When Collier Honora was awakened by a deafening train horn, they knew this was the one they were finally going to catch. It was about time, after two days of waiting for one that never arrived, one day of hitchhiking to the next crew change point four hours away, and another day losing one that sped away from them. They were finally going to hop their first train. Honora and their partner Zander ran through the rail yard in Dunsmuir, Calif., trying to spot rideable cars.
They didn’t see any. The words of their friend Allen ran through their heads as they remembered sitting across from him: boxcars can be closed on one side but open on the other. Collier and Zander crossed the tracks, turned around, and lo and behold, a wide-open boxcar—a rarity, they’d been told—presented it’s self directly in front of them. After four days, the best ride any train hopper could ask for was within their grasp, and they shared a wide grin.
I first heard Honora speaking at Story Slam, a CC event at Sacred Grounds where people share stories within a particular theme. I was intrigued by their tales of hopping trains. As we sat down on some steps, the first thing Honora did was pull out a Zig Zag and a tobacco pouch and roll a cigarette. “Uhm,” they paused as they concentrated on rolling the flimsy paper, “it was always an attractive lifestyle for me, I guess,” they said with a shrug in a casual tone of voice. Honora began their adventure in May 2015. They were studying in Arizona for a semester and drove up to the Bay Area with Zander, to begin their adventure once school got out. Honora’s spontaneity and world view allowed for this adventure to happen.
“You literally can’t plan anything, ‘cause you don’t know if you’re gonna get on the wrong train or like what the fuck’s gonna happen,” they said. Honora held the cigarette up to their mouth, lit it, took a drag and continued speaking, “See, like, riding trains is one of those things that if you think about it too much, like, you’re not gonna do it ‘cause it’s pretty scary at first,” they said as they let out a laugh and repositioned the short hairs poking out from under their greyish-green corduroy cap.
Their first train had a storybook ending; they arrived safely in Portland, Ore., after 20 hours in a boxcar, which according to Collier never happens. Even their experienced friend Allen who has been riding trains for seven years has never had the rare opportunity to ride a boxcar. “It’s kind of a dope story that my first train ride was in a boxcar,” Honora said, nodding while their eyes gazed into the distance from under John Lennon spectacles. “But like…the experience really solidified the idea that I can’t make any plans and if I do I’m going to be disappointed. So I’d rather not make any plans, and be pleasantly surprised by everything that happens and everything that comes along.” The level of comfort expressed by Honora when talking about the unpredictability of this kind of travel led me to feel that they truly embraced the lifestyle, even if for a finite amount of time. The community they encountered and the attitude they expressed about train hopping was unexpected. Honora said their mindset is shaped by the belief that “the universe is looking out for us.” This helped them have a better experience than a lot of the other people they met on the road.
This notion that people on the road help each other out and understand each other stems from Honora’s belief about restless energy. “I feel like most kids on the road, they’re all here for the same reason. It’s because a lot of us have this restless energy, and restless spirit and mindset that ‘you can’t stop me,’” Honora said. They met the “craziest people” on this adventure. There was Brian, their friend in Portland who has a family and works on a fishing boat but knows everything there is to know about trains. Then there was Jake, the “train nerd” who spent his days watching and tagging trains in the Portland train yard. There was the German nurse who was high on Molly, and the nice couple who picked them up in the Salt Spring Islands. Honora went into this adventure believing they would always be taken care of, and it seems like that belief paid off.
This positive outlook would fade at times after Honora returned to CC, but they never abandoned it. For weeks after returning from their sojourn, Honora slept in the park next to the school, unable to sleep comfortably in their bed. To this day, they do not own a bed, preferring to sleep on the hard floor. Not only were the physical adjustments hard, but the mental transitions proved difficult. “I don’t function as well in society as well as I do doing my own thing,” Honora said while taking a long drag on their fourth cigarette. “This [lifestyle] is representative of the ideology, the ideology my whole life is based off of,” they said. This ideology consists of living a simple, but hard lifestyle on the road and keeping a positive outlook in difficult situations. Living invisibly is comforting to them: “At first…it was fucking crazy that that happens. And then by the end, [I was] honestly [in] the most comfortable state I’ve ever found myself in.” To be ignored by society was a great comfort to Honora, they had no more labels, expectations, or responsibilities; it was freeing.
From their spontaneous tattoos drawn by friends, to their impulsive, life-altering train-hopping experience, it seems to me that Honora has solidified their love for trains and experienced a strong community rooted in kindness and mutual understanding. Honora ultimately took away a different, more positive code of ethics from this experience, one that embodies simplicity and optimism.