Model Citizens Page #2

I'm gonna build a town,

I'm gonna build a city,

I'm gonna build a layout.

The creation part of it is

what's so cool about it.

- John Allen, who was a

prolific modeler back in the

early days of model railroading.

He always had these little

whims built into his scenes.

A stegosaurus pulling a boxcar?

Come on, who does that?

(laughing)

What other hobby do you know

could do that and kind of say,

it's my world, so what?

(laughing)

- I might go to, let's say

I go to somebody's house,

and I look at their

model railroad and

let's say it has a

lot of toilet humor.

It might have, say,

a scene where

there's a prostitute,

or things like that.

And you wonder what

made him put that there

because this person that has

a prostitute and a John

modeled on his layout...

It might be your

pastor at your church,

and it kinda makes

you wonder, like,

hmm, is he trying to

live a secret life there?

Or something like that.

But I have noticed that.

You look at somebody's

layout and you'll

have a scene on

there that I'm like,

I wouldn't think of you

planning a scene like

that in your head.

(stammering)

I did meet a priest that had a,

maybe not a priest, a pastor.

I don't know if there's

a difference or not.

That had a dirty

scene on his layout,

I was very surprised.

- It's just a toy

that we have fun with

and it gives me pleasure

and I get to,

create, I get to create stuff.

Just like a painter would

take a blank canvas,

I take a car out of a

box, it's unpainted.

Put it together the way

I want it put together.

And I get to paint

it the way I want it

and I get to weather

it the way I want it.

When I'm happy

with it, then I...

(laughs)

Really, I put it

back in a box again,

and store it until the next

time I wanna look at it.

It seems kinda silly,

but that's my deal.

- A lot of us see,

incorrectly, I'm sure,

we see model railroading

as an art form.

And I think it really is.

In other words,

If you paint a

backdrop, that's art.

If you paint a locomotive,

or weather it to make it look

old and used, that's art.

If you put a building

so that it looks

right in a scene, that's art.

If you arrange several

buildings into a bigger scene,

that's art.

So when you start

getting into art,

you can offend sensibilities

pretty quickly.

And so I think the line is

right there at some point.

But I think if you've

got everybody in a mellow

mood and discuss it,

I think we could probably come

to some kind of understanding.

- [Voiceover] Okay.

So why should we care

about model railroading?

(train humming)

- What model railroading,

like any other

creative pursuit...

Is the participant gets

actively engaged in it.

Model railroading, in

the end is going to

train your brain by

requiring you to do

lots of different

things to be multimodal.

I honestly think that

the combination of

thinking about engineering,

about fine-motor control,

about the kind of

problem solving that

operations involves.

Or even designing a

layout and figuring out

how you're gonna fit stuff in.

All that kind of flexibility

that's required to do it,

I think tends to keep

people's brains pretty sharp.

I think the worst thing

for brains is sort of

the degree to which we end up

doing the same thing

over and over again.

The ways in which

we end up becoming

passive not active.

Obviously you could do

that as a model railroader,

but if you're gonna take

it really seriously,

you've gotta be active

and you've gotta really

be working in many

different modes at once.

(jaunty music)

- I retired about,

oh, 10 years ago.

And I began kinda

searching around for

a hobby or something and it

was a natural progression

to get back into

model railroading.

- The most important

thing is to have a hobby.

I see too many people whose

entire lives are their jobs.

And if your job's

really rewarding,

let's say maybe

you're a trial lawyer

or a doctor.

And your life is

important to a lot

of people and all that, great.

But most lawyers and

doctors I know are retiring.

And one of,

our kid's pediatrician, in fact,

called me up and he says "Okay.

"It was my turn to

take care of the kids,

"now it's your turn to come

help me with model railroading."

And I think that's very

smart of him because

what are you gonna

do with your time?

You don't want to idle.

And there's too many people that

just retire and literally die.

And I think it's

almost out of boredom,

I don't know what

the physiology is,

but they just stagnate because

they got nothing to do.

(slow instrumental music)

- I think anything in

which you have a passion

not only can keep you young,

it can keep you alive

and keep you going.

And I think model railroading

has that potential.

So does golf.

So does...

I had a very good friend who

came down from the

state of Oregon

to a great organization

in California.

There was no commitment,

but it was sorta of okay,

you know, when the current

Executive Director retires,

you'll become

Executive Director.

Well that didn't happen and

he was very disappointed.

And all he could do was look

forward to his retirement.

He retired.

He was gonna write a book.

He was gonna lecture.

He moved out to

Rossmoor Leisure World

and he was dead in three years.

He didn't have anything to do.

He didn't have anything

to keep him going.

So, model railroading,

can keep you alive.

But so can a lot

of other things.

You gotta have a passion.

- When I retired from

the state of California,

where I worked for 40 years,

there were a couple

of people in my office

who didn't retire

and they could've.

I'd asked them, "Why

aren't you gonna retire?"

And they said,"I'm

scared to retire,

"because I don't

have anything to do."

And I thought my

God, that's tragic.

They were so lucky,

happy, for me.

Because they said,

"You're so lucky,

"you have something to

do, you have a hobby."

Oh my gosh, it isn't like I'm

the only one with a hobby.

One thing that we're

looking at is trying

to reach out to people

who are near retirement.

The kids have grown up.

They have maybe a little more

income that they can keep now,

instead of paying for

the kids' expenses.

And they wanna do

something meaningful.

Well, this is a

meaningful hobby,

it's a constructive hobby.

- One of the things that

I think distinguishes,

not just model railroaders,

of course, but,

model railroaders

among others is that

they've never given up playing.

That the play part of their life

is maybe more important than

the work part of their life.

Which I think is

actually a healthy thing.

- Everybody comes to

the hobby with their own

viewpoint, with their own

motivation of why they

play with trains or

operate trains.

I mean, you don't wanna say

they're playing with trains,

because that would

be too childlike,

so they say they

operate the trains.

But it's still definitely

a form of play.

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes