Pastor Skar

     The lady in the seat across the aisle from me from New Orleans to Chicago was African American with gray hair and a voice to soft I couldn't hear what she said half the time.  She was on her way to Chicago to attend some sort of cancer seminar.  She has three sisters, two of who were recovering and one in serious trouble.  Her name was Virginia.      In the club car on the Empire Builder I met Jean.  She was a former lawyer who was traveling on Amtrak with to of her retired friends, on of whom was her college roommate from the sixties.  They had left Chicago on there way to Portland, Oregon to stay with another friend for a few days.  Then it was off to southern California and across to New Orleans and back up to Chicago.  She was not completely retired.  She wrote travel guides, mostly for Europe, particularly Croatia.  I expressed some skeptism as to Croatia as a tourist destination, but Jean assured me i...

Train arrived in Chicago at 9:00 am. I found s Dunk’n Donuts under the El about two blocks east of the Willis Tower, which used to be the Sears Tower. Ruth and I went the top on our honey moon in 1987.  The El is very loud when it goes by overhead. I’m sitting outside at a table next to two huge pumpkins on top of a couple bales. Many people stop by to admire them. One man said, “Nobody’s going to steal them things.”      “Nope,” I said, “not as long as I’m guarding them.”      “Is that why you’re sitting out here?” He asked.      I just smiled. I felt like saying, “Here’s your sign.”  But since it was Chicago, the murder capital of America,  I held my tongue.

     The Battle of New Orleans was fought in late December, 1814 and early January, 1815, culminating in the final battle on January 8.  The Americans, a ragtag bunch, made up of some regulars and some militia, plus volunteer free Blacks, Creoles, Natives, and s few French pirates We’re led byAndrew Jackson.      The British had more soldiers and they were better armed and better trained. However when the final battle was over the British had suffered 2000 casualties and the Americans less than fifty. It was one of the most lopsided battles in the history of warfare. Ironically the battle was fought after the Treaty if Ghent had ended the War of 1812.  The Americans victory ensured that the British would honor the terms.   It also propelled Andrew Jackson into the awhite house.      The pictures above were taken at the battlefield. A tell oblisk monument marks the center of the battlefield. The other picture is if the rai...

     I had a hard time getting my head around the fact that the Mississippi flows through New Orleans from west to east rather than north to south. The river dominates the city.  It actually winds through the city in a “u” shape.  The right side of the “u” actually flows south to north.  They don’t use the cardinal directions: north south east west. Instead they say up river downriver toward the river and away from the river. They also talk about before aKatrina and after Katrina.   I took a riverboat down riverfive mikes to where the Battle of New Orleans was fought in 1815. I took some pictures along the way including the dukes that are supposed to keep the river under control.

 The first thing I did when I got to New Orleans wise get a day pass for three dollars so I could ride the street cars. I got on the one that took me up north so I could see that memorial for those killed in Hurricane Katrina whose bodies were never identified . I am not sure how many there were probably dozens. The pictures below are of the memorial.  I believe the bodies are buried in the Cripts.

Shortly after I took the pictures of the cotton field I got a cup of coffee and sat down at a table in the club car across from an African American woman who looked to be in her fifties. She turned out to be 68, which I learned later.  Another couple mentioned playing cards and she expressed an interest. The couple left and didn’t come back. He lady, whose name was Marla, had been reading out of her Bible, the book of Isaiah.      She said she would teach me how to play two person solitaire.  I suggested that was an oxymoron. She suggested I was a smart Alec. We played one game, which she won. Then the conversation turned to my asking her about herself. She said she ran a house cleaning business and was busy in her church in Jackson, Mississippi. I told her I was a pastor so we talked church stuff for a while. I asked her about her family.  She is the second youngest of ten children. Her younger brother called while we were talking.      Wh...

We sat at the station in Memphis for about twenty minutes just before sun rise. I looked on the map and saw that the National Cicil Rights Museum was only about three blocks away. In 1968 that building was the Lorraine Motel where Martin Luther King was murdered in April. I was tempted to scoot over there and have a look but didn’t dare chance it an gave the train leave me.     Steve Goodman, in his song “The City of New Orleans,” originally sung by Arlo Guthrie in 1971 and later by Willie Nelson, wrote a line “the graveyards of the rusted automobile.”  I would like to report nothing has changed in five decades.  Many junk yards full of rusted cars can be seen along these tracks.      The picture below is of the sunrise over a cotton field just south of Memphis.  Some cotton fields have been harvested.  I hope to see someone harvesting.

The empire Builder arrived in Chicago almost two hours late which turned out to be a good thing because now I have only two hours to wait at Union Station. It’s okay but not as impressive as Grand Central in New York.       One thing though. If you saw the movie “The Untouchables” with Sean Connery and Kevin Costner, you will remember the scene where Eliot Ness played by Costner was in a shootout on the staircase at Union Station.  This is the staircase where that scene was shot.

Train arrived an hour and a half late.  We left Minot at 11:20.  I was already in a bad mood because the twins lost.  I took some time to solve a puzzle out of Minot Daily News.  The I went to sleep..  But not for long. A man sitting one row ahead an across the aisle started acting up.   I could not tell if he was on his phone or was hearing voices or was engaged in a ranting soliloquy. He was mad at somebody—loud with a great deal of swearing.      Other passengers got scared and fled to the club car.  I stayed for about a half hour. Two conductors came but he just kept on. It was him and a conductor and me. She got on her phone  I heard her say something about police, so I headed for the club car. The train stopped at Lakota. Two sheriffs deputies took him off thre train in hand cuffs. We watched from the club car as they took him away.      Most of the other passengers we’re laughing and making snide remarks abou...