Afriation Phobia: A Psycho-Phobic Novel

By Richard Bird Baker

This is perhaps the most unique novel you will ever read. It contains no conventional narrative. The voice that delivers the plot and its messages is the voice the main character constantly hears in his head. The voice constantly speaks in short imperatives, and often separates into two bickering voices. Presenting this mental condition requires second-person writing, something rarely found in fiction.

An afriation is an organization or institution that forces one to constantly associate with people one wouldnt choose for company. This novels main character is not an easy person to like, but is very easy to empathize with. This mentally unsound individual has an excessive fear of afriats, people we are forced to interact with via an afriation. As a result, he is often a homeless transient feeling forced into being either a trespasser or a vagrant.

The voice in our characters mind carries you with him hitchhiking on freeways, hopping freight trains, struggling with employment in a conventional afriation, side-stepping civilization, and going to jail. It follows his thought processes as tension leads to a mental collapse. This novel is more than a typical action fiction. It presents a unique and valuable insight into our social structure that is yet to be dealt with by social scientists, one that is based on the types of social interactions we encounter.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Mar 11, 2010
• ISBN: 9781450209601

Richard Bird Baker

Richard Bird Baker of Great Falls, Montana, has long been an historical lecture, speaking about the Lewis and Clark Exploration and the life of Charles M. Russell. He has previously published five books in prose, three of which have won national literary awards. He has long been a collector and performer of traditional western ballads. This is his first rodeo with cowboy poetry.

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

How many years too late are you? About ninety, wouldn’t you guess? What year is this? Isn’t it nineteen eighty already? That must be right, because you were born in forty-five, and you’ve somehow managed to live for thirty-five years. You’re a hundred years too late, anyway. You’d be hearing the clear voice of that stream trickling not more than forty yards from behind this fence.

Of course, there wouldn’t be any fence. Just you and the stream and a lot more of those fir trees, cottonwoods, willows, and other saplings whose names you’ve forgotten or never known. Who could ask for better company? The sunset concert would be about to start, featuring that stream, accompanied by fiddling crickets and the harmonies of a good many birds. Their songs would fill this canyon like an amphitheater. Instead, you have this unaccompanied bass drone of idling diesel locomotives.

You’d have a lot to thank those quiet trees for, wouldn’t you? They’d provide shade during the hot months, a wind break during the rest of the year, and a log cabin over there near the wall of the canyon. If your cabin were already built, it would sure spare you from this mid-September night’s raw wind that’s beginning to make you quiver as if you were riding on an open flatcar. That grove of trees would be donating plenty of dead wood to keep your fire going all winter. You could just stay put and ignore the bite of this wind that’s trying to warn you and the birds it’s time to migrate.

Of course, all them fine-feathered, fair-weathered birds would leave this canyon once the last of the chokecherries, rose hips, huckleberries, and crab apples that have been keeping them and you alive are gone. But you’d stay here without them if you could manage to pull a fish or two from that stream and kill a fur-bearing critter once in awhile for its meat and hide….

Cut it out. Do you really think you could survive a winter in these mountains? Or in any other wilderness?

Probably not today. But maybe you could’ve ninety years ago. A lot more men had wilderness survival skills in the late eighteen hundreds. Either you’d have acquired some of them yourself or you’d be dead by now.

That’s probably it; you’d be dead. You might as well be, anyway, for you’d soon be chased out of here by the first crew that arrived with the dynamite to shape the floor of this canyon to the will of the railroad company.

No, you wouldn’t be dead. You’d probably have just crossed that stream and erected a small lean-to in the woods a mile or so from those No Trespassing signs. There’d be no cabin for you, though, because you’d still be trespassing on government-grant railroad land. But what else could you do other than trespass? You’d have needed access to that stream….

No, you’d have had to move on. If you’d stuck around here, you’d have seen the men with the dynamite return to make room for the highways. First, they built the two-lane highway that you followed out here from that town, and fifty years later they built that four-lane interstate whose sparse traffic you can sometimes hear about eighty yards from that opposite fence. Then you’d have had to witness the area’s population grow until you found yourself with afriats and irrelevants scampering all around you like this cold wind that’s spooking through this canyon, spoiling what would otherwise be a fair evening. Yeah, you’d have probably been wiser to leave when the wind advised you and the birds to go.

