30 Years Down The Line
The sky, in all its wonder and vastness, was silent as it hanged above Tidmouth sheds. Almost no clouds could be seen against the bright blue.
All was peaceful.
"BEEP, BEEP, BEEP"
Well, almost all.
Thomas the tank engine was blowing his whistle as loud as he could. His eyes clamped shut with every blow. "Wake Up, Wake Up" he yelled.
All the other engines, still trying to get some early morning sleep in, slowly opened their eyes.
"What's wrong Thomas? Why'd you wake us up so early" said Percy with a yawn.
"Yeah, we have today off" said a sleepy James.
"And do you know why we have today off" asked Thomas.
"Yeah, because today's the thirtieth anniversary of our TV show" said Edward, with his eyes still closed.
But the moment Edward said those words; all the engines opened their eyes as wide as they could go.
"Today is" began Henry.
"The thirtieth anniversary" said Duck.
"Of our TV show" finished Gordon.
The engines were silent, not a word said…but not for long.
"YYYEEEAAAHHH" screamed the engines as they blew their whistles.
"THIRTY YEARS AND STILL GOING STRONG" said James.
"WE'VE BEEN THORUGH SOME ROUGH YEARS, BUT WE GOT THROUGH THEM" said Gordon.
"AND KIDS, PLUS OLDER FANS, STILL LIKE US" said Percy.
"We really need to thank all the people who made us who we are today" said Edward.
"Yeah. We need to thank Britt Allcroft for creating our show. She saw that our books could become and great series and she was right" said Thomas.
"But we also need to thank David Mittion. He directed the episodes, and made our island look as real as ever" said Henry.
"How about we thank Sharon Miller to" said Charlie, who was collecting coal cars nearby.
"NO" screamed all the engines. Charlie frowned, and went back to shunting.
"Finally, we need to thank Andrew Brenner. It was because of him and his writing team that our show got back on track after all those years" said Edward.
Thomas smiled. "So many people made this show great" he looked up at the sky "I wonder what the next thirty years will bring"?