Thirty-Eight

            I got up into NY state and had to change trains in Jamestown, NH. It wasn't a very big place and I found out there was only one train through there a day going my way. It didn't stop, just slowed down a little. I had to catch it or wait till the next day for the next one. Some fellows told me where the best place was to try it. They said some fellows make it and some don't. All I knew was I had to make it. I was pretty good at it by now and felt sure I could so I settled down and waited.

            After quite a wait I heard the noise. I couldn't see it but I could hear it and I knew it was traveling. I soon seen it and knew it was going somewhere in the middle of forty miles an hour. I was almost afraid to try it as the engine went by throwing dirt and gravel. I had to try it quick so I'd have the second chance before the whole train went by.

            I started running with it as fast as I could. The train was still going past me awfully fast but when the next steep came past I made a jump and grabbed for it. I had the bundle over one hand so I had about one and a half hands when I caught hold it jerked me off the ground and my feet was straight out in the wind.

            My fingers felt numb and I felt them slipping. I was thrown across another set of tracks and hit the rail after the third one with the back of my leg, just back of the knee. I thought it was broke it hurt so bad.

            By now the train was too far gone. I couldn't move well enough to make the second try so I spent the night beside the railroad tracks waiting for the next one.

            The leg was so sore and aching. I decided to head back to Uncle Paul's place. It was nearest so I got rid of the bundle and made a try the next day at the train going south. I had both hands free this time and it was all I could do to hold on when my feet left the ground. It was the fastest traveling train I ever caught and I was sure glad I had a year's practice behind me.

            It was the next day, towards evening. I was going back down the mountain over the horseshoe curve near Altoona, PA. I was riding the top of one of the boxcars and the view was just as nice as I enjoyed the first time. I looked forward to seeing it again after leg was ok and I started my trip north again.

            It was a couple of days ride till I got back but as soon as Paul seen my leg he got me to the doctor's in the horse and buggy. I had a read bad bruise where my leg hand landed across one of the rails. He had to put a tube in my leg in the back of the left knee and I had to keep my foot up on another char so it would keep draining. I was laid up for six weeks. My Uncle Paul laughed and said, "Just think, after all the miles you traveled and all the know-how you have, now something like this happens." I told him I just met up with a train anyone had to be crazy to try and catch. Guess I just thought I was better than I was and learnt my next lesson. I knew after that, a train traveling around forty-five miles per hour was just too fast to handle.

            One day, after I was getting around okay, Paul took me along to a funeral of a man he knew. The man had shot himself in the forehead. He was alone at home. When they found him he was sitting upright in a corner.

            It was the first time I had ever seen anyone dead. I went along with Paul up to the coffin and looked at him. They just had a small piece of cheesecloth over the hole in his forehead. I could see right through it where the bullet went in. That's the only part of it I remember.

            One more thing I never forgot was, when my friend and I were in Mexico and the people there got us to put a pepper in our mouth and chew it up. We thought our mouths would never stop burning. It was our first time with hot peppers and the people there got a big kick out of us trying to find something cold to drink.