When I was in middle school, my Dad and I started to collect cards. He mostly collected baseball cards getting complete sets as well as Oriole cards from the 50s and 60s. I on the other hand started to collect basketball cards and Starting Lineup figures. My first set of cards that I ever got was an 1989-1990 Hoops basketball set that my Dad bought me. You can see the picture above which is the actual set he bought me.
I recently have started to sell off some of my collection. When my Dad moved to Blacksburg he gave me his collection as well. None of either of our collection has retained the value of what we were paying for it back when I was in middle school and high school. The market was flooded with cards and so the value of everything I have has taken a major dive. I am finding this out the hard way as I try to sell the cards on Ebay.
Here's the thing though. The value of these cards can't be measured in money. Yes there is monetary value associated with my baseball, basketball, and football cards but it is far out weighed my the sentimental value.
I can remember going to card shows with my Dad. We would get in the car and drive to Burlington or Charlotte just to go to a card show on a Saturday morning. I even remember driving to Concord once. Sometimes there was an awesome show with lots of stuff available while other times there was barely anything.
One time we drove to Charlotte. I always remember listening to the oldies channel when we would take these trips. That is where I fekl in love with the Temptations and Smokey Robinson. Anyway when we got there I walked all around the show trying to decide what I was going to spend my money on. I wanted to buy everything but I only had a small amount of allowance left. It was getting close to time to go and I couldn't decide. I kept coming back to this unopened box of Hoops 89-90 wax packs that had the covenanted David Robinson rookie card in them. I only had enough money to pay for half the box.
I think my Dad saw how badly I wanted the box and he offered to cover the other half. I can't remember if it was a loan on the next lawn mowing or just a Dad buying his son some cards but it meant the world to me. We started back home and I started to fiercely and carefully open packs of cards looking for that David Robinson card. I found Michael Jordan cards and Larry Bird cards, I found Karl Malone cards and John Stockton cards but as I got closer and closer to the bottom of the box, I wasn't finding a David Robinson card.
On the way home we had to stop at the grocery store. I remember that I had 5 packs left to open when we got back into the car. After our shopping we were ready to go and I remember my Dad telling me that there was a David Robinson in those 5 packs of cards. I opened the first pack... nothing. I opened the second pack... NOTHING. Then I opened the third pack and half way through the pack there he was holding up a Spurs jersey, Mr. David Robinson! I was so excited. I can remember high 5ing my Dad.
I reached down to the open the next pack with no expectations after finding the David Robinson card, but to my surprise there he was again looking up at me! Mr. David Robinson! I had found two in the last five packs of cards after opening the whole box. Dad and I were high 5ing and I was jumping up in down in my seat (as much as I could with the seat belt on!). I opened the fourth pack and there was nothing special in it, and finally I opened the last pack. The second to last card in the last pack of the whole box was again, number 50 for the San Antonio Spurs, Mr. David Robinson! I found 3 of them in the bottom of the box.
The value of those cards at the time was around $40.00 a piece. The value of those cards now is around $5.00 a piece. Here's the thing, it doesn't matter. I don't care about the value of the cards. What I care about is the memory of my Dad and I going to card shows, listening to Oldies, and finding David Robinson cards. That is something that will never go down in value. That is something that I will have forever!
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