When I grow up (to be a man)

Yes, I realize that I've named two of my posts today after Beach Boys songs. (I'll have to do a post called "In My Room" soon. That could tie in really well with baseball cards.)

They rule. That is all.

Actually, I've got a couple more thoughts and stories that I want to share with my fellow readers tonight.

Firstly, I made one of the best "blog discoveries" since my introduction to the blogging community tonight, thanks to the good ol' blogscroll.

I started reading a blog "drewscards". It just happened to be at the top of the blogscroll when I checked. A few minutes into reading I realized that, hey, I'm not the only teenager in the blogging community! I thought I was the only one all this time.

Drew is one of the members of the "new generation" of baseball card collectors. After reading a couple of his previous posts, it appears that him and his dad have a mutual love for baseball and baseball card collecting.

It reminded me so much of my dad and I. You have no idea how glad I am that my dad shares a profound interest in my collection, and helps me out whenever he can. (Just take a look at the "November" section of this post for evidence.) I've heard stories where some people around my age have parents who don't support and are highly condescending towards their kid's collection.

Believe me, I don't take my collection for granted. I highly doubt I'd still be collecting had I not had my parents' encouragement and support all these years.

Also, judging from some of Drew's older posts that I browsed through, he's a Beatles fan as well. Any teenager that likes the Beatles (or any '60s music for that matter) is fine in my book.

He's got an unbelievable Yankees collection as well. Definitely a blog worth checking out if you haven't already!

Speaking of the "new generation", you might be wondering what the Ozzie Smith card at the top of the post is all about. It's a really neat card, but that's not necessarily why I'm featuring it.

Yesterday, I read a post by "The Lost Collector", which was the tale of one of the oh-so-few kids that are still in the hobby today.

It got me thinking about my personal favorite baseball card story of that sort.

At the flea market last summer, I came across a dealer who had a huge box filled with dime cards. One of the rows in the box was all cards from the 2001 Topps Archives and '01 Topps Archives Reserve sets, from which the Ozzie Smith comes from. ('01 Archives is easily my favorite set of the previous decade.)

I walked away with over a hundred cards from that box. But that's not why it was so memorable.

As I was in the process of my "dime box dig", a kid and his father came up to look through the box. Naturally, I shifted over to the side to give them room to look. (My biggest card show pet peeve is when people hog the boxes and don't budge an inch to let other people look at the cards, but that's another post for another day.)

Right away, the kid was excited because of all the cards of older guys that were in the box. I remember he was really excited to find a Don Drysdale reprint card. Heck, it's an unbelievable accomplishment nowadays for any kid to know who Drysdale is, much less be excited to find one of his baseball cards.

The kid got a few cards he wanted to buy. The best part was that his father was more than willing to purchase them for his son, sharing all the enthusiasm the kid had for the cards that he was about to possess. (Again, it reminded me a lot of me and my dad.)

After they bought the cards, the kid said to the vendor, "Thank you for selling me these cards! They're cool!" Usually, it's the other way around. The vendor thanks the buyer.

It really struck a chord with me.

A few times at the flea market last year, I saw kids excitedly walk up to look through some of the dime and quarter boxes the vendors put out. And almost all the time, I heard something along the lines of "Come on, now. Let's go. I'm not going to buy you any cards..." from the parents within a few seconds. Which was shortly followed by a disappointed kid, begrudgingly walking away from the hobby for what might be the final time.

I understand that not all parents and/or families are well-off, but the boxes the kids wanted to look through were dime or quarter boxes, not "glass case" cards. People can't spend an extra buck or two on something their kids are excited about anymore?

Like I said, I'm just glad my parents were never that way with me. They help me out whenever they can. They never spoiled me (thank God), but they always let me know that they'll be there to help out if I need it. (Heck, my mom is even treating me to a card show next weekend as an early birthday present.)

To all the parents out there, I encourage you to do the same with your kids if they ever get into baseball cards, or are already collecting. A couple bucks here and there to support a collection can go a very long ways.

Plus, when kids are collecting baseball cards, the world is a better place.

I firmly believe that.