Take care of yourself, guys

  

I've written a few times over the last couple years about a collector I know. He was a co-worker. He didn't work in the same department but he used to come up to the office and we'd babble about cards.

 

Through the years he went from a collector who bought boxes and boxes of cards at the local Target/Walmart (I once encountered him and his girlfriend with a shopping cart full of blasters) to someone I saw at the monthly show with a table selling cards -- something that earlier on he couldn't see himself doing.

 

He died a week ago today. Heart attack. He was 53.

 

That is crazy young, younger than me. And all I could think of was a whole bunch of people that I see at card shows who are in bad shape -- much worse than the guy I worked with and often even younger. Since I heard about his death, it's been on my mind. Last weekend I went to an outdoor flea market and my mind fixated on the out-of-shape people, thinking "take care of yourself, dude!"

 

Corey wasn't obese, but you could tell he liked his beer over the years. He used to play softball on a semipro level and when my newspaper had a softball team, he was the star player. He liked the Yankees, had a bunch of memorabilia along with the cards, would go to spring training almost every year and had been to The National a couple of times. He had so many cards he was even selling them out of his house. I never got over there.

 

He was a good guy, friendly, easy to talk to. We chatted quite a bit at his table at the monthly show. I'm not a chatty guy but when you're talking about cards, I can go on and on. And we did -- about business, the state of the show and the hobby. He had expanded to a table at the big show in Syracuse the most recent time I was there.

 

The last time I saw him was at the monthly show in June. Our paths didn't cross at work lately, he worked days and I nights. He said then he was going to skip the next couple of summer shows, business wasn't great, and come back in the fall.

 

But that's it. I won't be able to grab any fancy cards on the cheap from him anymore. He used to set aside some cards for me. This is all stuff I picked up from his table in the last year.

 

Yeah, all modern stuff. The only vintage card I found at his table -- in a dollar box -- was the Rocky Colavito card at the top of the post.

 

I had my eye on a Martina Hingis relic/auto card that he had displayed for months and months. I didn't want to pay the price (it wasn't the most attractive looking card), but figured I'd get it someday. Now I won't.

 

As collectors and show-goers we sometimes make jokes about the clientele. Sometimes, between the backpacks and the "suitcases" and the width of the collectors, it's tough to get down an aisle. There are jokes about people's unkempt state and "the smell". But when you think about it, it can be concerning, I'm assuming collectors want to be playing with their cards as many years as possible.

 

I've dealt with health issues regarding weight and nutrition. Thirteen years ago I was diagnosed with diabetes. I got things under control but it's a battle every day, sometimes it's going great, other times it's not. I work out or do some form of exercise every single day. When I found out why I was feeling so horrible I was freaked out. I thought I'd be dead by the time I hit 50. But I'm still here.

 

Anyway, that's at least the third time I've dealt with the death of a collector at too young an age that I knew. The first two were virtual friends, formed through the blog but this one was from real life.

 

I don't know what happens to all those cards now. It's tough.