During the summers of my college years, starting at the age of 17, I worked on a “gandy gang” for the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad. These are some of the most memorable summers of my life as they taught me about hard labor, persistence, and camaraderie. “The Commute” is the first chapter of a serialization about those summers and those lessons. So far I’ve written about half a dozen chapters of this ongoing work. Check back for further chapters. And please, let me know what you think!