A MAN'S PASSION TO RESTORE THE PAST or BRINGING BACK THE OLDIES

My man is nothing if not passionate about whatever he does. He is like a dog with a bone and won't let go.  In the beginning( big deep voice saying, Let there be light!), Mike collected vinyl. He played clarinet in the band and listened faithfully to AM radio at night. He was taken, heart and soul, by music. His mother, Ruby, sang hymns and his sister, Linda, played piano. Mike can play Heart and Soul on the piano to this day. Early on in his 'bachelorhood', Mike collected vinyl. He had the single most eclectic collection I have ever seen. Then the arrival of transportable music--the 8 track. Ah, those really were the days. But vinyl could get scratched and 8 tracks soon wore out. On to a handier, more compact cassettte, hence the 'ette' which I believe is French for petite or smaller. Now we've all seen those strips of vinyl fluttering along the roadsides, so we all know they get twisted and pulled and broken. Today everything is on compact disc and going digital from there. Mike has had massive collections of all these forms, but due to the fact that they take up so much space and he has a wife that requires equal, if not more, space. These collections had to go and go they did. A couple years ago, we bought a CD clone so he could make copies of his cds for the car. Good idea, right? Seeing as how the cds can get scratched/damaged. Well now we have iPods. One that holds 20,000 songs and one that holds 40,000 songs. Mike has discovered the used cassette bin at Goodwill where cassettes are 38 cents each. He is transferring the cassettes onto rewritable discs that I can put into iTunes and then onto our iPods. Then he can simply donate the cassettes back to Goodwill. My iPod is full and his is close to the 30,000 mark, but he is able to find old music that is no longer available in any other form and put in on a source that is totally available to him and anyone else out there that can access our iTunes. Isn't that cool? And I don't have to watch near as many football/basketball games!

This a portion of Mike's CDs. He gets them from everywhere--garage sales, Goodwill, Weird Harolds, Stuff--and occasionally new from various stores. I make him glean through them once a year and take a box full down to Weird Harolds where he gets credit on future purchases. He rarely parts with something he pays new price for and I don't blame him but all the used ones are saved in 2 places so there is no need to keep them. These shelves hold about 1200 CDs and they are in alphabetical order. How else could you find what you are looking for? I love my hubby's hobby because it is something we can share and something he can share with family and friends. If they ask for a copy of something, he is always willing to spin one up. It is an economical hobby that benefits a lot of music-loving people. And best of all, he enjoys it!! So, while, there have been many changes in the way music is conveyed to the masses, my man has kept up and continues to bring music and his love for it out there for everybody.
Next time, see my post on the transformation of the video.......NOT!