Coin

I collect things.  Some might call it hoarding, but I can stop if I want to and I don't have complete collections on a lot of things that I have collected and I'm good with that.  On one of our early camping trips, we ended up at the campground store in Mesa Verde National Park and I spotted a sew on patch that had a scene of Mesa Verde stitched into it.  I thought it was pretty cool and that collection started.  Every place I go now, I look for patches to add to my collection.

My parents had some old coins, actually, they still have them because I asked to see them again recently, so I could show my kids.  My parents also brought out a couple of the proof sets of coins that they had purchased after our tour of the US Mint in Denver, Colorado, probably on the same trip where I started my patch collection.

After seeing those proof sets, I think my kids finally figured out why I have so many proof sets of coins collected myself.  If you've never really looked at proof sets, you really owe it to yourself.  First off, they are perfect strikes of each American coin, then sealed in plastic.  Think of the shiniest coin you've ever held in your hand.  Quadruple the shininess of that and then you might be getting close to what a proof set looks like.  

What looks like black is actually just pure flatness of the coin shining back whatever it reflects.  There's just something about the luster of them that is hard to describe.  I know a friend of mine once told me when he was young he found a proof set of his dad's and he had to see the coins up close, so he broke the plastic so he could handle them.  That totally ruined the value of the coins.  I felt his dad's pain.

These are three of the quarters from my 2010 proof set that had the commemorative dollar coins dedicated to the presidents as well as the new backs to the quarters, two of which you can see here, commemorating different scenic areas of the United States.  Most people who know me well totally get why I'd have this set, which has both Grand Canyon and Yosemite commemorated.  I doubt I'd ever sell these, mainly because of the subject matter, but they are fun to look at every now and then, and I guess that's really the point of them.