Category: Trains

Disney Detour

I was going through some 2011 photos and found this. The Casey Junior Train is the best thing in Disneyland (there isn’t one at Disney World). It epitomizes everything I wanted to visit at Disney theme parks when I was young, and it is pretty much all that is left of the Disney magic that I can embrace. I didn’t really want to go to Disneyland (crowds, lines, heat) but my son was hell bent on seeing this train, and he was right – it’s the coolest thing there.  I’m amazed that the Disney merchandising juggernaut has not capitalized on the train mania – aside from a pin, you cannot find any models or memorabilia related to this train anywhere in Disneyland. I’m not complaining (okay maybe I am) but it’s so discouraging when you can buy princess everything and Goofy sweatshirts in size XXXL but not a toy train.

The Casey Junior song from Dumbo is my all time favorite sequence in Disney film – every hue and detail perfect. (The colors in the VHS format are actually richer than the DVD, I think.)

And you know what else I love about it? See the patchwork quilt that makes up the landscape? Those are all succulents, planted by Walt Disney himself, in every hue imaginable. Oh, and my boys rode around in the monkey cage. I loved that, too.

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The Engines Have Boilers for Hearts

Inside the heart of every autistic boy floats the Island of Sodor.  I read once that the only universal characteristic of autism is a love of trains; this theory may have changed but I certainly have found it to be true, and Thomas the Tank Engine, in particular, with its distinct expressions, concrete plot lines and happy endings, seems to capture and hold the hearts of these kids.  It is in this context that I had the following conversation this morning:

Our boy brings me the iPod and puts it up to my ear – the music is Hark the Herald Angels Sing from A Charlie Brown Christmas.  He is grinning.

“This makes my heart happy,” he says.

“That’s church music,” I note.

 “I know,” he says, “Sir Topham Hat and the Engines like it.”

 “What do they do at church?” I ask.

” They pray.”

“To whom?”

” Jesus.  They pray over the dead people.”

 “What else?”

 “They get married.”

 “Does praying make their hearts happy?”

 “Yep, and their boilers, too!”

 I laugh.  He becomes very earnest.

 “The boilers are their hearts, Mom.  The engines have boilers for hearts.”

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