Railroad Shorty Catches The Westbound Train-With Townes Van Zandt Brazos River Song In Mind 

Tacoma Tommy and Platte River Knobby, as the men closest to him in a world where close associations were as fleeting as rolling up your bedroll and heading out in the early morning burn off fog, laid old Railroad Shorty out along the Brazos about a mile from their old railroad jungle camp along the old Texas & Western tracks just where the river bends which provided clear running water for the camp and provided old Shorty with a fine view resting place, a place he always talked about so that is where he would lay now for eternity. The boys laid him out as best they could, put a little half-ass cross made of small twigs gathered from the spreading oak tree which would give Shorty some shelter over the shallow grave they had dug for him for they were unskilled at such endeavors and moreover were as hungover as tow skunks, maybe dug enough to keep the scavengers away maybe not, just in case he was a Christian and wanted it that way. Funny in the hobo, tramp, bum worlds and there were very serious distinctions recognized by all among those three classes of brethren (ironic even down in the fellahin world such populations would divide just like regular society) except when some soup line missionary workers, usually the blessed damn Sallies (Salvation Army), wanted you to repent along with your soup, no man spoke much about his religion so old Shorty could have been a Mohammedan or an atheist for all anybody knew. As far as they knew while Shorty may have been on the con with the merciful Sallies to get a few bucks or a bed for a week or so when he was sick he never bought into that old time religion stuff, never did like Sky-lo King did and join the bastards without a murmur banging some silly drum around Christmas time pan-handling the gentle folk for dough for the missions.

All Tommy and Knobby knew was that morning when they tried to awaken Shorty as they usually did since he would usually be up until all hours, quiet like, sipping that old Tokay he loved when he had some change, he had not responded, had caught the freight train west like a lot of travelling men before him. Guys like Big Bill, Lefty, Arfy Darfy, Frankie Machine, Prince Love, Black River Sam and a hundred other monikers some used over and over again, some used by different men and used for a purpose for it was far better to be some anonymous Cactus Mack than use your given name in case some surly ex-wife, some crazed repo-man or some rat-bait sheriff was looking for you heard you were headed west. Usually a guy would thinking he would only be on the bum for a few weeks, maybe a month, would  use his given name but all it took was one close call by some vengeful ex-wife who had hired a private detective to run you down, or even hear of such exploits to wise up and get a respectable moniker.

All they knew as well was that the only proper burial for a hobo and Shorty qualified in spade for that title since in the doomed fellahin kingdom a hobo like Shorty not afraid to work if necessary, if only for a bottle, even if he wasn’t making a profession out of what he was doing like “pearl diving” was ahead of tramps who avoided work and bum who under no conditions would do such labor was royalty and that distinctions carried weight even in camps where tramps and bums could hang for a while, was to get the body away from the railroad jungle and buried before the police or some authority came snooping around asking who he was, did he have family, did he leave anything of value behind like hobos had some treasure trove to be distributed upon taking that forlorn west-bound train. All that noise, all that law for a simple unadorned vagrant burial in some town’s potter’s field. Both men agreed no thank you Shorty was better off against the banks of the Brazos, the banks of any river, down in any arroyo, under any railroad bridge if it came to that than to be in some numbered no man ‘s graveyard.   

Their hot sweaty work done Tommy opened up a pint bottle of old rotgut whisky, Old Tom, Old Tom that has probably killed more men than the plague, certainly more denizens of the jungle camps, Shorty’s only valuable possession at the end, and took a swig for Shorty and then passed it to Knobby who did the same. As they started to reminisce for a moment about Shorty Knobby asked Tommy how old he thought Shorty had been, roughly anyway. Tommy answered that he figured about fifty but you could never tell with hobos because the weather, the booze, the irregular and usually awful food, even the Sally fare depended on what some local grocery store had thrown away and these mercy-benders were no cooks whatever else they could do in life, and the living conditions aged a man quickly out on the road. Tommy asked Knobby how old he thought he was. Knobby said sixty and Tommy answered with a blush beneath his wind-burned, tanned, wind-burned again face and said forty-five. That ended that line of inquiry and as they took another swig each for Shorty they talked about the deceased and how he was always a straight-up guy.  

Tommy could remember that first time he set eyes on Shorty out in the Gallup, New Mexico railroad jungle out along the Southern Pacific tracks outside of town a few years back as Shorty welcomed him with a fresh swig of Ripple wine, all Shorty had at the time. See Shorty was one of the original founders, you might say, of that camp at that site (there was an older site near Kingman in Arizona but the local sheriff and his boys busted that up one night just for the shear hell of it and the local citizenry stood by and applauded as they “threw the bums out of town”). So Tommy and Shorty went back a ways, a pretty long time as far as travelling men goes, and when Shorty and some Tex-Mex named Diablo Fuego had words and Shorty decided if he wanted to avoid a shiv some dark, moonless night he had better head out, head east this time to the Brazos Tommy had grabbed his knapsack and bedroll and headed out with him (that knapsack or rucksack and a bedroll with ground cover all a travelling man had  to call home. Everybody, well except maybe Diablo but what can you expect of a Tex-Mex, had a good word for Shorty since if he had dough, had food, had hustled an extra package of cigarettes, and most importantly, if he had booze, he shared. (That was the rationale the boys used for taking Shorty’s Old Tom to themselves rather than burying perfectly good whisky with Shorty which was an old tradition among certain Western hobos.)  

You might hear from some guys from the cities, college kids, folksingers or troubadours, guys who spent maybe a forlorn couple of days doing research or something talk about the camaraderie of the road, the “honor among the brethren, among thieves” maybe says it best but don’t bet on it, don’t leave a bedroll, a swig of Thunderbird wine, hell, even a cigarette butt around without keeping two, maybe three, eyes on those items or that will be the last you see of them. But Shorty was a master hobo, held a high degree in that railroad kingdom. Just then Knobby though he heard some car coming up the road so they hit the road back to camp and left Railroad Shorty, name unknown, age unknown, place of origin unknown along the sweet Brazos never to cross that river, the Trinity, the Pecos, the Colorado, the Platte and a hundred other rivers no more. RIP, Shorty, RIP.