The First Day of the Rest of My Life

The Final Ride
Has Come and Gone

As I look outside my window tonight I see the weatherman's report is a good one. Ten centimeters of the white stuff is to fall by morning. The snow is coming down as if a winter postcard has come alive, offering a Christmas a chance to become as it should, a white one.

This decision I make is one that has been planned for the past, almost five years and one that was not to happen until the New Year of 2006, however I look to the outside now, hesitating for only a moment to reflect on a 34 year career with CN Rail - a very long and testing time, especially the past few years with the Americanized management style infiltrating our lives, and now I see only freedom, the same sensation a prisoner must feel on the eve of his release from a lifetime behind bars.

As I write, the snow is forever falling so gently upon the ground, white and beautiful - I can see that now.

Yes, of course there were some very good times, great guys to work with for the most part, and tons of old memories from long ago. But this is all in the past now, as I move on to my new life...a life that holds no bars. Freedom is now my order of the day, days to do as I please, the things I have only dreamed of doing are now at my beckoning quest. An ideal come true; it is a paragon of my new reality and one that will follow me into my new future. No one knows of what the future may hold, one can only dream to make things come true...

This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
- Shakespeare-Hamlet

As does "the wind sets into the shoulder of your sail," at times, I too am set to move on, and with my final decision to end what has been a part of my life for so many, many, long years, and start anew. Tomorrow, I intend to resign from CN Rail, and with CN form 92 in hand, one which I have carried in my coat pocket for the past while, the same offers freedom, I will walk out from that place with a great sense of relief that I am not tied to CN Rail anymore. Tomorrow has now come, the clock has ticked itself past twelve, and I fear not the phone ringing oh so loudly anymore.

The resignation form itself is typical of CN Rail, a paradigm of an epitome of heartlessness; it is stark and to the point, standing without feeling of a distinct resolution of fact...after the name rank and serial number comes the wording: "Voluntarily resign from the service of the Canadian National Railway Company"...strange wording for which the CEO, Hunter Harrison has told employees they are not to use the word "Canadian" when conducting company business, but that is not my concern anymore...the battle is now over and the sun shines brightly overhead. No, my concerns of railway issues are history, one that is best left behind like dust in the wind.

Where life leads me now is subject to imagination and vision wherein I will take time out to reflect and project my life. I look forward, with a smile, to the "First Day of the Rest of My Life". and I thank God I have made it this far, as many I have known did not.

Now I can truly say, without thought: Carpe Diem.

Adios y buena suerte a todos usted Railroaders, ha sido una experiencia no pronto olvidado, y mi dios bendice...

greg