Evolution is a book of short stories inspired by the seven years of my life I spent riding freight trains. It is now for sale on amazon.

Please read the following sample below.

First Ride

Davenport, Iowa is cold during the winter. The wind travels through the barren cornfields of Nebraska with nothing to stop, or slow it. It enters Iowa without a glance back. Silos and lonely farmhouses will not slow it down. Along it speeds picking up a bitter chill. Then it hits the Mighty Mississippi. Here is where it will stop. The wind hits that big frozen expanse of river and just stops right there. Well it does not really stop. It forms little cyclones of cold air. All of that spinning, twisting air seeks the warmth trapped under my blankets.

Part of me thinks it is only fair that the cold wind steals my warmth. After all, I stole the blankets from the Salvation Army dumpster. To be honest, I could be sleeping nice and warm in the same Salvation Army. However, fucking Mogan David would not stop making Mad Dog Hawaiian Blue. If God was going to put Manna in a bottle this was it. From the first crack of the seal, that fruity smell became my shield. With the first taste, I was ready for another day in the desert. Everyone may just swoon when that golden calf appears, but I was just fine when I drank that wine. I bet you wouldn’t guess I was a poet.

Should I write something here so I appear sympathetic? Why? Do you really care about another bum alienated from the middle class? Should I write about the alcoholic dad who beat the kids to prove he was alive? Isn’t that kind of cliché? Maybe I should offer you some titillation by writing about my rape up the ass at age nine by my cousin and his friend. Well, that is a story I do not share around the bottle. I might make the wrong kind of friends that way, if you know what I mean. However, I was talking about the cold.

It started snowing around 10 pm. The wind was forming little snow tornadoes right before my eyes. I could not sleep because I did not know how deep that snow was going to be by morning. I figured I had better spend the last of my money on another ticket to Hawaii.

Walking back from the store I started following the twin humps in the snow that had been railroad tracks just an hour ago. Do not ask me why, but I walked right on past those stolen blankets of salvation. I was tired of being cold. I hated the sight of the Mighty Mississippi. I wanted more than being another dead wino in the snow. I wanted something that was going to allow me to feel I was living a life of romance. I wanted to go back to when it was all good. I wanted the comfort of ‘The Boxcar Children.’ I wanted to ride the rails. I followed those snow-covered tracks until they took me to a train that was standing in the yard.

I walked along the train without a clue about how to do this. I was just looking for some place protected from the cold and snow. Someone must have struck a staff and parted the door to a car carrier. Those are the big two story yellow railroad cars you see with the brand new automobiles inside of them. Here was one with a gap in the door big enough for me to enter. Inside were all these shiny new automobiles. I didn’t think twice. I found a luxury sedan and sat myself right in the driver seat. Looking in the glove box, I found a key and started that bad boy up.

This was heaven. I was the luckiest man alive. I had heat. Turning on the radio, I had music. I opened up that MD 20/20 and had me some manna. I was going to ride this night through the desert.