I've always found modelling a lonely business!
And Forum Following!!!!!!

I'd contend that you're about half right. The building is often solitary, but the sharing is a group activity. The two Seattle groups I hang out with tend to have before and after meetings where folks eat, drink and share stories that might or might not be modeling related. One group even encourages building during the group meeting. The Portland IPMS group has a monthly build meeting where folks actually build models while sharing tall tales.

Guess I'm really lucky, as my brother and I have had basically the same two hobbies all our lives: Modeling and photography. We even follow the same sport teams. While we live in different towns, we live in the same county, so we see each other often. We were founding members of the Suffolk county chapter of IPMS almost 40 years ago.

Still, the actual business of modeling is a solitary activity.

With the growth of the internet, and countless modeling sites & forums, I'm never really off by myself for very long. I usually have Aeroscale and ARC uploaded while I model, so I can take multiple mini breaks to ease my constant eye strain.

Dozens of daily emails, & PMs on modeling from my brother and site members more then compensates for no longer belonging to any clubs.

Joel