Come on, ride the train

I took Amtrak for the first time last week (to southern New Jersey), and let me tell you, it was complete heaven. A co-worker of mine once described it as "a civilized way to travel", and boy was she right. The steps involved with traveling on Amtrak go something like this:

1. Purchase your ticket online
2. Arrive at station a mere half hour before your train (and that's a generous amount of time)
3. Print ticket at the kiosk
4. Relax and wait for the train. Don't worry about checking your bag, going through security, if you've packed liquids larger than 3 ounces, yada, yada, yada.
   
5. Board the train. Relax some more
6. Relax. Oh and if you forgot, relax some more. Enjoy the beautiful scenery, sleep, do work on your laptop, savor the loads of leg room (and snicker when thinking about the poor suckers currently stuffed into an airplane seat), buy something to eat in the cafe car. You get my drift?
7. Marvel at how much happier you and everyone around you seems to be when the causes of road rage and the hassles of airports are removed from travel.
   
8. Arrive at your destination.
   

Ahhhh, it's making me calm right now just thinking about it. While riding the train, I began thinking about the other situations I would be in had I chosen another form of travel. We all know about the perils of airplanes. The other option would be driving four and a half hours with no traffic, and up to 6 and a half hours with traffic. The common theme is stress, stress and more stress. Yes, Amtrak is not cheap. It was $216 for my round trip ticket. But it's so worth it. And in the words of a very wise woman, so civilized.