But go where? It’s always Go where? Go somewhere else and look for a place where you’re allowed to be. That’s nowhere during these times when every place is fenced and everywhere you go you meet another No Trespassing sign like the ones along this fence. Either you’re trespassing or somebody is demanding you pay to be somewhere. Can you think of any exceptions? Just public parks, and if you’re not out of them before dark, you’re still a trespasser.

Well, if it’s trespass you must, then trespass you will, but you gotta go trespass somewhere else, because one thing you’re not prepared for is cold weather. Get off the ground. Move around a bit; keep your circulation flowing. It’s dark enough now to walk back and forth through the tall grass growing alongside the fence. Faster. And rotate your arms. Higher. You’re feeling warmer already. Circulation is a wonderful thing, isn’t it? You’d forgotten how cold the nights can feel in mid-September in these mountains. You’re lucky you’re heading toward the West Coast.

You’d better crouch down now. No sense taking too many chances. Keep hidden from the yard lights. Look east as far as this angle lets you see up the tracks. There’s still no sign of the big headlight on that four-engine freight train that’ll pull your frozen carcass out of this windy canyon, through the rest of these mountains, and down into eastern Washington, where winter won’t catch you for a couple more months. Get here, train.

It shouldn’t be much longer now. Didn’t the switchman tell you a west-bounder would be stopping here a little after dark? Of course, they never know very far in advance when the trains will arrive, since trains run more by tonnage than by clock schedules these days. But remember, he said it’ll stop to pick up some grain cars. Then it’ll take you within eighty miles of your apple-picking work.

That man sure threw some caution into you when he told you how much the yard bulls have been busting riders lately. Remember, he said they’ve pressed trespassing charges against more riders this summer than any time since the Depression. He said, Too many migrants are trying to ride again. Sounds like times are even harder than when you left in a boxcar last June. Of course, you wouldn’t know. You haven’t tried to find work all summer.

He said, You’d be safer waiting under that bridge at the west end of the yard.

When you thanked him and said, I will, you didn’t mention you’d been down there trying to catch out since dawn. In fourteen hours, only three west-bounders have left this yard, and by the time they reached that bridge, they were all moving too fast for a chicken like you to try to hop.

No, you’re not a chicken. Just cautious. A more seasoned traveler with a lighter pack on his back might have caught a ride near that bridge today, but don’t you risk any limbs. Just catch the train right here where she stops. You can’t afford to miss another one by waiting under that bridge. The night’s not going to get any warmer.…

There’s two long blasts from the whistle of a locomotive. It’s somewhere west of you. Hear how the loud rumble of a moving engine is burying the lower-pitched drones of the idlers? What’s moving?

There it is, a single locomotive moving a short string of grain cars to the center of the yard. She’s stopping. There’s two short whistles. That means the engine will be leaving those grain cars on that sidetrack, ready for the switchman to join them to the expected train. It’s coming soon, you can bet.

Car headlights! Lie down flat! A car’s coming up the gravel road. It must have pulled out from that parking area near the dispatcher’s office. Get your head lower.

Relax. It’s not the yard bulls. It’s one of those big vans that transport the yard crew. Most of those guys never care if you’re hopping a train.

You’d better stay out of sight just in case there’s an ornery cuss who might radio the police. Wait, the van’s stopping. Now two switchmen are hopping out by the grain cars. You’ve seen this operation many times. The driver will take the other two men in the van down to replace two of the crewmen in the caboose. You’ll see the engineers leave those throbbing locomotives, as fresh engineers replace them. Good. The train will be stopped long enough to look for an empty boxcar. That may be the only way you can take this cold ride….

Another set of headlights! They’re moving your way. It couldn’t be another van. Nope, it’s a sedan. Get your head down.

You knew it. There’s a beam of light approaching you, inflaming the grass around this fence. Hug the ground. See if the light passes over you.

They’re being too thorough to miss you. The lamp’s snooping everywhere. You can’t stay here. Climb the fence!

Wait! Your pack is still open and you’ve still got some clothes on the ground from when you pulled out your sweater a few minutes ago. You’re not prepared to run anywhere.…

Now why’d they shut off the searchlight? They’re approaching a lot faster. Did they see you? How could they? The light hadn’t reached you yet. Good, they’re driving by. What’s up the track they’re rushing to?

Look, there’s a headlight up the track to the east. There’s that long blast of a whistle followed by two shorter ones. Here’s your train.

