Night Owl Cards

  Ever since the local monthly show (and many other shows throughout the country) has become overrun with TCG cards I've debated skipping or at least not automatically attending every month. It's become less and less productive over the past 9 months to a year.   But like they say in the majors, "that's why you play the game." I was pretty surprised when I walked into the usual hall Saturday.   First, it was packed. I normally attend closer to 1 p.m. when typically the crowd has thinned out. But I could tell driving into the parking lot that there were still many people there. Second, the show was overwhelmingly sports cards. Any Pokemon, Magic, etc. seemed limited to a handful of tables. I don't know what caused the sudden shift back to sports cards but I was glad I got up off my recliner.   The change affected my mood more than my shopping. The tables were still overrun with graded football and basketball and I'm sure I heard "PSA" uttered 25-5...

It's difficult for me to imagine what life was like for a kid in the 1950s. Even though the '50s is one of the most romanticized decades in American history, there is still much of it that escapes me. I don't know what it's like, for example, to live in a world without sugar packets or air bubble packaging or astroturf. All of it was invented after 1956 but before I was born. And I don't know what it's like to put a penny on the counter and receive exactly one wrapped baseball card in return -- which was something you could do in 1956. But thanks to the cards that came in those packs in 1956, I've often wondered what it was like to be a boy that year. What was it like to go to the corner grocery store or drug store, surrender a single coin, and receive a piece of art on cardboard in return? I know what it's like to be a 9-year-old in the '70s. The plaid pants, the flowered wallpaper, the yellow smiley faces everywhere. I know what it'...