Congratulations Train Fiend!

“FUCKIN’ TRAINS MAN!” you’ll shout, head pushed out of the side of the boxcar. Then you’ll pull your face back inside and just breathe heavily for a few minutes. The other hobos in the box car will just sit and stare at you. Jerry, the lead hobo with a heart of gold and a social conscious, will just shake his head. You won’t even notice. You’ll just shiver and black out a little. “I fuckin’ love trains… Unnnnh.” A tiny bit of pee will come out as your whole body relaxes.

Jerry will walk up and put his hand on your cheek, rubbing his fingers and feeling the moisture. “You might have a problem man.” The other hobos will take a break from tuning their folksy guitars and mouth harps to nod in agreement.

“Naw,” you’ll mumble. “Jus’ love traaaains.” At this point you’ll be fading fast, so high on train that you’ll barely even know where you are, and you certainly won’t care. Then you’ll black out.

When you come to you’ll be tied to a tree some distance away, surrounded by hobos. Their beards will cast wild shadows in the night as the fire dances across their faces. They’ll look like a smelly, sweaty, unkempt horde of mountain men just waiting for the order to rip you apart.

But they won’t. They’ll simply step back, leaving Jerry standing alone at the head of the hobo collective with his guitar across his back and a glimmer in his eye. He’ll look straight into your soul and murmur, in his softest hobo voice, “We’ve gotta talk.”

You’ll shake your head and moan: “Where the traaaaaaaain man?”

“That’s what we’ve gotta talk about.” Jerry will rest his hand against your cheek and smile. “You’re addicted to the rush of riding the rails. We’ve all seen it before, man. Hell, half of us have had it. But you can’t be a Woody Guthrie style hobo fighting for change if you’re high all the time, man.”

“What?! LEMME BACK ONNA TRAIN!” You’ll struggle against your bonds, feeling the ropes dig into your skin, wrists, arms, legs. Skin will start to feel raw, but the hobos won’t move to untie you. Instead Jerry will simply stand there, flanked by hobos, and give you tiny bits of food and water as needed over the next several hours. By the time the sun rises you’ll be in the full grip of train withdrawl. By the next dawn, you’ll be alone, untied from the three with a brief note from your hobo companions.

Don’t ride the trains ‘til you think you can. And don’t vote until America swears off wars, man.

- Jerry

You’ll start walking until you hit a set of train tracks. You’ll see them and you’ll just feel so tired, so filled with desire to ride on the train, it’ll only make sense to ride on the train tracks. And you’re so used to riding the rails that you won’t even notice the vibration of the train along its tracks until it’s far, far too late. You’ll barely feel the train sliding over you at all, it’ll just be an instant of intense, profound pain and then nothing at all.

Congratulations Train Fiend!