The Little World

We may be, depending upon who you ask. The secret to happiness is not to ask.

Adult scale modellers of any ilk…car people, boat people, plane people, people people…can often find that other adults treat them with a snide disdain. Words and attitudes are discovered that suggest childishness in the modeller, and reduce them socially thereby.

If they were children, they would be sometimes praised for being dexterous or patient or serious, but mostly in the language of indulgence. The grown-up gets none of this…they are treated, at best, as slightly eccentric, and at worst as social losers.

Yet who can observe scale modellers in clubs and exhibitions and not see the social skills that they exercise along with the artistic and mechanical ones? The club, be it social, technical, or men’s shed is a vital asset for most participants, and enriches their lives. The very act of building scale models possibly prolongs them through the stimulation of the mind.

If the participants in the hobby are sometimes greedy, petulant, and selfish, it is to be remembered that they could be this way in Parliament at expense to the general public. While clipping apart sprue trees they are not clipping the taxpayer. And as far as morals go, while they are cementing plastic parts they are not gluing their bits elsewhere.