Reflections on the fifth birthday of the blog

It has been five years that I started this blog. It feels like it was just now. First, I have to say it has given me so much, before you wonder, mostly because of the people I met through the blog. For some nostalgy, this is how it all started.

Soon after I started it, a guy sent me an email from Australia, who is also a visually impaired collector. Today I can call him a great friend, and our relationship extended much farther than just collecting friends, though we never got collecting off the table. We even had a chance to meet a couple of times, as it turned out we work in the same industry, so we attended a couple of conferences together mostly just by accident. I also met people who were interested in the blog, with some I have exchanged coins, and I think it also helped me to be invited to speak at some clubs, I will never know for sure. Recently I have visited many places, and I think my blog also helped me to get some appointments in museums where they could see I was serious about it. This, I will not know either, but it happened several times that people who hosted me in museums knew my blog inside out.

But let’s go back to the beginning. Originally the idea was to tell the world that you don’t need eyesight to collect coins. What I didn’t think through early on was that it isn’t hard to run out of topics. Not completely, of course, and my experiences will always have the blindness aspect, but there is only so much to say about how I collect differently. Later I started to write about some of my experiences in collecting and numismatics, and later I wrote pieces which had nothing to do with blindness, mostly book reviews. In a way I felt sorry for a while that I chose the name Blind Coin Collector, because I wanted to write about other things. But then why not? After all, it is still the blind collector’s blog, and I had to give it some freedom to shape and evolve, just like I did. Two years ago I got a great opportunity at work to travel the world, and I exactly knew what I would be doing. During my free time, I started visiting museums, coin stores and meeting collectors, numismatists. This immediately gave me a lot to write about, and in a way I got back to the blindness theme, not purposefully, but this was how I have experienced numismatics, and without explaining it fully it wouldn’t have made sense to the readers anyway. In the meantime, work consumed much of my life and I didn’t have much time to venture out into many other things, though I still tried to find time to write about numismatics.

I can’t just write about the blog remembering the last five years, as I think I have changed more than the blog. Ten years ago I called myself a collector, though I think I was more of a hoarder with a catalog. Five years ago when the blog started, I think I was legitimately a collector. Yes, I did start collecting 30 some years ago, but I didn’t have a systematic approach. Today, I think I can also call myself as a hobby numismatist, the beginner kind.

The blog certainly helped me to hash out ideas and shape my interests, though the people I met along the way probably had an even bigger part in it. I think my biggest achievement in collecting was that I started contributing to the hobby. Modestly through the blog, though a few presentations I made, and also by becoming the newsletter editor of the World Internet Numismatic Society, where I am serving my second term. Today I feel that collecting alone wouldn’t make me content. Happy for sure, but I can’t imagine spending thousands of hours of my life doing something that is mine, and if I’m lucky enough it is not going to end up on an estate sale. Though in the meantime one of my daughters is definitely an aspiring collector, and the younger one is toying with the idea. But at this point I’m enjoying the hobby on my own for the most part. Contributing also didn’t make sense just by doing things randomly, I am currently trying to find my place in numismatics.

This is worth a little explanation, going back to the blindness theme. Much of what collecting is, needs vision. At least in its traditional sense. I am not able to sort my coins alone. I need to know what it is when it comes in the mail, when I buy it, or when it comes out of a bag. Some scenarios are easier than others, but I already wrote a lot about that. Research is exactly the same, in a way much more difficult when all I have is pictures. I can read text based books with computer technology, but if I would like to contribute to numismatics, I need to find my nitch. It is definitely not easy to find an area which I can master mostly on my own, which interests me and there is work to be done in.

I tried a few things particularly over the last year. Coin forums are just not my thing. I don’t mind reading them here and there, sometimes I write a few things, but I keep forgetting to check back on them. I did play with editing Wikipedia articles, but there’s no other way to put it, it just didn’t work. I found it time consuming to edit the articles, I spent more time editing than writing, and though I love the concept, I was dragging my feet when it came to posting something. The other question is the subject area where I would like to contribute. Much of what interests me has been well researched already, and without looking at coins through a magnifiers or dusting off old books, magazines and letters it wouldn’t work. One theme that has interested me all along is Hungarian numismatics, and I find that there isn’t enough information out there in English. I feel like I’m finding a nitch here, but time will tell. Much of the research is done, information is out there, but much of it is in Hungarian and relatively scattered. I think there is room to sharing the beauty of Hungarian numismatics with the world in English without having to see, and of course here and there I can ask for help, I just don’t want others to do my work.

And some statistics:

This is the 65th article on the blog, about one a month was the average throughout the entire five years, there were only a few months when I didn’t write.

Since I started the blog, I got 2700 new coins, in average more than one a day. This more than doubled my collection. Where this is interesting is that though I’m always happy to get some random coins, I’m collecting around specific areas. I only added 40 new countries to the collection, which is now at 187. Though I had coins from many countries before, I did spend more to work on the countries and did not chase a new title in the catalog.

I can’t count how many people I met, probably tens just through the blog. I also met several people through my travels whom I originally knew through online exchanges or coin clubs. Or, also got to know many along the way. I am still in touch with many of them. In a way it is fascinating to meet somebody in person whom I have corresponded with. When I travel I always make a point to meet people I know. There is no secret there, I find out where they live when we send coins to each other.

I visited 9 museums and a mint, I have been to several coin clubs and stores. There were a few places which I didn’t manage to visit for some reason, but one thing never failed, I always brought some coins home. The most currencies I had in my pocket at a time was four, which I have used within four days in five countries. Yes, travel gets to be quite hectic sometime. Last year once I was in three capital cities in one day. Not all that unachievable, just an interesting fact. At least, for me it is.

It has been a tradition that I write a birthday post on the blog with some facts about the previous year. Here are the previous birthday posts, with this one on top. Since I’m already writing a review of the last five years, this year I will keep the events of the last year shorter, because I don’t want to repeat myself. I mostly wrote about travel, as I have been to many interesting places. Last July I started at the ANS Museum, then in Cambridge UK, Dublin, Bucharest, this year in Ottawa. I had a wonderful time presenting and later visiting in Columbus, and I was also back to Chicago to attend a CCC meeting. You can read all about my numismatic travel here. I have to admit my first few travel posts weren’t all that interesting, I wasn’t sure how much I would be traveling, so I started out by writing something, but later only if something interesting happened.

I also did two interviews, one with variants in coins. These were some of my attempts to contribute some to numismatics. And a few more ramblings about miscellaneous subjects.

I also did make a few attempts to make some coin photos, I put a few on Twitter, but let’s just say I won’t be the next blind photographer. However, it is fun to share my coins with others here and there. Most of the time I don’t ask for feedback before posting, so it is mostly obvious that I took the pictures. In a few cases, I have also posted things where I thought I knew what was on the picture, or I thought that something was there. But these tweets weren’t too important so I didn’t want to ask for much help with them.

The one thing I didn’t make much progress with is my book. If it happens, I will tell you what it is. It is a difficult topic to research, but I’m still planning on it. It would make sense to just publish the information I have on the blog, but it is not sufficient for a book. But I still believe I can write it.

In conclusion, I am glad I started the blog. there were times when I wasn’t motivated to do anything with it, other times I was but I didn’t have the time, but for the most part it was much fun, and I hope there is at least five more years to come.