Dreams about trains?

[Boyd]

Anyone else once in a while have a dream about trains? I've had multiple dreams about train tracks and trains just across the road,,, and also going through the very rural large dairy farm my parents sold in 1981. In reality the nearest RR line was the C&GW 3 miles east of our farm going through Racine Mn. There was no need for it to come to or through our farm. Other dreams have been of riding a 1/4 scale train going around the side of a mountain, tracks and train at one point going upside down and still working, then later going through water on the tracks.

[Wizlish]

Sigmund Freud rather famously associated trains with death in dreamwork.  (Of course, trains for him were black, ugly, more than a little frightening, and filled with fire, so many of the semantics were different...)

Two things to consider:  dreams can help you work through things you want to see, and they halp you face fears or expectations that are worrying you.  You may find these two principles can help you interpret some of the imagery you remember.

I've had numerous dreams with railroad content --sometimes NOT involving trains even though I wanted to see them.  

 

[Semper Vaporo]

Okay... I sent this e-mail a little over a year ago... The detail was mainly to explain some of the event to some of the people I sent it to, since they don't really know much about trains.

 

------------------------------------------------------------

Subject: An event to relate... Don't expect video.
Date: Fri, 23 Aug 2013 10:33:58 -0500

Last night I was parked on a dirt/gravel road next to a RR grade crossing to watch trains a few minutes.  I was sitting in my car, but there was another fellow there standing next to my car talking to me and taking photos of the area. 
 
We watched as a pair of really old Diesels came by pulling 3 "Maintenance of Way" (MoW) "Dormitory Cars".  These are rather rare except way out west where there are few towns with enough motels to house a full gang of track workers for large track jobs.  They are just huge white boxes on RR trucks/wheels and are as PLAIN as can be.  A few small windows in random places in the side walls, but with a small "porch", complete with a pretty wrought Iron railing around it on one end of each car.  All had a couple of Adirondack chairs on the porch and one had a small propane barbeque grill (all the comforts of home!)
 
That short train stopped just past the road and someone got off the last car and threw a switch behind the train such that any following train would be diverted to a curve that went off behind a small hill to the south  He got back on the train and it continued on its way.
 
A few minutes later a small MoW "Gang car" came along (often called an "Inspection car" or a "Fairmont Speeder", named after the brand and model of the company that made the majority of them).  This is just a small 4 wheel car with open sides and room for maybe 4 men and a toolbox.  It is powered by a small gasoline engine (often a "rope start") and it is small and light enough that 2 men can pick it up off the track or put it back.  It is a later version of what you see in old movies where two men work a see-saw to make it go, but with seats, a windshield and a roof.  These are not used much anymore (most are in the hands of RR enthusiasts that collect them) as the RRs have switched to using highway trucks that have flanged wheels that can be lowered to fit the rails, using the rubber tires to propel the truck down the track.  (With the flanged wheels raised, they can drive on regular streets and roads.)
 
The fellow standing next to my car suddenly said, 'Hey, there was nobody in there and the engine was not running!" 
 
By the time he had said that, a "Tamper" came by.  This is a large machine that is used to push the rock ballast "under" the ties of the track.  It is a fascinating piece of machinery to watch work as it slowly moves forward at a constant speed.  When in actual operation, while moving, the center section will rush forward and stop, then push a bunch of paddles (over-grown soup spoons with flat bowls!) into the ballast next to the ties and waggle these paddles to push the rock under the ties.  Then before the rest of the unit catches up to the center section, it pulls the paddles up and out of the ballast and rushes forward to do it again to the next set of ties.
 
But, again, the engine was not running and we could not see anyone in the cab or on the running boards along the sides.
 
I got out of my car to get a better view and about that time a short train came into view.  This was just two flat cars, an old boxcar, a gondola and an old wood caboose.  No engines!  The flat cars only had some debris on them (one short section of rail and some old ties).
 
Again, we could not see any people on this "train"!  They all were rolling free!
 
