Blast from the Past: August 13th, 2000

August 13th 2000

"The train ride today was long. We didn't have to change trains, thank goodness, but it was 5 hours on the train. Sort of in the middle of the ride, Joe and I started playing cards, and Katie was playing Gameboy. This little kid kept walking by trying to watch what we were doing. He would be really cute if he were older. He'd pass, then stop and watch, then walk away again. Finally mom came by and said, "This is Antonio, and he's like to watch you play cards. He lives in London," I said sure, and he kept asking all these questions. He started to get annoying. Then, I said, "Do you want to play a card game called B.S.?" he agreed, so I taught him how to play and then mom came and said what I THOUGHT was, "London is our next stop." So when the train slowed to a stop, Joe, Katie, and I frantically got off the train, and when we did, mom and dad weren't out there! The lady was closing the doors, and we stopped her and asked where we were. "Stevenson," she said. "Stevenson!?!?!" we demanded we got on again, and they let us. That was freaky. I was about to die! If that train had left, we'd be stuck. After getting settled again on the train, we just sat there in awe, so glad we had gotten on. When we did reach our destination, we all got off and got a taxi to go to our hotel, off out by the airport. I didn't really like our taxi driver, he was weird looking. Turns out he took us off the freeway, around the city, and back to the hotel, so he took us the long way, so he could get more money! It cost us 43 pounds! 42! It was insane! We got up to our room, which is really nice, and watched Courage the Cowardly Dog because we had cartoon network. That was good. We also had dinner which wasn't great, but good. Joe found out there was a weight room. He asked me to go with him to it. I did. I had to change into my t-shirt and shorts and tennis shoes. I worked on every machine and did the bike for 10 minutes! I did pretty well! We went back to the room at 9:30, but we had to go to bed. I first took a shower, so did Joe. Good night!"


My family doesn't like to think about our little escapade outside the train. We have no idea what would have happened if that train would have left us. We had been sitting in a different car than my parents, so we got our stuff and left, thinking they were already outside. We almost got stranded in Scotland with no phone, no money, and no place to go. Who knows what would have happened!? When we got inside the train, mom and dad were laughing at us. I don't think they realized quite how scary it would have been if we had been left. They realized it later, but at the time, they obviously thought we were a bunch of bums. We just heard them wrong, that's all, but thank goodness Joe acted and asked that lady what stop we were at. Heavenly Father was definitely watching over us that day.