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Ross Jamieson

 

Neilston Station Celebration

What It Must Have Been Like

As I stood waiting for the train on a cold, dreek and wet morning at the edge of the platform of Neilston High Station I was wondering, "Will this train ever get here?"

I walked over to the timetable to see when the train would arrive f rom Ardrossan, I looked f rom the timetable to my watch and back again, f orever asking myself, "Are you reading it correctly? The train is f ive minutes late according to this!" I was very impatient as I had to get to Glasgow as soon as possible for an important meeting. With every second I grew more and more anxious as I might lose an excellent business proposition if it never got here on time.

I heard a low rumble and a whistle and I knew the train was coming into the station. I could see the steam billowing from the black funnel as it came under the bridge, screeching as the driver pull the brakes on hard to bring the six?carriaged wander to a stop. It stood there gleaming in its early day brilliance, one of the first used on the Glasgow?Ardrossan line.

As all three passengers boarded the train, the driver fed the roaring fire what coal he had left, muttering, "I must get more coal for this infernal thing!" He sauntered on to the platform and strode over to the bunker to load up more cool. It took him two minutes to get enough and by that time it meant the train was f if teen minutes late. I was getting restless, so I shouted to the drive, "Hurry it up, my good fella?" He clambered in and started up the gigantic, dusty heap of metal. It screamed and hollered as it left the station in the kind of way you would move as if you had just got out of bed. A slow chug, developed into a stream of speed.

I looked back out of the window of the station and thought, "How could such a small village have such a good train station? Thank goodness for whoever invented the train and whoever built our station!"

Ross Jamieson 52
Eastwood High School