Dave Caolo

Everyone knows the story of The Polar Express. Several kids ride a train to the North Pole, drink hot chocolate, receive a bell and have a wonderful time (I’m paraphrasing, of course). Many American cities with trains lying around stage their own interpretation of the book each December. It’s a fun, family-friendly holiday tradition that includes hot-chocolate burns to the face, lots of waiting, skinned noses and chins, terrified children, snot, tears and miserable adults. And it’s only $75! Hooray!

Let’s relive this precious memory that I will treasure in my heart forever.

Since the train station is about 25 minutes from our house, we left home early. After some aimless driving we found the designated parking lots. Of course, I had ignored my wife’s earlier request to stop at an ATM (why we’d need cash for a train ride is beyond me, but I know it’s just best to follow orders), so a few tense, thousand-mile-stare moments passed until I found a bank. That set the tone for the day.

Back at the lot, we parked the car and walked toward the waiting train. The conductor was running around looking like Sir Topem Hatt while extravagantly-dressed elves held ornate, color-coded scepters high in the air, designed to gather our attention and lead us to our respective train cars. Our tickets read “Blue Frosty,” so we followed the blue elf. It was all quite charming and the enormous train hissed steam and made all sorts of nostalgic noises.

Once inside, the spell was broken.

A member of the wait staff was carrying a large, sliver tray of paper cups filled to the brim with steaming hot chocolate. He musn’t have been in the holiday mood: The things he muttered under his breath in Spanish (I appreciate your attempt to disguise what you were saying, sir, but some of us can understand you) weren’t exactly “jolly.” We took four hot chocolates from him, and my wife poured one into a sippy cup for William. It was burning hot, so we let it sit with the lid off to cool (Foreshadowing alert).

The train started to roll, and oh, it was like a Norman Rockwell painting come to life. We were dazzled by glimpses of people’s backyards, abandoned cars, winterized fishing boats, stacks of lobster traps … real “Christmas in New England” kinds of things.

Ten minutes into it, William, who is 1 and not keen on sitting still for more than 90 seconds at a time, began to cry, whine and squirm around. We gave him a bag of pretzels, and my wife tested the hot chocolate. It was just pleasantly warm, so she put the lid on and offered it to him. He stuck it in his mouth and must have been surprised or something, because he immediately pulled back from the tilted cup, which continued to pour warm hot chocolate all over his face and clothing. Now he’s screaming bloody murder and I’m REALLY in the holiday spirit.

This is when Grace announces that she doesn’t want her hot chocolate, presumably because she thinks it hurts children.

Finally, an announcement crackles over the PA: “If you look to your right, boys and girls, you’ll see the North Pole!” The adults look at one another. “Which way is right on a train?” This sparks an intense discussion about the relative position of the engine and the conductor. “No, it doesn’t work like a boat,” some say. “It depends on which way the conductor is facing,” others say. “But the conductor can MOVE,” the answer comes back. “Well, not when he’s actually driving the train,” someone says. “Actually,” says another, “you don’t DRIVE a train….”

I want to shout, “Hello! Christmas Magic here! Childhood memories under construction! There are 4- and 5-year-olds on the cusp of disbelief sitting right next to you! How about preserving the adorable innocence? My daughter is about to implode because she actually believes that a 25-minute train ride through Sandwich, Massachusetts, ends at the North Pole! Who cares which way is right?!? Just look out the window and say, ‘Oh, look, honey! The North Pole!‘”

We exit the train and it’s very cute. The station is decorated nicely, and teenagers are running around dressed as elves, looking busy. Inside, an older woman, dressed as Mrs. Claus, is knitting in a rocking chair next to a wood-burning stove. Precisely what you’d expect Mrs. Claus to be doing, right? Grace refuses to approach her. She refuses to approach Rudolph. Ditto the elves and other “helpers.”

There’s a cute tree set up with a train at its base, which William promptly de-rails. One elf is taking the names of passing children to check if they’re on the Nice List. Grace, of course, blows him off when he asks her for her name. My wife tells him what it is, and he announces to his workers that Grace is on the Nice List and that they should begin preparing presents for her immediately, which they do. I found it charming. Grace glared as if they had just kicked her dog.

At this point we were waiting (and waiting and waiting) in the long Santa line. William was fidgeting and I knew that the entire thing would culminate in my childrens’ refusal to acknowledge Santa.

I was right.

On the way back to the train, William took a wicked digger and landed square on his face, cutting his nose, lip and chin. Now he’s screaming and bloody, as opposed to bloody screaming. It was at that very moment that I decided to open my mouth and say something so intelligent, so sensitive, so insightful that it would be remembered in family lore forever.

“It was a mistake to bring William.”

My wife, who is a good person without a vindictive bone in her body, shot me a look that said, “One more word and I will push you underneath this train.”

We had a quiet train ride back to Massachusetts (until William fell off of his chair and started screaming again), and a quiet car ride back home. That’s why I love the holidays: It’s a time for families to come together, set their expectations unrealistically high and fantasize about a holiday experience that is perfectly wonderful — as snowy and sparkly as Rockefeller Center on Christmas Eve, and as heartwarming and uplifting as the final musical number in the Albert Finney version of A Christmas Carol. Then, you forget to go to the ATM, you pour hot chocolate on your child, someone swears at you in Spanish and you realize that your life is not a scene from Currier and Ives, but a portrait of four people doing the best they can. All you can do, really, is hold on to each other, lean in close, look past the lobster traps, abandoned cars and trashy backyards and whisper:

“Look, honey. The North Pole.”