Chicago to Lamy, New Mexico.

25 hours. 2 time zones. Illinois. Iowa. Missouri. Kansas. Colorado. New Mexico.

Lots of sky. Lots of cornfields.

The first great thing about train travel is that the snack car has ramen noodles. For only 2 dollars you can stumble back to your seat holding a steaming, scalding styrofoam cup of noodles and half-thawed veggies. With any luck, you will avoid burning yourself or the  old Amish man who has decided to sleep with his head hanging over the armrest and into the aisle.

The second great thing about train travel is the people watching. The man across the aisle from me was traveling with his ten year old son, a scrawny kid with pink rubber bands on his braces and a white baseball cap. About every hour, the man would get up and go to the snack car, returning with a root beer and a Corona.

A group of five college students a few rows ahead of me discovered 16 hours into the train ride that they had accidentally purchased tickets to Las Vegas, New Mexico instead of Las Vegas, Nevada. Oops. There was some shouting and a few tears before they finally worked out that they could still get to the real Vegas. It would just mean an extra twelve hours on the train. And it’s my fucking birthday, shouted one. The conductor was unswayed by this declaration and the train continued on its charted path.