Translucent memory - an N scale NAR GP9 (Part 2)…

The latest ‘Canadian adventure’ has been somewhat deliberately limited in scope to somewhere, imagined, in northern Saskatchewan - helping inform the sort of models I felt able to justify and my choice of ‘company’ for the grain elevator…

What’s this then? An interloper?

The Northern Alberta was a joint Canadian National and Canadian Pacific venture to prop up the survival of the prospector and frontier shortlines that had spread north from Edmunton. In 1980 the line became part of the CN and its small collection of GP9. GMD1 and SD38-2 gained new identities and within a number of years, the company colours - the NAR was gone, in all but memory.

I can’t remember when I first heard of it but since I’m certain that I have always loved it. The nature of the branchlines especially are very “Hilton and Mears”. I’ve crossed its path and stood pondering the nature of life and the human condition in my late teens in its company. This then, an ode to that simple, childlike energy for a distant, almost translucent memory, a feeling deeply buried but important. Oh, and I love the paint job too…

In part 1 I showed some of the work that had gone into recreating this example from the bare shell upwards and today I’m proud to show what is a 99% complete model, photos of which are when blown up multiple times larger than the actual miniature.

Home made details, home mixed paints, home designed markings - this isn’t some reworked factory paint job, this isn’t some shake the box collection of parts others have deemed ‘correct’ - it is made from feeling, each element and subconscious decision results in a model that goes beyond the pictures here, it means something…

Something because it is part of me - its creation doesn’t just have my name, it has my heart. The series of deliberate acts that created the end result, each is informed by who and what I am, memories of the past and feelings of the present. Heck, even the act of mindfully creating it in the moment.

This model means more than any super detailed, box fresh, wonderfully exquisite ready to run model could ever dream of…

So another model graces the workbench, and is considered finished.

Equally, another chapter in my life is written. I reflect in these moments, what will these artefacts say about who we are and why we were when considered by others now and in the future.

And still in that moment I am calm, and proud of what I’ve made, what I’ve said and how I did it. Until next time, more soon…