About the time the boxcar was in the grade crossing I could see over the flat cars that the Speeder was well into the curve to the south, having taken the switch that was thrown earlier.  And I saw it derail, kind of bounce once and come to an abrupt stop.  The Tamper immediately hit it and the front derailed and started to tip over, but stopped about 1/2 way over.  Then the last set of cars rear-ended it and the flats derailed.  It also caused the Tamper to finally fall all the way over and slide on its side partially down a hill to a creek.  This left the caboose still on the rails, just past the grade crossing, and blocking all the tracks there.
 
The fellow with me and I both took off running toward the wreck to see if anyone was hurt.  He ran much faster than I and jumped up on the caboose and entered it.  When I got there he was coming out and he shouted that there was no one in it.
 
I went on past and went to the Tamper laying on its side next to the creek.  I could not climb up on it, but wading into the creek I could see into the cab and there was no one in it.  I went on to the Speeder and it was a crumpled mess, and again, I could not see anyone in it.
 
The other fellow came up from the other side, having inspected the boxcar and flats for people.
 
I am kind of dumbfounded by it all and am just standing there, kind of in shock at what I just witnessed.  The other fellow shouted, "I hear a train coming!" and turned around to run back to the grade crossing to see which way it was coming from.
 
I decided it was coming from the south of the curve and I started running on down the track to try to warn it to stop.  I could see only the front of an engine coming toward me, but I had no idea if it was just an engine or some huge long train.  I began to wave my arms over my head at them.  I could see the Engineer and Conductor in the cab and they were pointing at me and looking at each other and back at me.  They began to wave at me to get off the tracks.
 
Suddenly, I could tell that the Conductor spied the wreck behind me as he pointed past me and was shouting at the Engineer.  He jumped out of his seat and exited the cab through the door behind the Engineer's seat.
 
At the same time I heard the unmistakable sound of the train going into emergency braking.  A loud Whoosh of air and the wheels began to scream.  There is nothing an Engineer can do beyond putting the train into emergency... he can't steer or push harder on a brake peddle... so he also exited the cab via the door behind him.
 
At that point I could do nothing more than get myself as far from the tracks as possible, so I turned and ran down into the creek, across it (my shoes were already full of water from wading in the creek earlier) and up the hill.  At the top of the hill I was so out of breath that I began to cough and I could not stop.  I hacked and wheezed until I nearly passed out, and I was afraid I would miss seeing the wreck occur!
 
SOooooo....
 
I sat up on the edge of the bed to get control of my coughing and I adjusted my CPAP headgear to not leak so bad and only THEN realized it was all a dream.
 
It was 4 AM.
 
I kind of fell over sideways and immediately went back to sleep and dreamed a sort of stop-action animation of paper cutouts of rainbows and brightly colored ponys and unicorns.  I don't remember anything noteworthy about that dream.
 
 
HA, so much for going to bed hungry!
 
 

------------------------------------------------------------

Have at it Sigmund!

 

 

[dknelson]

I too used to have very vivid dreams as a child that there were railroad tracks running down an alley near my house, as well as running along a creek that itself ran under a railroad bridge that I liked biking to.  I don't think I dreamed of trains on those tracks, just the tracks themselves.  There is a chance that at some point in my childhood they dug up the major road near our house and unearthed the old trolley car tracks, since several miles to the north such tracks were unearthed during a sewer project as recently as the 1990s.  Seeing something like that could have inspired such dreams.  Or perhaps it was the siding my friends and I biked too that ran in a gravel road not too far away.

But the most interesting and vivid dreams of all were of biking to a favorite train watching spot not far from my house and seeing the most amazing, but decrepit, "funeral train" of odds and ends slowly rolling by -- with strange portions of GG1 electrics, Baldwin transfer engine centercabs, SP cab forwards, but all mashed together in impossible combinations.  The more I think of it the more I become convinced that I must have seen some sort of odd train of wrecked equipment go slowly by (I would have been four years old during some of the Chicago & North Western's famous southbound funeral trains of dead steam locomotives and I suppose there is a tiny chance I saw one) combined with the Air-O-Doodle from the old Howdy Doody Show, which was a neat combination steam locomotive, car, and boat, plus some images of GG1s, cab forwards, and transfer locomotives from my many childhood train books, and mushed them all together into a dream which I had more than once.

