I've been asked several times over the years how the nickname "balltrain" came about. You may or may not care but I anticipate for some it might be a somewhat entertaining story.
In the late 90's there was
a dance club on the west side of what is now the Gateway called Club Axis. We
didn't hit this place up often (my memories were more at The Bay on 4th south
at least until we all actually turned 18 at which point the dance clubs didn't
seem as cool anymore). I want to say this was Sophomore year for me but it
might have been Junior year. A group of us where at Club Axis dancing. The club
was obviously dark with lots of strobe lights everywhere. There was a stage as
well as some pedestals at each corner of the stage. I found myself on a
pedestal dancing with a group of girls. Truly I was king of the moment! That
moment lasted but a mere instant as I somehow lost my balance and started
shuffling backwards, sending the girls behind me off the pedestal and down onto
the floor below. As I stumbled backwards, about to fall off myself, I of course
flailed my arms out and grabbed the girl(s) in front of me in an effort to
balance myself. Turns out a 200+ lb dude is more of an anchor for a couple
teenage girls and I dragged them down with me, creating a train of sorts of
people falling off the pedestal onto the ground. Luckily nobody was seriously
injured (my memory of course is the pedestal being way high off the ground. . .
reality is that it was likely 1/2 a step above the stage and only marginally
higher above the ground). My pride of
course was seriously injured and I'm pretty sure I didn't dance with anybody
the rest of the night. Not only were the girls no longer interested in my sweet
dance moves, my friends were VERY interested in mocking me relentlessly for
creating a falling train of sorts at the dance club. Thus the
"balltrain" was born.
The story above is true
and undeniably had an impact on this nickname gaining legs and now becoming my
lifelong nickname such that all my social media handles are based off balltrain
and even my wife has had to adopt the rachetrain moniker. Also I'm a big guy
which I'm sure helps a nickname like "train" stick around. We
probably aren't comparing the small skinny kid to a train. Nevertheless, I feel
a long overdue confession is in order of the true origin of the name.
Most readers of this post
will be familiar with Saved by the Bell and it's overwhelming popularity in the
90's. I was a huge fan and continued to be a fan of "T-NBC" Saturday
morning programs long after the original Saved by the Bell closed out its
series. In fact, the original Saved by the Bell ended in 1992 and it was really
Saved by the Bell: The New Class that carried from 1993-2000 which were my
prime teen years. (143 episodes of The New Class vs only 86 of the original). I
loved watching T-NBC as well as some cartoons and finished off Saturday
mornings with NBA Inside Stuff. Great times indeed. There was a second show on
right after Saved by the Bell: The New Class called City Guys. This show was
basically Saved by the Bell but set in New York City. I watched both of these
shows basically all the way through and I must have blended them together in my
mind for quite some time. There is a character on City Guys called
"El-Train" (I always thought it was just L-Train but IMDB corrected
me). I certainly didn't realize it at the time because I had never been to New
York but I'm imagine the L-Train character name had something to do with the
subway system. I liked the character and in particular I liked the nickname
(the characters "real name" was Lionel Johnson in the show).
Somewhere along the line
of our growing up years we do stupid stuff or make up stupid lies and we end up
being embarrassed about them. I don't remember exactly when but I do know that
somewhere along the line in high school (and definitively before the above
mentioned Club Axis incident) I started referring to myself at school as
"ball-train". Yep, there it is. I gave myself the nickname and
somehow (surely with the help of the Club Axis incident) the name stuck and
became in some ways an identity of its own. My very first email I setup for
myself was balltrain@hotmail.com. . . my personal email that I still use to
this day and people always joke to me "you still use hotmail?"
I had a long period where
I doubted myself as I got deeper into my adult years. I could've sworn the
character was from Saved by the Bell: The New Class. When IMDB first came
around I kept searching through that series and cast and characters over and
over and couldn't find the "L-Train" character anywhere. I was so
frustrated as I just KNEW I had grabbed that name from Saved by the Bell. I
don't know how many times I tried to look it up but it was a LOT as I for
whatever reason wanted that confirmation that my memory was correct. Memories
are funny things.
Quick sidebar- I just KNEW
the time I went to Britney Spears with my buddies on the front row in 2000 was
on August 18th. I knew it because it was my mom's birthday so easy to remember,
right? Imagine my surprised a year or so ago when I pulled up the setlist to
see it was August 14th, 2000 not August 18th. Trippy but clearly our memory
fails us.
So anyway somehow within
the last few years I was determined once again to find this mysterious L-Train
character and this time instead of Saved by the Bell on imdb I realized I
needed to search for TNBC or 90's Saturday Morning NBC lineups. And there it
was: City Guys. I knew immediately "This is the ONE!". Took it
straight to IMDB and there was the character name I knew I had latched onto.
So why haven't I shared
this before? Easy answer. I was more embarrassed about making up my own
nickname than I was about a public embarrassment incident that I couldn't hide
anyway. Nobody ever needed to know about the City Guys and their great
character nickname development. Even the great Rachetrain herself was only made
privvy to this story earlier this year when I finally broke down and shared it
for the first time.
I turned 41 years old
today. It was a great birthday and I'm grateful to be alive. I hope I can
continue to share fun memories (and continue to gain new ones) as I move
forward in life with wonderful friends and family around me. Hope I was able to
give back a bit to everyone that gives to me with this story so call it my
birthday present to everyone!
