Thoughts on a birthday

The blog is two years old. Nothing about collecting today. Just some reflections.

Two years ago I started this blog to record some of my thoughts and experiences about what it means to be blind and collect coins. I have to admit, the blog did not have a particular purpose other than sharing what I thought was interesting. I did not advertise it, I didn’t promote it, other than showing it to a couple of friends. I wanted to do something that is related to my hobby, and is not done for any social and monetary benefit. Therefore, I just wrote when I had time, or something to share. I think sometimes I talked about things which didn’t strictly fit into blind coin collecting, for example a personal update about my new guide dog, or how I started collecting with our older daughter.

I also didn’t write too much, sometimes I felt that it is just one of those abandoned blogs that people start and don’t take seriously. I have to say, over the last two years, I did care about the blog, but sometimes I had higher priorities, or I thought I did.

The first surprise I had soon after I wrote my first few posts was that a gentleman contacted me from Australia, letting me know that he and his wife collect coins, and they are both visually impaired. First we talked about the hobby, later we found out that we work in the same industry, and after exchanging probably hundreds of emails, today, I have a new friend I have never met in real life. His site is worth a look too.

Since then, I have not met any new blind or visually impaired collectors. However, the blog is mostly talking to people who previously didn’t know much about blind collecting. I have received many interesting comments and questions. I even got a request to submit an on the World Internet Numismatic Society of which I am a member of.

Besides writing the blog, sometimes I also post on collector forums, where we also had some interesting discussions around this topic. I joined the World of Coins forum which required to type in the characters from the picture in order to verify that it is a human trying to sign up. I was greatly moved when the web administrator changed the sign up process to make it accessible to blind people.

I also met a gentleman who is collecting square coins, and he wrote a book about it. He was very kind to share this book with me in an electronic format so that I could easily read it.

I have swapped coins with people who found me through the blog. Though being blind has never been a problem when swapping coins, it was a relief for me that these people exactly knew what they are getting, part of the deal was that some coins may not look all that good, and others may not be what I thought they were. Fortunately, as much as I can tell, it didn’t happen, unless they didn’t tell me about it.

One of the few times when I reached out to potential blind collectors was when I posted some of the coin descriptions on the site. They may not be very useful, rather interesting to those who can see coins, but I thought if I have it I’ll post it and maybe it will help some people. This initiative has grown quite a bit, but that’s a surprise. I will write more about it soon in another post.

In conclusion, I had some interesting things happening over the last two years because of the blog. I only wish I spent more time writing, sharing, and joining online discussions. Maybe next year.