I Sold Some Old Magic Cards

For $300

Last week, I felt so triumphant about selling my old Magic cards that I told my favorite post office employee about it. “Magic cards?” she asked. She had no idea what they were. Neither did the guy at the Cash-4-Gold joint or the teacher at my daughter’s school. How am I supposed to gloat when nobody knows what I’m gloating about? Sheesh.

And so…

Magic: The Gathering is a card game. It was created by a company called Wizards of the Coast in 1993, though it didn’t really take off until a couple years later. To play Magic, players must buy cards, build decks, and find other players to play against. I started buying cards in ‘98 or ‘99, and I stopped during high school. I briefly flirted with Magic again in the early ‘10s, but that didn’t last long. All told, I bought enough Magic cards to fill a small shoebox.

I assumed my collection was worthless until I spoke with my friend, Dave, about some basketball cards he sold for major bucks. I then sold a rare Bernie Williams card on eBay to some guy from the Bronx. That felt right and good, and it got me thinking that maybe I had other valuable cards in the dusty old corners of my basement. A quick eBay search revealed that this was indeed the case. I took pictures of maybe ten Magic cards and listed them on the ‘bay. The next morning, almost all of them had bids, and one had already climbed to $50 with six days left in the auction.

This is Grim Monolith. Grim Monolith is a rare Magic card that I acquired in seventh or eighth grade. I ended up selling it last week for $186.50. For once in my life I am proud of 13-year-old Pat. Way to go, Pat! I promise you’ll eventually get taller.

Reading Grim Monolith’s description really breaks my brain in a way that only Magic can. I simply don’t understand how to use this card. I know it quickly generates mana, but how would I go about integrating it into a deck? I have no idea. (Full disclosure: I never played Magic as a kid. I didn’t understand it. None of my friends did, either. I merely collected the cards. My pal, Andrew, taught me how to play when I was 23. Turns out Magic is fun once you learn the basics.)

I collect stuff. I always have. Baseball cards, POGs, CDs, records, t-shirts, hats, books, zines–I’ve collected all of ‘em. I enjoy putting objects in a box and then putting that box in a closet. So sue me. Some people prefer minimalism–an angular beige chair in an angular beige room–and some people just want to haul their Nintendo 64 cartridges all across the country.

It’s easy to dismiss and maybe even ridicule the people who paid big bucks for my cardboard rectangles, but it’s not like I don’t act that way sometimes, too, albeit in more socially acceptable arenas. I’ve paid $110 for a hand-dyed, hand-screened yin-yang sweatshirt. I’ve shelled out $17 to complete my collection of a local band’s CD catalog. We’re all just collectors spending money (which I’m told is “fake”) to scratch some psychic itch until another itch materializes.

Part prison, part home.