Why do you collect?

[Exhibitman]

To paraphrase Terence Mann in Field Of Dreams:

“America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But collecting has marked the time. These items, they are a part of our past, Ray. It reminds of us of all that once was good and it could be again.”

Personally, I find that modern life is so frantic, so immediate, so consuming, and so impermanent that I long for something more. I want to reach that constant that baseball represented to Terence Mann (and yes, I am aware that he is a fictional character, but don’t let the facts obscure the point).

The mere fact that these things we collect are tangible sets us apart from the non-collectors. My wife often asks me why I want to keep a card when I could sell it for a profit. The non-collectors like her will never get the appeal these things have for us collectors; it is almost mystical. These things were made with great ingenuity and effort and care. They were meant to be enjoyed in the physical world. Some were meant to be cherished as heirlooms. Many were not, which makes their continued existence 100 or more years later all the more wonderful. Why would generations of someones save a scrap of paper through two world wars, two pandemics, depressions, natural disasters, and so on just so I could look at it 110 years later?

Pondering these questions is one of the things that gives me respect and, yes, love for old cardboard. I often think about the journey that items have taken. To me, it feels reassuring. Even though someone’s children or grandchildren just did not care about and would just as soon throw away the items, there are strangers who do care about these artifacts and will preserve them. That's what I find redeeming about the process: we collectors are the Memory Alpha for these people, both the subjects of the items and the people who cared for the items, just as other collectors will be for us after we are gone. Little Howie McCormick is long gone but his back-stamped T206 collection lives on through the collectors who have his old cards and actively trade and discuss them on card chat boards.

Now, excuse me while I go watch Field Of Dreams again.

https://youtu.be/Xq3hEMUeBGQ?feature=shared