Well hello again.
Life has a funny way of opening opportunities that it had previously closed. I have enjoyed writing since I was a kid. The idea of telling a story in a way that captivates and audience or the thrill of sharing exciting news with others. There are so many forms of writing and ways to enjoy it. I started this Blog eight years ago as a way to track and share my love of card collecting with my son Ryker who would be born soon after this Blog was created. I was about to have a son and hoped that he would love the card collecting hobby as much as I did. Well, my son is almost 9 years old and enjoys the opposite of most of the things that I enjoy. (go figure) That is not to say that he is not into the hobby, he just enjoys different aspects of it and that is an adaptation that I was not expecting. Lets have a quick recap of the past and lay out a plan for the future.
- 2013 - Attempted to complete the Emerald parallel set of Topps Series 1 baseball. Completion is around 60% as of today and no longer being pursued.
- 2014 - Being a father of two children, a husband to an amazing wife, and job responsibilities did not allow me much time to collect or write.
- 2015 - 2018 - These years all seem like a blur now. Work and Family dominated everything.
- 2019 - The death of my father in law demanded some changes in order to keep the family business running.
- 2020 - The Pandemic - like so many others this allowed me time to re-learn about the hobby that I love so much and it gave me reason to seize the moment. No more excuses, Get busy living or get busy dying. I created an eBay storefront and started my journey in entrepreneurship.
- 2021 - Living the Dream - When my career (teaching high school) started back to in person learning time management became an issue once again. This issue did not stop the dream this time, but it did slow it down. PSA shutting down also helped slow things down as well.
I know this is a lot of life boiled down to a few bullet points, and maybe I will write in more detail about some of those life events in the future, but for now I want to focus on the present. The present, such an interesting thing. I have always wanted time to move faster especially when I was younger. I couldn't wait to advance a grade level, drive a car, get a job, or graduate high school. In college it was more of the same and as a young adult more of the same. Now on the precipice of turning 41 years old I would give anything to slow things down. My children are 11 and 8 (almost 9) and I am closer to 50 than I am 30. The perspective of my life is changing so much and I am not sure that I am as prepared as I once thought I would be.
This COVID Pandemic has allowed me to embrace the unknown and not be so afraid of the outcome. I am more confident in my abilities to learn new things and adapt to the future than ever before. The desire to enjoy experiences with my children and my wife is stronger than ever. The acute awareness of life's fragility is a motivator rather than something to be feared. So with that, I and my family are off to new hobby and life adventures.
I will be documenting our new adventures here in this blog, that I hope to update weekly. I will be attending my first card show as a vendor in February, I am planning on opening 3 cases of Topps Heritage Baseball, and I will be letting you all read about it here. I am excited for these adventures and a little bit nervous at the same time. I hope that my writing inspires others to pursue their dreams and to overcome the obstacles that we place on ourselves. I hope to learn and teach through this process. I would love any feedback that you the readers may have. If nothing else I will have written down a piece of my life that my children will always be able to share.
Until next week,
Bubba