[soapbox]Obviously this post has been inspired by another,I did’nt want to hijack the thread to discuss age related topics. Not all of you are turning 65 but when you do you’ll notice its sort of a milestone, Like graduating Junior High,or High school,getting your degree or turning 21. I’m turning 65 in a month,and I have some health problems but nothing I can’t control at the moment. Still, I wouldn’t hesitate to start a new layout. I’m always looking at some guys new pole barn, or old mobilhomes or a double wide just to build a layout in. I mentioned to a freind of mine not long after I had some stents put in my heart,little culverts,if you will,to hold open the arteries supplying my heart with O2. I said “Geez,I feel like I got one foot in the grave.” His reply was ,in his hoarse voice" Yeah,well , you oughta have the other one on a skate board then"[:D] So anyway I took that advice to heart and don’t really consider my age when starting new projects,I have a freind who’s 80 and still working and he gardens like there’no tomorrow. So… never mind if you’re getting up there,the alternative to not growing and learning,is, well,…you know. BILL
Hi Bill,
Let me be the first to reply to your message. I had two stents installed back in 1999, and am still getting around pretty well, even though at age 82 I have to slow down quite a bit. I am heavily into HO model railroading, and also spend quite a bit of time putting in my two cent’s worth on the Model Trains Forum. It’s always fun to see how many of us “ole timers” are still kids, with a model railroad. Let’s hear from you as to your model railroad scale, desired layout size, era, and locale. Bob Hahn
[:-^]
Thanks Bill, I really needed that this morning.
I have been suffering with a siatic nerve problem in my left hip and leg for three weeks now. and on Sunday, a very good life long school chum of mine passed away , we are the same age “68”.
So I have been feeling pretty down lately and that really is not like me. I always try to see through the fog and find some bright light, but lately it has been difficult and I find that the older I get the tougher it is to do. Not that I fear death because I don’t. But there seems to be a sadness in the fact that there are a number of things that you have planned to do and you are probably not going to get at them all. And in that there is a pain and sadness as well.
But I like you, I keep plodding away on the layout and enjoying the trip. Whether the destination of the layout is ever fully reached or not, it has provided me with many enjoyable hours, days, weeks and years. I have learned skills and overcome challenges and have shared successes with others who are interested or with loved ones. And that is what it is al about. So reflecting back, although the LM&E is not near finished, it has been a success.
And thats my story and I am sticking to it. The mind and will doesn’t seem to age much but your personal mechanical properties sure the heck do.
Johnboy out…
Two years ahead. [:)]
I don’t want to start a new layout. I’m happy I have a layout where I can operate. And a few parts like Third Street District are with “finished” scenery.
Starting a new layout would be a big step back, for a long time no operating layout.
Wolfgang
Bob, Bill, and Johnboy… good words, one and all. It’s great knowing we have some Senior Operator’s out there on the rails. I just turned 71 two months ago, and other than “coming back” from knee surgery, I think I’m holding my own fairly well. Sounds like we are all graduates of Cardio University ( I had a triple bypass back in 1989, but I haven’t hit a bump in the road since then). I am currently working on a new around-the-room layout, and enjoying the adventure more every day.
I model the Great Northern & the Montana Western (circa 1950) in HO scale. The only age accommodation I’ve had to make so far is that I’m replacing my “duck-under” with a “lift-out” section (siatic problem).
Once again, it was good hearing from some of the forum’s senior members… God bless
Bob/Iron Goat
Once again, it was good hearing from some of the forum’s senior members… God bless
Bob/Iron Goat
Who else has the free time to post in the middle of the day? [:-^]
Andre - turning 65 in a couple of years
In January 2008 the rheumatologist told me I had better make plans for not being able to work anymore. I just laughed it off and carried on. In January 2009 my employer (a huge corporation) started sending me home as it was obvious I was in an awful lot of pain. Now I am off permanently. My three passions in life were downhill skiing, mountain biking and golf. I could fill pages with all the things I have done in my life and can’t think of anything I would still like to do that I haven’t already done. I was so busy having fun I didn’t get married until I was 40. Getting married late in life gave me the opportunity to build up my finances as I had no family responsibilities. I worked all I could anytime I didn’t have something better to do. So now not working and not being able to do much at all I am very thankful for my interest in trains. But sometimes after the wife and kids leave at 0730 I go into the trainroom and the only work I manage to get done is to lay down on the carpeted floor and look at the ceiling for two hours because my back just hurts to much. At least when my spine fuses in five to ten years the pain will mostly be gone (so I’ve been told) At least I can spend what I want on trains because I worked my butt off when I was healthy. Still hard to take at 52. My friends come over and tell me the BATMOBILE is getting dusty.
