A lot of my collecting, I would say 90% of it, comes from nostalgia. Collecting isn't an investment to me, it's more like a collection of memories. Almost every piece of cardboard, especially for my non sport PC, has some memory connected to it. I am hoping some day when I am older and these memories start to fade, that the cards will help keep them alive.
Just like music does for me. When I hear certain songs, I can put myself in that time.
Just like I did the other day.
Back in 1998 a big-time female pop star named Britney Spears was created when she released her song, Baby One More Time. This song was very catchy, and it tuned right into my head. Usually, men can't admit they like a female pop song, but I have no problem in doing so. It also helped that Britney was similar in age to me (2 years older) and was pretty hot.
I remember going to my friend Brian's house and watching the music video for the song, something I didn't have access to at home since we didn't have cable and not something I could watch at my grandmothers who had cable since she said it was a "waste of time watching music when she had a radio you could listen to it on".
Both Brian and I had immediate crushes on her.
When we found out she was going to be performing at one of the big fairs in our state a few months later, we had to find a way to get tickets. I knew I wasn't going to be getting them from my parents since I grew up poor, so I knew I would need another way to. Fortunately, Brian's parents came up with a plan for us to go, but it was going to take some work. In those days, parents just didn't buy you stuff. You had to work for it and work hard for it. Which is what we did. We spent that summer in the heat shoveling manure all over their big property to help the grass grow more and to clean out the barn as well. The manure was loaded up in a wagon attached to a four-wheeler and we had to make stops to fill it up with a shovel and stops to shovel it out.
Let me tell you, we earned those tickets.
The seats we had weren't great, but we still were able to go. We got to see Britney sing and dance and even bought a couple of small pictures of her from the fair so we could treasure the moment. It was a great time.
Years later, the picture I had from that concert became crushed and the ticket stubs have been misplaced. I had nothing but some blurry pictures to go on for memories so recently when window shopping on eBay, I came across a Britney Spears "rookie card."
It's from the April 2001 Sports Illustrated For Kids magazine which featured Derek Jeter on the cover.
At that time, I wasn't collecting the SI For Kids cards, so I knew I didn't have this, so I bid on one that was pretty low priced compared to where they usually are and ended up winning it.
Card back features stats on the Princess Of Pop and some other fun tidbits.
Guess you could say I was as happy as 15-year old me would have been if I owned it back then.
:)
Before I finish up today's post, I must tell one more story involving Britney and her hit song Baby One More Time. I can't remember if I told this story before on here or another blog, but I am fine sharing it again.
So, Brian got married a few years ago and we had mistakenly told his soon-to-be wife about our concert. Before the Dollar Dance begin, she snuck over to the DJ and requested that he played Baby One More Time to our surprise as we approached the tent where the dance was being held. We were also forced to dance together in front of a decent amount of people. As embarrassing as it was, it was another added memory.
Thoughts for today's post, your favorite Britney song or SI For Kids cards welcomed in comments.
TGIF to you!!
