G'day, GO Train

The things families remember
London, ON
March 2022
This photo originally shared on Instagram

To most people, this isn’t much of a photo, a commuter train sitting in the late-night shadows of an almost empty Via Rail station.

To me, though, it’s a quiet reminder of a cherished moment of parenthood.

See, GO Transit is the regional transit organization that services Toronto and parts of southern Ontario. Its double-decker trains are kinda iconic, and they played a role in our little family’s journeys when the kids (and we) were younger.

On our regular drives back to Montreal to visit extended family, we took the ginormous highway known as the 401, which took us through Toronto. The commuter trail lines ran - and presumably still do run - parallel to the highway, so we’d often see the GO trains doing their thing.

For reasons we’ll never understand, our kids would spontaneously break into cheers whenever they saw one. One of them would scream, “G’day, mate!” upon seeing the familiar green and white shape, and then they’d all just fall apart in shared joyous celebration of the cool-looking train.

To this day, they can’t explain where the Australian reference came from, or why the sight of these specific trains somehow set them off. But I smile every time I see one, and I’m guessing that deep in my brain, I’m holding onto a few more quiet little memories that matter to no one else but us.

Funny how that works, isn’t it?

Either way, I hope the GO folks never change their branding. But just in case they do, pictures like this will instantly take me back.

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