Friday night was awesome. Well, I mean the part before I sat in my dark apartment alone and cried for hours. Friday night was the night I got to totally indulge my inner geek (my outer geek is indulged on pretty much a daily basis) and talk about model trains with members of the Train Collectors Association who were in town for their annual convention.
I figured there had to be a story somewhere in that convention, so I flipped through their schedule and a couple of events caught my eye. Since the convention focused on trains and train collecting and all its attendant geekery, it was logical that it would feature more than a few actual train rides. As much as I wanted to ride the Mt. Washington Cog Railway with a bunch of train nerds (self-described), I was pretty sure the Free Press wouldn’t spring for the $90 fare. So I planned on hitting a “layout tour” in Colchester instead where nearly 100 model train buffs were to gather to critique Jon Brooks’ train room.
Our intrepid photographer, Emily Nelson, and I headed out to Colchester on Friday evening for the layout tour when most of our friends were probably getting ready to throw back one or nine frosty brews on Church Street. But it was all in the name of a good story. We entered the Brooks’ two-bedroom condo and were led to the basement by Jon’s wife, Elice. Elice, bless her heart, is a model train widow. She has basically had to resign herself to the fact that her husband has been having an affair with a trainset for years. She told us that nightly Jon retires to the basement with a glass of wine and sits with remote control in hand watching the trains go ’round.
Now, I like model trains. I always have. I never collected them, but I seem to remember my father trying to get my brother into the hobby at some point. But back in elementary school, my brother was more interested in cutting off his bangs and hiding the hair in the linen trunk than he was in trains. So the hobby never took off. We’re not a hobby family anyway, unless you count having bad tempers or being aloof as hobbies.
Anyway, back in Jon’s basement, Emily and I were admiring the spread before the hoardes of train enthusiasts descended on the Brooks’ home. It was incredible all the work that went into the layout. It was amazingly intricate. Everything from the miniature train passengers to the shrubbery was lovingly arranged. Jon’s 10-year-old daughter, Lauren, took greats pains to remind me again and again that she helped gather the greenery that would become the trees. Apparently being able to talk for America is a trait common amongst those named Lauren.
Jon has a lot of trains. He doesn’t know how many individual train cars he owns, but it seemed like it was somewhere in the neighborhood of one hundred thousand million. Which is good because when the masses alighted from their motorcoach, they wanted to see some damn trains. Emily and I were in the basement when the thundering herd came down the steps. Like sheep being corralled into a catching pen, the train enthusiasts marched into Jon’s train room, which was about eight square feet. They just kept pushing into the room until they could hardly move. And that is when Emily and I took our leave. The last thing I need in my life is to be smothered to death by a crush of model train collectors.
Upstairs, Elice was playing hostess to the train collectors who invaded her living room. She gave them water and soda as they sweated to the Oldies, literally. Jon is an Oldies DJ on Kool 105 and the evening’s musical selection reflected that. Emily and I headed outside to get some air and chat with some of the conventioneers. They generally liked Jon’s spread, though one fellow wasted no time in telling us he was in the process of building a model train room in his garage that was bigger than most people’s houses- more than 2,100 sq. feet. Perhaps when I am homeless and miniature, I can live there.
