STOP and Examine
RAILWAY PRESERVATION OFFERS SOMETHING YOU’LL NEVER BE ABLE TO ORDER ONLINE…
A FEW YEARS ago now, I had the pleasure of driving a newly outshopped locomotive on its maiden voyage. While waiting to take the trip, one of the sponsors on the train popped up and asked us what we were going to do next. Cheekily, I answered that I would simply be enjoying driving the train to the next station. Of course, it was a perfectly reasonable question to ask, and the nature of our hobby is such that, for most people, it is the excitement of what could be next that keeps the interest. For those doing the leg work of fundraising, project management and building things, each locomotive, carriage or building launched to the world represents a mountain climbed.
This magazine, of course, fans the flames of ‘what’s next?’ thinking. Month after month, the pages are filled with stories of great deeds done by committed teams, and so expectations are raised that this will always be the case. On a visit to the boss’ office the other day, there was a letter on the desk from a young supporter. This young chap had put a lot of thought into what was needed in the heritage railway world. It included things like the GCR reunification and Mallard returning to steam. The list was long and actually it wasn’t half bad, but you could sense it was the product of a young person brought up in a world where almost any consumer item you might want is readily available online, and that this thinking was percolating through in to the world of heritage railways. Want the ‘A1’ in a different colour? No problem – it’s available next day if you upgrade to Amazon Prime etc.
So, what has happened to our world? ‘Back in the day’ I used to buy various bits and proudly assembled a computer. If a new better part came out I would enjoy the upgrade tussle and make the new bit work with my machine. Boy was it exciting when sound cards first came along. Look – now the computer could play music! Nowadays I wouldn’t entertain the thought – modern off‐the‐shelf stuff is vastly better than anything I could hope to build. Great, yes, but in another way one of life’s joys has gone away and we have to look hard to find ways to replace those joys with something meaningful.
Last summer, I drove through a village near to my old home only to find that the entire place was festooned with crocheted items. The village had, it seems, been crochet‐bombed. Street furniture was all cleverly adorned with covers, wraps and woolly creatures. It was bizarre, to be honest, but it did make people stop and think. There was a certain pride in it too. Then one gets to thinking about the thousands and thousand of hours of work that it took to create all this. I arrived at my sister’s place for a much‐needed coffee, and found that she was crocheting. It turned out that she is one of t
