Greensboro, NC: A Frosty Train Ride

January 2025 | a giddy, interpersonal travel diary of a train ride from Louisiana to North Carolina

10 January 2025

I do this thing where I always bring tons of entertainment for myself when traveling. In my bag I had a pad of lined paper to write notes and jot ideas, my current read — a frosty one — Icefields by Thomas Wharton, my laptop, my camera. I even brought a sketchbook and I am definitely not an artist and, regardless, nature is an uncapturable beauty. Though I had all this stuff in my bag, I spent the bulk of the 21 hour trip staring out of the window at the quicky-passing scenery and sleeping (surprisingly comfortably) in my seat.

Earlier this morning I put on three layers of clothing, the outermost layer being a maxi jean skirt, an oversized L.L. Bean jacket that is tan and olive green, blue gloves, and my ear warm headband.

I walked to the lounge cart and got a breakfast sandwich and coffee (that was incredibly strong in taste) and sat for a while. From the train, the noise it makes sounds distant: as if instead of the train I’m on is making noise, I’m back in my bed at home hundreds of miles away listening to a train fly by in the deep of night. The ride is much smother than I was imagining. The terrain outside shifted and morphed drastically as the train zipped past on the rails. Louisiana had a cold rain, shrubby forests, and stagnant swamps. Alabama has thinner trees and a fog in the atmosphere. In Mississippi, the grounds were turning a beautiful brown and orange, the fog was farer in the distance, a little thinner. A drizzle of rain spanned across all three states.

At some point rain became snow.

By the time the train was passing through the outskirts of Georgia, darkness from the wintry, night sky cascaded over snow-laden forest beds. The occasional streetlamps poured a shadow, a slip of warm light onto the cabins. It’s always a profound feeling to pass by the different homes in different places and know everyone is living such different lives in the simplest of ways. These people will wake up in a few hours and perhaps the snow will still be on the ground, or maybe fresh snow will be falling. They’ll smile at the soft, twinkling glow of the gentle downpour and marvel at Earth’s temporary bareness and the blanket of whites and blues. Or maybe they’ll grouch at the cold, go back inside, and make a mug of hot coffee. Meanwhile, in a day, I’ll be on my way back home to a foggy rain in a city in which the trees are still holding on to green leaves. Where the air is still holding on to humidity even within the cooler temperatures.

12 January 2025

The train ride back home was brighter than the ride to Greensboro as it was a morning ride. The train zipped past frozen lakes and streams in Georgia, sunlight streaming brightly through a forest of frosted trees, ice crystals kissing their branches and sparkling sharply. Tiny cabins sat next to each other atop small hills, inches of snow pilled on top of roofs of houses, cars and sprawled throughout the grass. The Earth looked asleep, yet completely lively.

Lorelei¹ did an arrangement of exercises - rather, some swinging of her arms in the chair. “Gotta get your heart rate up,” she said. Then pulled out her tumbler of hot tea — of which she detached the top that had a handle, flipped it over, and poured a mug of tea.

“Oooookay..?” I said-asked before turning away from her and staring out of the window.

Yesterday I arrived in Greensboro, North Carolina at around 7:40am. The sun was still rising through the window of the train station which casted a subtle pink hue onto the snow. The train sitting stagnant on the tracks. I did the most important thing of the day first: played in the snow. I made snow angles, threw snow in the air, threw snowballs at my siblings, and — in general — ran around.

I got breakfast: a bowl of oatmeal, a mug of coffee, eggs, biscuits and gravy, and sausage (I was hungry, ok?) before taking a two-hour nap in my brother’s dorm room. When I woke, we took a very slow ride in a car to downtown Greensboro. I was very grateful for the slowness of Lorelei’s driving because - quite frankly - I was spooked by us driving in the snow also.

With my siblings in toe, we strolled around S Elm Street. The muffled crunch of snow sounded under my numbing feet. The whole, quaint area had snow and frost encrusting the streets, buildings and cars. I stopped by Northern Roots Coffeehouse. I sat with my order of a cookie butter latte and a sun-dried tomato croissant. Everything was delicious and the ambiance of the place was amazing.

Paw prints from the local huskies were within the snow in front of the Scuppernong Books bookstore. The bookstore was absolutely wonderful, an arrangement of used and new books. A cafe was set up quaintly within it. The selection was fabulous. We browsed books and lounged around the seating area for a couple of hours. I bought 5 new books: two for my around-the-world reading challenge, a poetry collection, and a collection of James Baldwin’s work. The man who checked me out had on a beret and a pair of glasses with a striped long sleeve shirt. “This book is really good” he told me while he checked out The Memory Police for me.

“Really?! I’m so excited to read it!”

When I come back to Greensboro, I will definitely be visiting again. It was truly a gem within the town and I am so happy I visited.

After exploring downtown we drove and ate some awful Chinese food at a buffet for a few hours.

I took my damp boots off and took a shower back at the dorm. Constantly throughout the shower I adjusted the temperature of the water. By the time I was dressed with leggings and a long sleeve shirt, the lounge of the dorm was filled with my brother’s friends. One of which (whom I will call Worm²), I gravitated to for a majority of the night. The room was full of lively chatter and I settled in on the couch with her. We went effortlessly went in and out of our personal histories, I asked her questions about her life and about any guidance she had to give. We talked about the books we’re reading, recommend, recently bought.

“I don’t know, sometimes I feel so alienated from it all. That concerns me about college because I’m not even remotely interested in the quote-unquote ‘college life’ stuff,” I say. I shared humiliating stories of when I tried to be a socialite, go to parties and large gatherings.

“Yeah, you remind me a lot of myself when I was your age.” We talked about how to be confident introverts, the places we want to see, dealing with guys when you don’t necessarily date.

Women do that sort of thing, y’know? Find one another and, whether we deeply know each other or not, share pieces of ourselves with each other to help better our lives or to just provide comfort, wisdom.

The night ended with the repacking of suitcases, long hugs, exchanging phone numbers, and sitting around the station waiting for the train to arrive again.

Back on the train today, the sun set quickly, I shrugged off my jacket, using it as a blanket, and sunk into my chair. The chug and subtle shaking of the train rocked me into a deep sleep.

A postcard.

From: Yulani Sann

1. At our favorite, local brunch spot, my mom and I are referred to as “the Gilmore Girls”, thus I shall henceforth refer to her as Lorelei.

2. Worm for a bookworm