Lost My Marbles - Part 1
Photo by Unsplash
I was a collector. I collected basketball cards, the Walter Farley’s Black Stallion series of books, comic books and marbles. I started out with basketball cards in the 90’s, just a few years too late. Michael Jordan’s 1986 Fleer Rookie card sold for $738,000 dollars this year 2021. On lunch break from my City Hall internship, I briskly walked, while autumn leaves ran down Broadway towards Wall Street where scruffy 50-year old white men with sad, droopy, hustler eyes cloaked in oversized 9 pocket Haband Jackets with lining and ahead of the season stood behind foldable card tables, their backs to the traffic. Laid out like gold bars were Shaq and Mourning rookie cards, Baby Jordan, Chris Webber, John Starks. I purchased the card with Jordan air born about to yoke it* on Ewing. I had the Rain man Just a few years too late. After work I would walk down Broadway towards wall street and scruffy guys standing behind tables laid out on the table Kobe and Shaq rookie cards, Shaq rookie cards. I had the card where Jordan yoked it on Ewing. I owned the Rain Man, Shawn Kemp, top 5 dunker in NBA History according to me. I had my Shaq card, not the rookie. The one and only Shaq, the self-proclaimed Superman. My favorite line from his commercial: “Don’t fake the funk on a nasty dunk.”
Before cards there were marbles. 6-year old me had an infatuation for marbles, glass little planets with splashes of color inside. I would race them to the wall to see which one was faster. I added to my collection solid clear glass, Chinese marbles, multicolored rainbows.
Before these collections I did own one precious item that had no equal. Before the comic books, Black Stallion, basketball cards, and marbles there was Benji. Benji had a metal tag on his collar and was about 9 inches tall. He had silky brown hair and a trim white vest. He was the only one in our New York City Home. Okay, perhaps he was one from an assembly line of a run of 500,000, but for me there was only one Benji – 100% matted furry cocker spaniel, schnauzer and poodle mix. He was a situation handler, problem solver, a superhero dog, brave, bold and with the uncanny superpower and knack of being in the right place at the right time and he was mine.
I collected as you know the Black Stallion Series, and before that at 6, 7 years old I collected marbles. I loved marbles, little glass planets with splashes of color inside. I would race them to the wall ad see which one was faster. I added to my collection Chinese marbles, white with orange and yellow colors.
Photo by Mistofer Christopher - Benji a few decades later
He had a metal tag on his collar, and was 9 inches tall, doused with a generous amount of silky brown hair and a trim white vest. Benji was always there and sat waiting for me on my pillow.
One day my sister and I were playing in our backyard and, as we searched and explored around the base of the giant twenty-five foot Blue Spruce tree, she dug and found the pearl of treasures. I couldn’t believe her fortune. It was the biggest marble I had ever seen in my life! If my marbles were planets Mercury, Venus, and Mars, this marble was Betelgeuse, the supergiant star 950 times larger than the sun. It was cracked, fractured, and fissured and my sister had discovered it.
I asked: “Can I see it?” She let me hold it. The gravitational pull of my heart and the weight of the star sunk into the palm of hand.
“Can I have it?” I asked.
She hesitated…