It occurred to me that I have practically always been a treasure hunter, of sorts!
From a very young age, I was fascinated by the idea of finding "value" in something that appeared to not have value.
I'm not entirely certain when it started, but I'm pretty sure that it was with my little tree farm when I was about five or six that it took form.
What am I talking about?
Well, if you're a gardener you probably know how birds will eat the seeds and berries of plants, shrubs and trees, and then they will invariably poop somewhere. That is nature's way of propagating itself!
Not so long after that some tiny green things come out of the ground and quite a few of these are, in fact, trees and shrubs. The most gardeners, these are a great source of annoyance that have to be pulled as weeds, but I decided I wanted to give these tiny trees a chance to grow. So I started a tiny tree farm in a small corner of one of our flower beds.
The theme here, is that I took something that was worthless to most people and even an annoyance and turned it into something of value. And value it was! Some years later, when I was probably about 10 or 11, I ended up selling all my little trees (now a couple of feet tall) to a local landscape gardener who was thrilled to find some relatively rare things... and honest enough to pay accordingly.
At different times, that same "value from nothing" came from gathering mushrooms in the woods and selling them to people who just didn't have the energy and patience to go and find them, and during the summers I would often be out there picking wild strawberries and wild raspberries which were considered a great delicacy, but nobody really had the time to go and find them in the quantities they wanted.
But I did. And I went out hunting for these things quite extensively, instead of playing road hockey with the neighborhood kids.
My treasure hunting took a different turn when I became more serious about my stamp collecting hobby, and discovered that it was great fun too buy entire boxes and even suitcases full of people's old stamp collections, sort through them and find the treasure hidden within.
Indeed, I often kept some of the best things for myself, but I also had a keen eye for the things I could pick out and subsequently sell to other collectors. They, in turn, would just thrilled to find some rarity they'd been looking for for a really long time.
Of course this particular form of treasure hunting took a turn towards becoming more profitable when online marketplaces like eBay became a reality and I had a much larger outlet for my "treasures."
In asense, the stamp gig was just a variation on a theme many people often think about... which is to go to flea markets, antique malls and junk shops and find some hidden treasure they can resell, or just fix up and be extremely proud of displaying on their mantlepiece!
I did the antique hunting as well for a number of years, but that's such a hit and miss thing and I soon realized that it's better to be a specialist at something you're really really good at, than try to know enough about everything from sports cards to antique pottery to determine what's treasure and what's junk.
Many years later, treasure hunting hit a new high for me when I moved to the state of Washington and we lived near the beach. I'd always been a keen beach comber so looking at/for stuff while I walked on the beach meditating came quite naturally to me.
In turn, that turned into my "beach coming business" which was quite successful for about three or four years... until somebody got the idea that they wanted to turn it into an entire industry, rather than just about somebody being a hobbyist walking on the beach.
Even so, it was quite a delight to be able to do one of my favorite things, find "treasure," pick it up and repurpose it as something wonderful for people all over the world!
I think I ultimately have my dad to thank for helping me develop the sort of "eye" you need for looking for treasure.
In truth, I expect that much of my fascination with treasure hunting also was driven by my general avoidance of "real" jobs and pursuing a so-called "career."
Even today, I'd just as well not be an editor, so I could just fiddle around with various treasure hunts!
Thanks for stopping by my blog, and have a great remainder of your week!
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Created at 2024-01-09 01:51 PST
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