This is a joke. The author is responsible for the opinions expressed in the text.
When the snow plows thunder across the street at night, I think of the people of Hallsberg or another railway junction where people supposedly sleep well at night, except on weekends when no trains rush over the switches.
On board the train it was the joints being played that rang out. William Somerset Maugham wrote the spy novel Ashenden in 1927, which was later translated by Nils Holmberg:
“He slept well in the sleeping car and was not disturbed of trembling; it was pleasant to lie down for a while, smoke a cigarette and enjoy the pleasant solitude of the little compartment; The rhythmic sound of the wheels clattering over the rail joints was a pleasant backdrop to one’s reflections, and the speed at which one raced through the night and darkness made one feel like a star traveling through space.”
So true and sure. I remember one late evening at the end of the last century, boarding a train in Verona and haggling with the sleeping car conductor for the only available first class seat. Unfortunately I couldn’t get a ticket.
The sleeping place was in the middle of one end of the car, above the wheels, which rumbled all night long. In the morning I arrived sleepless in snowy and ice-cold Munich. The conductor came with black coffee powder, a rock-hard crust and a wry smile; I realized that I had been the only passenger in the carriage. He had bluffed and made a fortune.
I had company from Boston to Chicago all night long with a sleeping car conductor who was one with all the trains in the world and was completely sold out on European railways. He knew every single track, every single gauge and unsuccessfully informed me about the existence of Swedish RC locomotives in other parts of the world.
In India, I woke up one morning in a shared sleeping compartment as my fellow passenger, a Sikh, stood combing his long, thick black hair, which he then folded and made into a turban. The reason I woke up was because he kept clearing his throat with such force and volume that it was impossible to continue sleeping.
I’ve never tried sleeping in a stroller, but I suspect it’s something similar.
Read other short stories by Säverman, for example about a forgotten singer who wrote about snowfall.