From time to time I actually have solved a challenging model railroad problem by dreaming about it but that is a tale best told in another part of these Forums.

Dave Nelson

[Firelock76]

I thought I was alone in this...

Strange you bring this up Boyd.  Every once in a great while I have a recurring train dream. It's very vivid too.

I see a classic turn of the 20th Century 4-6-0 locomotive, polished brass, Russia iron boiler, the works, with a passenger consist of ivory colored cars. The rail line runs along a small river with thick woods on either side.  It's springtime and the foliage is a vivd green.  The sun's shining brightly as well.

I get on the train, and just as it starts to move I always wake up! 

Hmmm, what might happen if the ride starts and I DON'T wake up?

Someone cue the "Twilight Zone" theme right about now.

[northeaster]

My family members think me a wee bit odd when I recount a dream I have had relating to trains but in almost all instances, when I have had a train dream the day following seems to be much more pleasant.  Perhaps, memories of train trips are among the most rewarding and are therefore used as the minds way of bringing a feeling of well being?  Maybe, we dreamers of trains are just weird but I look forward to my next nocturnal rail ramble.

[edblysard]

Firelock76

I thought I was alone in this...

Strange you bring this up Boyd.  Every once in a great while I have a recurring train dream. It's very vivid too.

I see a classic turn of the 20th Century 4-6-0 locomotive, polished brass, Russia iron boiler, the works, with a passenger consist of ivory colored cars. The rail line runs along a small river with thick woods on either side.  It's springtime and the foliage is a vivd green.  The sun's shining brightly as well.

I get on the train, and just as it starts to move I always wake up! 

Hmmm, what might happen if the ride starts and I DON'T wake up?

Someone cue the "Twilight Zone" theme right about now.

 

I think that started playing halfway through the original posting.....

[CShaveRR]

I still dream about trains, plenty.  Never mind that I've been retired for over four years now...I'm still back at work, and there is usually some disaster that has tanen/is taking place on my tracks.  As is often the case, I can't do anything about it, except to wake the rest of the way up.

Other times I'm watching trains and seeing some exotic freight cars ("exotic" in my sense--they could exist, but I'd not seen them before, and I was totally unable to take notes on them.

Fortunately, I realize on waking that I haven't seen trains like those recently, and no, I haven't been to work since the day I retired, so these therefore must be dreams.  I guess I need more pleasant dreams in one case, or more exotic realities in the other.

[dakotafred]

A friend once characterized dreams as a means of eliminating mental waste ... no more worthy of examination than excrement.

[jeffhergert]

A few years ago I had a reoccurring dream.  

The dream was that I was on a train, coming up on the rear end of a train ahead of me.  Not fast, maybe 10 mph, but even with the air brake in emergency we weren't stopping. 

I had the dream about 4 or 5 times, but not every night.  Just every so often over a month or two.  Each time I had it, we got a little bit closer to the train ahead of us.  The last time I had it, we hit it.  Kind of like making a hard coupling.  After that I never had it again.

I've had other dreams, including a few involving train accidents.  The worst dreams I've had however, didn't involve accidents.  It was dreaming that I was furloughed, waiting to be recalled to work.  

Jeff

[Firelock76]

dakotafred

A friend once characterized dreams as a means of eliminating mental waste ... no more worthy of examination than excrement.

 

Well, Joseph Goebbels once said griping was a bowel movement for the soul!

[ValleyX]

I used to have the dream that I found many of my fellow railroaders had. I would be on a train and run a STOP signal somewhere, I always knew where it was but saw no reason to stop.  Then, I'd keep going because I'd always think, "I'm fired anyway, why stop now?".  Usually, I'd wake up and wonder at it, am I fired or was it a dream, before I'd finally decide it was a dream.

Other dreams involved getting called and not showing up for work.

With retirement, I've had a couple of dreams where I went back to work and got on the engine and before we'd get ready to leave, I'd wonder, "Why am I doing this, I don't want to do this anymore".