What I’m gonna talk about today is a feeling that really cannot be described with any accuracy to anyone who hasn’t felt it. All of us here have felt it, and as such, I think there is a good audience for this.

What I’m talking about is that moment when deep inside, something relating to your passion clicks.

First, I need to say I have had the pleasure of experiencing “the moment” in a wide array of experiences. I have been in championship hockey games when all of the sudden it feels like there is no way anyone can beat me. I have been involved in BMX races where it almost seems like I am on autopilot and everything around me slows down. You hear Race Car drivers talk bout being in a “zone”. And a lot of people talk about it, but you have to wonder if they really have ever felt it. Like there is that split second where deep in your soul the physical world just… connects. And in that split second, everything is right.

Now, to some it may seem silly to think that this “zone” can apply to what some can view as “just buying toys”. But I imagine most of you reading this are nodding in agreement. You’ve felt it.

It’s that second when you are looking through a 50 cent box at a flea market and see red lines on a tire. It’s that second when you walk into the aisle and see that JL with the white interior.  Or when you are the first one in the door in the morning and no one else is there, and the rack is yours. Or when you wander back to the aisle in the middle of the day while you are out picking up a notebook for your daughter and you FINALLY find that 100% that has eluded you for so long. Deep inside it stirs. And it can only be described as a passion igniting. And it’s a feeling that only real collectors can experience. First and foremost you have to LOVE it.

Here’s a little story to help illustrate it. When I was a kid, my two favorite cars were my Stutz Blackhawk (Grey with yellow and Blue Tampos) and a Rescue Ranger. The Red One. Once I got back into the hobby after about fifteen years of fruitlessly growing up, I decided that I HAD to get at least those two cars. I remembered others, but those two stuck. One day, I accompanied my father in law (a comic book nut) to an “antique show”. I walked with him (and my Mother In Law’s instructions were to “Keep a muzzle on him”), and watched him carefully eye stacks of books. Table to table I just kind of hung out. Then on one table, there was an old Hot Wheels 24 car case. I wandered over and right on top, shining like you wouldn’t believe were BOTH the Radar Ranger and the Stutz. Both near mint. Just a little play wear. I would swear there was a ray of sunshine directly on them. I’m not sure what I paid for them, and what I paid is irrelevant. When I saw them, all of a sudden for a split second I was out in the back yard, on my knees lining out a dirt road with my fingers, getting ready for another car chase. Deep inside, these “inanimate” pieces of metal came alive, and made so much noise they woke up my inner child. It was THAT moment I realized I was a Hot Wheels lover, and I always had been. These cars touched somewhere deep inside. Ever since that first one I had, I was a car lover. These were decent substitutes, and deep inside I wanted to find a way to find my old cars.

A few weeks later, we were moving my Grandmother. After everything was boxed up and taken out, one of the last things to move was the couch. I was at one end and picked it up and as I was walking backwards, my cousin said “Hey Patrick, I’d bet this is yours” She reached down on the floor and I hear the unmistakable sound of those wheels scraping across hardwood. Before I even saw it, I knew. I felt it deep inside. It was MY Stutz. Covered in dust and just as scratched as I remember, but there it was. Somehow, someway, this car spoke to me. Deep inside the recesses of my brain, I somehow remembered at that moment the last place I saw it. That was the BEST moment of my collecting life.

And the moment I found a GTX hunt on the pegs. Or the moment I picked up an Orange and green 31 Doozie for a quarter. Or that moment when one of my customers came in and GAVE me a race team Hummer for being so nice to him. Sure they are not of the same magnitude of finding the Stutz. But they are no less impactful. In those moments, these cars touch my soul. 

And I kind of feel sorry for the people who never experience that.

---43Goalie