Ego trip

 

The World Series starts tonight and you couldn't pick a matchup that I care less about since probably the Giants-Cardinals ones a decade ago, or maybe even going back to the late 1990s.

Saturday night was pretty poor with the Dodgers being eliminated. I would've liked to have seen them play the Braves with the team they had in September, instead of losing a key player every other day. But that's the postseason, the hot hand always wins.

However, I found a way to deflect the misery (and the haters) by going to a card show the next day. And after that, I took a side trip to the book store, where I found this:

Yeah, that's a Beckett article all about me -- written by me.

If that doesn't wipe away the postseason blues, I don't know what does -- without the ensuing hangover, anyway.

The November Beckett Baseball issue was delivered to subscribers earlier this month. I don't have a subscription to that one so it took an email from Bob of the best bubble for me to know it was out. Then I had to wait until it showed up on a magazine stand, which always takes a couple more weeks. (This is where people wonder why I don't have a free subscription -- I've been sent issues with my story when I've asked, but I don't want to ask all the time because, if you haven't heard, print media is struggling and I would like to stay employed).

I mentioned on an earlier blog post that I was writing this article. It's pretty much an ego trip, just a look at my collection and how I became a Dodgers fan. It was by far the easiest story of the ones I've written for Beckett.

I was told by the editor that they ask collectors to write about their collection from time to time and I was offered the chance to do so. Let me tell you, it's quite a hoot to see YOUR STUFF in glossy pages in a national magazine.

But for people who read my blog, everything in the article is old news. I wrote about why I am a Dodgers fan a long time ago on this blog and just about everything that is featured in the article has appeared here.

The lamp.

The volleyball.

The run of Koufaxes.

And, of course, the card that launched thousands of cards in my collection.

 

There you go. There it all is. Once again, many thanks to those who provided some of the items shown.

It's a great gift to be able to write about why you do what you do, and why you love it, and have it printed for posterity.

This article may not be of as much interest to readers as some of the other Beckett articles I've written, but it felt good to do this. As a journalist, I've spent all of my career avoiding being part of the story. One of the reasons I started this blog was I could finally write about myself and get my feelings out.

 

And now -- just this once -- that kind of perspective is in print, too.

 

When I got to the bookstore, I took a sharp turn right, to where the Beckett magazines rest, looked down, and there was just one left. I scooped it up -- snapped a picture to send to the wife and kid -- and bought it (still, no clerk has ever asked me why I am buying it. I have such a good response).

I drove home with that magazine and with the cards I had landed at the card show and I was even happier than I was before Game 6 began.