Brent
I’m a little behind you at 62. Fortunately, a little arthritis in my knees is the worst problem I have.
I am in the processing of wiring my latest layout, but I know it won’t be my last. My wife and I have already decided to move when I retire in 2-4 years. Then I’ll build the “big” one. Actually my current layout is really a bit of a test layout to try out a strictly point to point shortline to make sure that’s what I want to do in retirement. It’s also my first experience with DCC. I don’t really know how many more layouts I’ll build, but I don’t plan to ever stop. In addition to the big one, I’d like to build a trolley/interurban in O and a garden layout in G. And an Sn2 narrow gauge as well.
Enjoy
Paul
62 years for me. I’ve been building this layout for 4 years, and it’s pretty much complete, although there are fill-in projects to keep by busy in this space for a while. We become semi-empty nesters in the fall when our one-and-only little girl heads off to college, and I’ve been told I can take over the family room with trains at that point. So, the layout will grow, giving me both a longer mainline and some staging, a big omission from my original smaller layout plan.
Happy to say, I’m still outwardly healthy, but now I’m popping pills each morning for cholesterol and high blood pressure. Not too happy to have to do that, of course, but I’m still physically very active (downhill skiing, bicycling and ice hockey) for a guy my age, so I consider those blessings well worth taking the additional precautionary care for.
I look to my father-in-law for inspiration. He’s 92 now, and his wife is 88. They still live completely independently, in a second-story, no elevator condo. When he was 86, he had a hip transplant - so he could get back on the tennis court.
As you all are saying “it’s nice to see other"old guys” here. I’m turniong 79 and just been diagnosed with cancer but don’t expect that will hold me back! Nursing a torn rotator cuff hinders such things as wireing at the moment but that too will pass. I’m modeling in HO which I think we’ve all found can be a bit of a challange for old eyes _ thank God i’m not doing N!
Keep Railroading!!!
Jim
Gentlemen, getting older doesn’t mean you are going to die any time soon. I just turned 64 in June. I feel as good now as I did when I was much, much younger. I will grant you I do not do the things I did when I was younger, but I would like to think I am smarter. I lost my job at 57 and was not able to start over again so I started my own business that I run from home. In 2008 my wife and I sold our flower shop in the attempt to beat the market turn down. I thought about buying the LHS when it became available but decided against it. My health is good as is my wife.
I 2007 my wife and I bought a home that has a 10 X 11 bedroom that I am able to build a layout. I have a good sized yard and help my wife with the physical part of gardening. I bought a rotor tiller and dug up a couple of big areas of our yard for my wife to fill with flowers. I hauled by hand 4 cubic yards of dirt and 5 cubic yards of mulch. And I woke up the next day feeling pretty good.
My layout is moving along, Norfolk Portsmouth Belt Line in HO. I started it in August of 2007 a month after moving in. All the track is down and many of the building are complete. I do a little here and there with intention of getting it completed. If that ever can be done… I will eventually replace the Merchant Square, DMP, and Atlas buildings with higher quality kits. Same with the RTR roster of rolling stock.
I have been blessed and intend to make the best of what has been given me. My mom lived to 84 and my dad to 80. I don’t know what is going to happen in the next second but I am not going to worry about it.
Being medically retired like I am is a downer…I had hope to retire to fishing,railfaning and modeling…Well 2 out of 3 is good.
As I mention in the other post I am in so/so health…This is after my near fatal heart attack in 2005-I went to death’s door and returned.
As you can guess the hobby has taken a hit as far as worrying over mintue details and the limited use of my right hand has change the old ways of modeling.I welcome RTR…I will be using Kato’s N Scale Unitrack.More then likely I will be using Woodland Scenic’s Grass Mat and cut in the needed roads and will use WS ready made trees.
I will resume work on the layout in the fall…I have the majority of the needed Unitrack…
Of course I am not worried about not being a “real” modeler…[(-D]
Well said Brakie.
Yes, it is nice to be able to post in the middle of the day.
BTW, I model in HO scale,and also do scale ships and planes,also the occasional stage coach or farm wagon in 1/8 scale. My current layout is 11x14 and is primarily logging and mining in the 1920-1950 era. GN prototype is my favorite but WA state and ID is prime railroading country. Specially here in the Camas Prairie country.
Being disabled and in pain would be a bugger for sure, and lord knows I have my days, but look around and you’ll see someone worse off who doesn’t seem to notice. One of my best MRRing freinds is blind in one eye and 10% vision in the other. He has a 27x17 S-scale layout that he built by himself. I go over and help him assemble KaDee couplers, but he installs em.
