My Train Set

                                                                                                                                                             My Train Set

                                                 
My son always liked trains when he was little. We had a train station that was close to our house at the time.  So when he was 7 or 8 years old I wanted to build one for him. I had never built a train layout before so it was all new to me. I went to the hobby shop and picked up a book that showed different layouts and how to build them. Since I had gotten a divorce, I lived by myself in a little one bedroom apartment. There wasn't any room so I chose this one layout that was 4x6. It just fit in my little dining area. It was fun building it and it gave my son and I something to talk about when I would call him. Whenever I got stuck and didn't know how to do something I went right for a book that told me how to do it. It took a long time and finally it was done. It wouldn't have taken so long but I didn't have any money. My son finally got to see it and he was excited. He built the mountains and helped me with the landscape. We both loved it. During the Christmas season I put garland and lights all around the edges of the layout and I had the buildings all light up. I put the Christmas music on and watched as the train went around. My son lived with his mother in another state so he didn't get to see the train set during Christmas. I missed being with him.

I always told him that I built the train set for him and he could take it anytime he wanted too. But as the years went by my son grew older and I lost interest in our train set. I let it go and it got all dusty. The landscape looked terrible and the train wouldn't work anymore and that's the way it stayed. My son got married and moved away as far as he could. I still don't know why. I have been in this same apartment for 27 years now. I guess I got a little depressed last week because it's that time of the year when everybody decorates for Christmas. I looked over at the train set still sitting in my living area and thought about my son and how it use to be between the two of us. I really miss that. I didn't want to look at it any longer and I thought about throwing it away in the dumpster in the back of my apartment. I got up and went over to the train set and just looked at it for a while. I happen to see a bag of grass left over from long ago. I picked it up and wondered how it would look if I sprinkled a little grass on the layout. It looked cool. I had nothing to do so I got out the bottle of the white scenic cement and started brushing it on the layout. I sprinkled a little more grass down over the cement. "Hey, that looks good." Before I knew it I was hooked. I had to get this train set looking good again. In the mean time I sat down and worked on the train itself and got it running again.

 I decided to redo the whole train set but this time I'm doing it for me. I still have a long way to go before I'm finished with the scenery but I'm having fun. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and I want to put the garland and lights around the layout again just like I used to do and play Christmas music. My only wish for Christmas would be if my son was with me when I turn on the lights in the town and get the train going around the tacks.