But keep an eye on that police car. See, it’s stopping less than a hundred yards up the tracks. The cop on the passenger side is stepping out of the car. He’s crossing the main line of tracks and pulling a large flashlight from his utility belt. The driver just shut off the motor. He’ll take a position across the tracks from his companion.

Thanks to the yard lights, you can discern the police fairly well from this distance. They’re wearing uniforms, gray, perhaps, with holstered pistols and police clubs handily attached to their utility belts. The cop nearest you is flicking on his flashlight. He’s checking the beam. Apparently he’s satisfied; he just flicked it off. Now he’s fondling the handle of his pistol. Maybe he’ll fire off a round to test it.

There’s another long whistle. It sounds louder and stronger than before. It’ll be followed by two short blasts—there they are. The first of the four engines has almost reached the police, who now stand waving ritualistically at the engineers. Both officers just turned on their flashlights. Now the locomotives are passing between them. You won’t see the one farthest from you anymore, but you know he’s doing exactly what his partner is doing: shining his flashlight on every spot where a poor, freezing traveler could be riding: through the rattling doors of empty boxcars, on the front and rear platforms of grain cars, under the trailers of piggy-backers, on the ladders of tankers, everywhere except inside the gondolas. That requires a little climbing.

There’s the whine of the brakes finally being applied. You were starting to wonder if this train would ever stop, or if it was just slowing down enough for the cops to shoot the trespassers off the cars. She’s the longest train you’ve seen today, so it’s probably going all the way to the coast. Don’t miss it. Put the rest of your clothes back in your pack and get it on your back.

Why not follow this fence toward the engine and watch for an empty boxcar a good hundred yards west of the police? They’ll be satisfied they’ve checked every car that’s rattled by them, so once you’re in a boxcar, you’re on base. Roll out your sleeping bag and ride first class.

That’s what you want to hear more of, the squeal of brakes slowly being applied. Put some more distance between you and the cops and then make your run for a boxcar while they’re still busy checking for riders.

This is far enough. You don’t want to be too close to the dispatcher’s office either, in case he has orders to radio the cops if he sees anybody hopping the train. Cross the dirt road right here.

See what you’ve gotten yourself into here? Two of the sidetracks between you and the main line have strings of cars on them. You’ll have to slip through a couple of cars to get to your ride. That’ll put you out of sight of the police, anyway. This boxcar’s got both doors open. Pass through it. Wait a second. See what that cop’s doing. Now where is he? Can you spot him? Hey, there goes the cop car toward the caboose. He’s probably going around to the other side of the train to pick up his partner. Move! Climb through the boxcar. Slide on your lower chest and abdomen like a lizard. Pull your body and the weight of your pack toward the center of the car. Do it again. Get your knees into the action. Wriggle forward a little and your feet will be in far enough to stand up. No problem in a car that’s not moving.

Before you hop out the other door, look up and down the row. Nobody’s out there. Sit down in the doorway. Extend your legs. Make sure you push yourself out far enough to let your pack clear the ledge. As your feet land, let your knees buckle a little to help absorb the cold jolt.

You’ve still gotta cross one more string of cars. Do you see any open boxcars or flatcars near you? Nope. Lots of grain cars this time of year. Go ahead, take hold of the ladder and pull yourself up onto the first rung of this grain car. Now up one more. Keep a solid footing on this mammoth, just in case some locomotive starts pushing these cars somewhere or takes to slamming cars onto the end of ‘em. Move just one hand or foot at a time. Take hold of that supporting rod around the corner from you in your right hand. Now put your right foot down on the little platform behind the car. Shift your weight over there now. Watch your balance. Those wheels are right below you.

You’re lucky your train tonight has some open boxcars. Remember the time you rode on this end of a grain car looking at the wheels like this for hundreds of miles across freezing North Dakota? Never again. You’re better off freezing to death in the railroad yard.

Now do the same process in reverse. Right hand around the corner and onto the ladder. Right foot…shift your weight…left hand…left foot. Step down to the bottom rung now and drop. Push yourself out while you’ve still got a good hold on the ladder. Never overlook the weight of a backpack when you’re climbing on trains, especially when pulling a foolish stunt like passing between cars in an active railroad yard. More seasoned tramps than you have lost limbs and lives doing that.

Here’s your train. Walk up toward the engine and find an empty car. If this were a month ago, you’d be happy lying prone on one of these piggy-backers. Not in this weather, though. You’d be better off walking.

Here’s an open boxcar. It has both doors open, so it’ll be a little drafty. If this car’s absolutely too cold, you can look for one with only one open door the first time the train stops. The main thing right now is to get away from these cops.