So anyway, keep the fires hot and the steam up, and roll on. BILL
i’ve been retired for a little over a year and a half now and it feels great to be a consumer instead of a provider. got more done on the layout in the last year than i had accomplised in the previous seven and a half.
yeah, i got the cholesterol, blood pressure, blood sugar, eyesight things but biggest problem is my legs get tired after standing for a while. big deal. sit down at the 'puter and bug somebody. kids are all grown and gone, (i broke their plates when they left) the woman has her own adequate income so TRAIN TIME!!
things i have learned = every asset can become a liability, rivets don’t matter when you can barely see the side of the car, a 50 inch high duck under makes a great back scratcher. buying extra of everything when you are young leaves you plenty to work with when you get old. a bathroom in the basement was a good idea. pain pills are one of the seven basic food groups. if you stay in the basement till the wee hours with all those bright lights on, people will think you are growing pot.
good luck to all, gotta go, late for my after lunch nap.
grizlump
Hang tuff!
As one who is 68, had low back and hip pain daily since 20 (conginital back deformity) along with various and sundry other problems — DON’T even begin to feel limited! I know a blind man who is an execelent furniture maker and uses every power tool known to the wood shop. At 55, I started building my work shop/wifes studio and then my 2000 sq ft brick house. My 92 yr old mother with congestive heart failure gets out in our 100 + degree weather and works in her flower garden every day.
None of us knows how long we’ve got, and we may have limitations, we just need to figure out how to accomplish whatever we want — if you have enough money to throw at the problem, GREAT. If not, but you have a younger friend you can con into helping, that’s great. If all else fails, you will just have to work smarter, not harder.
We have expierence even if the body won’t work like it once did – use what you have to build some mountains out of mole hills (plaster, foam, whatever), lay some track, learn a new way of doing, build a new car, start a new layout -------- NEVER, NEVER, NEVER give up and just say well I cain’t anymore — I’m just too old and crippled up ----
Keep the rails shinny!
John T. in the hot ‘n’ dry cow pasture
At 73, I tore out my completed N scale layout and started over. The new layout, 10’x11’ around the room with a peninsula, is a little simpler to operate – no reverse loops, double-track main, a big yard to store trains on site. I hesitated to do this [start over] because of my age, but I need to keep busy and I enjoy layout-building [probably more than running trains]. I’m 74 now and the track is all in place and about half of the scenery is done. I still have to connect structure lights and signals. I got a low rolling stool [14" high] to get under the duckunder and to do undertable wiring. I got an optivisor and an Ott light to help with kit building. I plan a few tasks for every day – today I laid ballast for about four feet, built a couple of trees for my logging camp, and installed and sceniced my Cornertone bulk oil dealer. Going up and down the basement steps is great exercise for both me and our Labrador retriever, Lucy, who follows me every trip and has her own cushion under the layout. An afternoon nap refuels us both.
What is more worrying then age is the fact, that the number of model railroaders following our foot steps is getting smaller and smaller. In my family, it was some kind of a tradition. My grandfather had a Marklin gauge 1 layout (that was the time before WW I ), my father a Marklin HO layout, well, and I am still up to my neck in model railroading, but failed to pass this passion on to my son.
At the age of 53, I have survived two serious heart attacks and a minor stroke, that left my right hand trembling a little. I am also in deep financial trouble, but believe me, I will enjoy a lot more model railroading until the Big Conductor gives me the final “All aboard” call.
Until recently, I was one of those revoltingly healthy people that other people love to hate. Other than removeable teeth and a couple of bone spurs I had nothing on my medical record. Then the pain hit me in the hip - and I couldn’t stand as long as I would like to. Last week I got the ungarbled word - my right hip didn’t break down, it just wore out. Replacement surgery isnt a matter of ‘IF,’ it’s a matter of, ‘WHEN.’ (No complaints - I have a friend that reached this point at the inverse of my age. Hers hit her at 17. Olympic-level gymnastics might have had something to do with that - she competed in Seoul in '88.)
When I finally got the space I’d dreamed about and started building my ‘last in this lifetime’ layout my 65th birthday had been history for a couple of years. Lots of people younger than I am have marked up on that call board up yonder. However, my parents both made it past their ninetieth birthdays and I have several blood relatives that are ‘77 going on 40.’ I don’t think that expecting to live to be a centenarian is overly unreasonable.
Actually, I had joked about driving the golden spike on my 100th birthday. Given my current rate of progress, that might be an accurate prediction…
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)