New and old

I was in Target a couple of days ago, as I often am at this time of year, not to hunt out baseball cards but because this is The Birthday Month in the house.

I did step over to the card section, of course, and grab a few 2024 Topps packs. I was actually hoping to pull a particular card, but I didn't.

The card is the one above of the Royals' Michael Massey. I thought it would be a nice card on the occasion of my daughter's birthday. Michael Massey turns 26 today. So does my daughter. Massey is the only player to share the exact same birth date as my daughter.

I have just one card of Massey but at least it's his rookie card, right?

Even though my daughter is not much of a sports fan, she has a connection to baseball that I don't have. There is no MLB player who was born the exact day that I was (only in other sports). And I like that I know this Massey factoid because it keeps me young, even though my daughter being more than halfway through her 20s makes me feel old.

As a parent, there's nothing like your child's birthday to make you appreciate the old and the new. Old pictures and memories of your kid pop up on this day and so do current pictures of your kid and what she's doing these days. It makes you proud, it makes you marvel at the passage of time and as she gobbles up what the current world has to offer, it increases your appreciation for the now.

I like 2024 Topps. I still think it's cool to buy the packs of the day and pull the notable players of the day. That's still exciting to me, even if I know far fewer of the players on the cards than I did when I was much younger.

 

I appreciate new pictures and what's new-and-interesting. This is a cool photo. I'm glad it's on a baseball card. I'm glad I didn't stop collecting in 2023 so I can experience it.

 

 

It's also cool to still be collecting a team set after all these years and finding a card you need, along with a couple of inserts of one of your favorite players on your favorite team (although the dreaded paralleled insert bit me this time).

Is that because kids make you appreciate the world around you more? Probably. It shakes me out of the crankiness that people my age sometimes suffer from when they realize that fewer people know who Van Halen was.

 

I admit, though, I find the cards that I collected as a kid or teenager -- what I'd call "my era," I guess -- the most comforting. They make the most sense to me, they appeal to me the most. These particular 1981 Fleer Sticker cards are 43 years old (!!!!!) but they're new to my collection and that makes me feel young again.

These came from Greg of The Collective Mind. He was nice enough to note that I had piled up the remaining '81 Stickers I need into my sportlots cart and send me a few so I could remove them and save a little money.

I'm now down to the final four stickers to complete the set -- and, yes, I'm still staggered by how many stickers are in this set. When I'm finally able to pull the shipping trigger on my sportlots cart, you'll see a completion celebration post.

 

What about cards from before I was collecting, from that time when I didn't even know what a baseball card was? Yeah, I appreciate those, too.

The attachment isn't there like with the cards I collected as a youngster and I can't make any connection between my offspring and me, but just like I enjoy old photographs of my parents or relatives, I like cards like these.

I wasn't even 5 when the 1970 Topps set came out. My baby brother was born the year this set came out (that'll make anyone feel old when your youngest sibling hits 50). These cards LOOK old. From another time. For me there's a dividing line somewhere before 1972 Topps in which what came before it is old old and from a different era and what came after is what I've always known cards to be.

But I did see 1970 Topps during my young collecting days and that's why I'm trying to complete the set. There' s a connection, no matter how slim. It's the last 1970s Topps set I need to finish and with the above two cards, I'm down to the final four cards (the final six if you include two upgrades that I definitely want to make).

This is why I like new and old cards. I can connect each kind to my interests from whatever period they come from.

This is also why I don't bother much with cards from the pre-1950s though. With the exception of guessing what cards I think my father might have collected as a kid (I have no firm idea), there is no personal connection to them. 

So, yeah, I guess there can be cards that are too old. And, definitely, there are cards that can be too new.

But that's fine. I can't collect everything.