So, for now you’ve found yourself a home, you old boll weevil. Toss your pack up there. Pull yourself on in. Have a better look at it. It’s fairly clean; you have to hand it to the maids. Do you still have that railroad spike in your hip pocket? Jam it between this door and its track so the door can’t slide shut and lock you in here.

Now get up there where you’ll be riding, the front of the car half way between the side walls. You’ll be as safe as possible in here, if you lie with the bottom of your feet almost touching the front wall. Once the train’s out of this yard, you can roll out your sleeping bag and turn in…if you still have this boxcar to yourself. One thing you don’t want tonight is company.

Won’t it be a relief to get rollin’? You’ve hopped enough freight trains to know that empty boxcars don’t gently rock you to sleep like some songs about hobos would have it, but tonight you’re tired enough to sleep standing up. Come on, train. Are there any slower moments than those you spend waiting to leave a railroad yard?

Patience. You can’t leave until the train’s good and ready. Maybe you should see if any brakemen are visible. If they’re tinkering with the brakes, it could be an hour before you hear those two long whistle blasts announcing you’re on your way. Go ahead and check. Move along the wall to keep yourself out of sight. Don’t lean out the door so far; there’s another access road on this side of your boxcar….

It’s those headlights again! The sedan’s only a dozen cars down from you. There’s that searchlight again, shining through that boxcar door. This one might be next. Get out the other door!

Wait! You left your backpack up front, fool. Why didn’t you wait until you’re rollin’ west before you put it down? Get it. Hurry up….

No, you don’t have time. Hear that sedan? It’s almost here. Leave the pack. They might not see it so far from the door. Dash to the rear of the car and crouch down in the dark corner. Their light will probably miss you. And most cops are too lazy to search a boxcar on foot.…

Here’s that sizzling beam of light you worried about, barging in and lighting up the front of the car…marching along the opposite wall toward the rear of the car…now retracing its tracks forward. The light’s off. Sounds like a car door is opening. The sound of a big man’s boots grinding into the gravel is the last thing you needed to hear tonight. There’s the flashlight beam you knew would soon be snooping around, examining the front of the boxcar. It’s coming to rest on your backpack. Now it’s springing backward…it’s following the opposite wall back to that empty corner…crossing over now to your face. What more can you do than squint like a fool and wait for him to start the conversation?

Come over here.

Just oblige him and say, Yes, sir.

Come down from there.

All right. I’ll just get my grip.…

I said, ‘Out’!

Just agree by saying, I will. Now add, May I grab my pack first in case the train starts to leave?

No!

Put your right hand on the ledge of the doorway and hop out to face him.

Put your hands on the side of the police car and spread your feet.

He can frisk you till the cows come home, but he won’t find any weapons.

Now turn around and show me some I.D.

Sound obliging. Yes, sir; here it is. Pull out that old driver’s license you’ve kept for showing to police. It should be under your sweater in your shirt pocket. Now the younger of the two policemen is approaching, thumbs tucked under his belt, boots grinding into the gravel in imitation of his trainer.

What were you doing in there?

Try to sound sad, humble, and a little simple-minded, and tell them, Just trying to get home.

They both look pretty doubtful, don’t they? They know a man still riding the rails at your age wouldn’t have a home. The older man’s looking up from writing information from your old driver’s license onto his standard trespass report.

Where’d you enter the yard?

Point to the employees’ gate. Over there.

And you thought the no-trespassing sign was there for a joke?

I guess I didn’t notice it. You’re a pathetically poor liar. You know he’s not going to believe that.

This driver’s license is expired.

Tell him, I no longer drive.

Don’t you have any kind of current I.D.?

No, sir.

It’s foolish to be without a valid I.D.

Sorry. I’ve neglected to….

Better get yourself a state liquor card.

Promise him, I will. Promise anything. He’s handing you back your shabby card. Take it. Just put it in your front pants pocket.

Now get your belongings out of the boxcar.

Sure. You were wondering if you’d ever see your only possessions again. You better add, Thanks. Now pull yourself aboard and follow his flashlight beam to the front of the boxcar. Both men are closely watching your hands, so keep ‘em in plain sight as you pick up your grip and carry it to the doorway. Drop your pack to the ground and let yourself drop behind it. Let your knees buckle a little to ease your fall.

