Rediscovering Joy

Today was beautiful. We had Trunk or Treat at church, outside, and there were lots of folks from the community wandering around. Today also solved a Lego problem for me. For the first time in the Covid era, I saw kids faces light up when they saw the small bit of Lego I had brought with me to go with my Emmet costume. I remembered what truly delights me about my favorite hobby - the joy it can give others.

Since we moved here almost 2 years ago I've been working on a new layout, and it's about 95% finished, but I'm about to tear it down. Regardless of Covid, it's in a room that is not easy to get to and very cramped with the layout up, so it's difficult for people to fully enjoy when they do get a chance to see it.

For the last 10 years I've built my layouts on modules, in theory to make them easy to transport and show. The challenge is, with the Lego system I use, dating from the 1980s, there is a lot of wiring to install to power everything, from the motors on the trains to the signals, lights, switches and so on. A few months ago I figured out a way to create a modular layout and deal with the wiring, and ever since then I've lost interest in this layout, but until today wasn't sure why.

What's mine is mine to share, or to give away, and sharing this means building a layout that can be moved around and brought to places where large amounts of people can see it, and kids can have that "wow" moment.

In our last house I had a huge bonus room with plenty of space for people to walk around and look at all the details and so on. My favorite moment on any given tour, was the moment a visitor walked into the room. I would always try and be a few steps ahead so I could turn and see their reaction.

My childhood dreams of "big Lego" have come true. It really is a delight to share those dreams with, and maybe inspire a few of, the children of today.