Well, two of actually.

One of the older gents who i speak to on a regular basis popped round earlier, and he does like to talk, to put it mildly; so I thought the evening was going to be totally unfruitful. The gent in question was a signaller on the old line that ran through the area, and worked out of the railway station in the village (I'll dig some of my personal photos out sometime). We were sat on the bench in front of the apartment, and he asked me if I was interested in the local railway, and what scale I was modelling to as he'd seen me wandering through the village with a bit of flexi under my arm a while back.

So I told him that I was attempting to build a small representation of the line, and what gauge; and I've rarely seen the reaction that I got from him. He was off like a proverbial hare, and a few minutes later he reappeared with a small box. He passed it to me and said that he wanted the photos back after I'd had a look at them, but I could keep the other bits in there. In it, was a pair of 0-4-0 short wheelbase tank locos, of the type built by MTM in the same era and style what I'm working to. He proceeded to explain that he used to model railways, and he'd built a layout for his grandchildren, but they weren't interested in the old things, much preferring the noisy, brightly coloured 'new digital' things instead of the locomotives he'd presented me with.

We sat there, with me looking at these locos, and they are superb in detail. I don't know where the bodies are from, or who made them, but they are very solid chunks of metal indeed; and they are built on top of, I think, Fleischmann chassis (not had a proper look yet, but they run beautifully).

He said that he'd not got round to painting them up, as they were still in primer as he was going to do one each for the two grandkids but as they wanted digi-diesel... So I said what I'd do with them, and went indoors to pick up the one that was currently on the workbench. His first words on seeing it were "That looks too clean!", so it looks like some weathering and sun fading is going to be done on them, but he mentioned that not all the locos up this region carried the green/black, as a couple were just in black with white/grey lining, some in green/black and with silver lining, some in straight black and a couple more had the red running boards on a black loco.

We sat for almost an hour, with me taking notes as he explained some of the workings that used to pass through; some of the incidents that he'd seen and also the operating practises of the region.

When we'd finished and he was off for his dinner, I asked him how much he wanted for the locos, or what he'd take in payment (apart from the bottle of wine I gave him), and all he said was "Just make it look like the area, capture the essence don't worry about recreating it perfect, so the memory is still there" and as he walked away, he stopped for a moment and looked back. Then he said, with a smile, "Let me come and just run the trains for a bit."

In all, it got me thinking about what people like this chap get out of what we do as modellers (at any skill level), and whether it is a form of remembrance, a tribute almost to what they did in what we do (whether completely prototypical or not); and also it got me thinking that when someone like this shares the advice, stories, and even though he had just given me two very fine locomotives, who got more out of that hour sat on the bench out front.

I've a feeling, in all, it wasn't me.