roaming the tracks. Feel free to do your own track walk, maybe you’ll find some interesting weird stuff like I did. Talk to y’all later!