Polar Express Conductor Hand Delivers Christmas Spirit To Autistic Boy
By kncipat on November 22, 2019
I always thought the Polar Express might be the best train ever. Now I know it is! The Swartout family in Arizona thinks so to. Ty Swartout has austim and his favorite thing in the whole world is trains. In particular he LOVES the Polar Express. Despite having autism and being non verbal Ty reads the story over and over and LOVES the movie….he watches it every day. His parents took him to a real life Polar Express. A train in their hometown in Arizona runs an overnight sightseeing tour and at his time of year one of the cars is decked out just like the Polar Express complete with Polar Express engineer. The whole family had tickets in hand and Ty was sooo excited.
When the train pulled up that’s when things when sideways. The noise, the lights, the excitement was too much for Ty….he had a meltdown. The people working with the train were patient, supportive and tried their best to comfort Ty and get him to board. No go…..it was just too much for him. The family had no choice but to retreat to their hotel room in order to calm Ty down. Ty’s mom said her heart was shattered. She wanted so badly for this to happen for her son.
About 2 hours later there was a knock on their hotel door: It was the conductor from the Polar Express. He had a special gift for Ty. He gave him his pocket watch and then sat down and read the book the Polar Express to Ty. At the end he handed Ty one more gift. A small silver bell.
As he left he cupped his hands to his mouth and said very softly, Merry Christmas.
The railway also have Ty’s family a full refund. They didn’t want it but the railway insisted.
Ty’s mom posted the story on her fb page along with the Conductor reading to Ty. She wanted to use the mans’ name in order to thank him properly…… but all he would allow her to call him was, The Conductor.
