Re: Rails & Running Trails are OK

It isn't always the train that gets you.
Many years ago when I was in high school, I was jogging down an 'unused' spur during the summer getting in shape for the upcoming football season. Everything was going fine until I stepped on something slick on one of the ties. My feet went up in the air and all 175 pounds of me hit the rail just below my hip - HARD. The result was a deep bone bruise that still hurt like the dickens six months later. I still have a lump on my thigh that gives me trouble whenever I sleep on it wrong. Still I consider myself to be very lucky since it could have been much worse. According to the Dr. if I had landed a couple of inches further up my leg it probably would have broken my leg at the ball and crushed the hip socket. In 1967 they didn't do hip replacements and an injury like that was a life sentence to a wheel chair.

John

PS - The walk back home wasn't bad since the guys on the switcher pushing a string of loaded tank cars that came by a little after I came to gave me a ride home. I guess it was a good thing they had trouble with an air hose and were running late.