Let’s see you march right back out that gate. I suggest you get on that interstate entrance and start thumbing.

Agree with a big I will.

Because if we see you in this yard again, we’ll press charges for trespassing. You’ll be looking at thirty days in jail and a five hundred dollar fine.

Fabricate a frightened expression and nod.

If you think you can afford it, try riding this train again.

Reassure him with, I’ll go. Good; they’re turning to reenter the sedan.

We give a man one chance. You’ve had yours.

They’re probably driving to a place where they can watch you to make sure you intend to thumb. You’d better go act like you’re hitchhiking for a few minutes to put ‘em off your trail. Crossing four lanes of an empty freeway is as illegal as anything else you have to do, but it’s out of the railroad cops’ jurisdiction. They’re probably watching you by now. Walk backwards and thumb. Once you reach the end of the railroad yard, you’ll probably be out of their sight. Then you can make a break across this highway and go hide under that bridge where you waited for a train all day. Good thing there aren’t any cars coming. Hurry up and get past the yard before a car stops for ya. If the cops see you refuse a ride, they’ll be watching for you in the yard all night.

Darn it, there’s a car coming. Now that you don’t want a ride, it’ll probably stop for you. But you’ve gotta stick your thumb out, ‘cause the cops can probably see your arm from wherever they’re watching. Thumb up. But don’t get a ride, whatever you do. Make an ugly face at the driver. A maniacal, suicidal face. Open your mouth and let your tongue hang out. Look like you’re fixin’ to throw yourself in front of the car. There. He’s moving into the other lane. Quick. Make some tracks backwards. Pick up your feet. You’ve still got a good quarter of a mile to walk backward….

Here comes another car. It’s got headlights bright enough to burn ya. Surely the cops can see your arm in all this light. Thumb up. Make your face again. Come on, you can look uglier than that. Open your mouth more. Cross your eyes. Good, he’s pickin’ up speed.

Hear that? Two blasts of a whistle. Probably part of the train is pulling forward, preparing to back up and pick up that string of grain cars.

No, they’d have added those cars by now. That whistle means your train is about to pull out. You can’t risk missing another train. Look, you’re less than a hundred yards from the end of the yard. The cops probably can’t see you well from here, especially with no cars coming. Run for it. Hold your pack still. Keep it from jabbing you in the kidneys. Hustle part way down that exit ramp. Leave the pavement. Cut across the weeds to that road going left. It’ll take you under the freeway to that overpass that crosses the tracks.

Here’s that wire mesh fence that guards your descent to the railroad tracks. Here’s that familiar old sign: Private Property. No Trespassing. Violators Will Be Prosecuted. Remember, the part of the fence just to the right of the bridge is your easiest climb to the tracks. See, the top wires have all been bent toward the ground by the boots of hundreds of police-anxious trespassers.

Toss your pack over. Grab the top of that fence post and pull yourself up. Use your legs more. Now you need to place both feet on top of the fence. How’s your balance? Seems okay. Now gyrate your body around and shift your weight to your arms. Kick out away from the wires. Let your feet land on the fence—about halfway down. Let ‘em support your weight for a second. Ready? Drop.

Remember, the dozen or more lines of track in the yard converge into two tracks just before they leave the yard. Crouch beside them in those dark shadows below the bridge. Now try to conceal yourself from the wind and the yard cops both. This is the first time you’ve felt cold since you entered that boxcar. That’s one nice thing about the police. They help you forget all your other miseries.

Cold or not, you’d better not stand up and move around now. Once a cop gives you a warning, never take unnecessary chances. Just sit here and thank the cold for helping you forget that you haven’t eaten anything since early this morning. Times like this can make ya wonder if the pain you endure to avoid afriats isn’t worse than afriats themselves.

Sounds like no traffic’s moving out on the freeway. There’s just the drone of the diesel engines that will soon pull you and two miles of freight away from this cold, windy fate. You hear that? Somewhere out in the darkness that whittling stream is carving away at this pass the tracks must follow through these mountains to the plowed land far below.

So, once again you’re a trespasser. You’re always either somebody’s trespasser or somebody’s tenant. But you can only take so much of this lousy trespassing. Feels like it’s almost time again to rent yourself a few square yards of space where nobody has the right to enter without your permission. It’s definitely time to go to work in those orchards again. Get yourself a pile of money to pay for your legal piece of space….

That bass drone isn’t a drone any more. It’s amplifying into a rumble. There’s the two blasts from the whistle