End of a Career
In October 2022 I moved to a new home. It was not by choice but instead by necessity, and it was emotionally harrowing. Consequently, when it was all over, I fell into deep depression, and lost interest in modeling... and most everything else. By December things were starting to turn around a little, and I had thoughts of dipping my toe back into the hobby. And that's when I made a horrifying discovery: One of the boxes of my modeling supplies was lost in the move.
And not just any box, but the single most important one: It contained many hundreds of dollars worth of tools, hundreds more in kits, and hundreds more in modeling supplies. But most distressingly it also had a large number of models that all belonged to the Animation Collection, a series of dioramas featuring quite a lot of my very best work. I'd even made plans to write articles about them.
The dioramas represented my "crowning achievements" after sixty years in the hobby, my swan song as I faded into obscurity. And now this: I had to lose that which most defined me as a modeler. Now all that remains is four dioramas in various states of completion.
If it was any other box that was lost in the move, I could have recovered from it. But not this. Not the single most critical cache of tools, models and supples. Bad enough that I suffer from terminal heart disease, which could have taken me—and still can take me—at any time. But here I am still alive, still needing something to do and still wanting to make what I do count in a hobby I've enjoyed for many decades.
Thus ends my modeling career. While I might be able to come up with new projects, perhaps utilizing things I might scavenge from the dioramas, all of the wind has been knocked out of my sails. I have zero impetus to continue; indeed, I find it quite depressing to look at those things I still have. I had a goal in sight; now it's been snatched away from me thanks to my own stupidity. I should have been much more careful with the important stuff. Woulda coulda shoulda.
So, I'm putting my X-Acto knife down for the last time. It would have been nice to go out on a high note; instead, I go out utterly defeated. I can't think of a sadder way to end my story.
—DKS, 27 December 2022