I still gain immense satisfaction from the thrill of the hunt, and my joy in comics has almost always been about the discovering something new, not resting with old favorites. So, I don't know that I can see a time when my course will be run as long as I am physically able to keep doing it. My budget for doing it is a lot less these days, so I don't go to as many shows or explore new shops, but it was never about what I got but about the people I met and the books I discovered along the way. If there comes a time when I no longer enjoy that process (or am not able to physically do it any longer) then I will hang them up, but it won't be about there not being more books I want or having enough to read, it will be about not being able to enjoy the journey finding those things brings. But I still enjoy rooting through a long box to discover a book I never knew existed or encountering a creator I wasn't familiar with, or meeting a new dealer at a show and striking up conversations, or doing the same with people I meet at shows or shops, or running into my old con friends I only get to see at shows, etc.

It's going to be different for each person as we all have our own reasons for what we do. But for me, it doesn't matter that much what books I get when I go to a show or a shop, it's still about the experience of doing it. Don't get me wrong, I have my favorites and my want lists, but they are part of the process not the point of it for me. But I also get a lot of joy in curating my collection and my want lists, organizing, displaying etc. and if there comes a time when I can't do that either, or if that part of it supersedes the enjoyment I get from going to shows and shops, then it may be time to make these kind of decisions. But for me, today is not that day, and I don't know how close that day is for me.

-M

Well, in the past 4-5 years, I've been buying a lot more old comics, but I don't collect in any particular manner. I like going to shows mostly for the social aspect and will looks through junk bins for cheap stuff to read for fun. Mostly stuff on newsprint, so you know I'm not buying for condition.

The one thing I have been spending money on is older undergrounds, which I can justify bu knowing there's a very limited number of them (compared to superhero runs), there's a lot of stuff that hasn't been and probably won't be reprinted, the best ones are very re-readable, and I can be fairly secure that I have the biggest collection of them on the block.

I buy new work from certain creators--Deitch, Griffith, Los Bros, Clowes, Burns--and some odds and ends that look interesting if it's inexpensive.

In a couple of years, I may start selling off my silver age collection, just 'cause I see friends rakin' it in. I'd probably have to go the clean-press-slab route though, and that whole thing just depresses me.

For me, it was the mid 00s to the 10s. I went from going to the LCS weekly, to once a month and still was getting very little. I bought some book collections or European graphic novels; but, that was about it. Once I found digital collections, I stopped even buying books. I still get digital, now and then, especially if something becomes available that hadn't been; but, it's been a long time. My buying petered out by the new millennium and especially for back issues. No point in looking for original comics when I could find book collections, or digital. Then, enough on-line reading sites turned up if I was just curious to sample.

I stopped obsessing over collecting decades ago. Now my collection is something I have that I still enjoy adding to, but I also recognize that I don't appreciate nor utilize it enough for all the space it consumes. It more than paid for itself when I sold off key books over the past few years, but it's still boxes upon boxes of books I will probably never read again before I die.

When I was young, I guess I had this idea that it was possible to one day own and read it all. Now realizing how absurd that idea is, the question becomes what to do with a partial collection.

And I think the answer is simple -- enjoy it when you can; get rid of it if it ever becomes a burden. When I die or move into assisted living one day, I have no problem with my kids calling Mile High and letting Chuck's successor rob them for the privilege of getting it all out in one fell swoop. I've long abandoned any romantic idea of my collection living on beyond my own exit from the hobby. So these books are here for me to enjoy them, or to not. If I have the space, and I find any satisfaction at all in adding to it or in continuing to re-experience it, then great. And if it sits and collects dust until I die, that's okay too, I guess.

It's the other stuff I worry more about -- photos, artifacts, even sentimental furniture. That's the stuff that no one is going to show up with eager eyes and a crisp hundred dollar bill to take away and then pass on to others who will appreciate them just as much.

It's a Mount Everest deal for me. I've climbed the highest mountain in my collecting, and in my desired price range. Where do I go from there. I don't want to stop; there's Kickstarter projects, collected editions. But the books I've been seeking and hunting will finally be put into my collection shortly. The trophies have been mounted on the wall. 

Maybe my phrasing might be wrong; I don't know. When did the slow down start maybe....

It started out as a financial choice back in 2011 when I got laid off. And even though in that time things have changed, I just never got back into it. I've made a few annual or opportunist type purchases over these last 12 years but the more recent ones in the last 4-5 years are still sitting on the table unread. I haven't even bagged or boarded them. Some months back I even started reading Age of Apocalypse again, one of my favorites for both the story and nostalgia and I haven't even finished it yet. So I just took that as a sign I might not be into comics anymore or just may not be for a good while more. If I am honest, part of it is still financial. I can afford to buy comics, but I still don't feel like they are justified. That the reason I am still buying them is collector mentality or habit. As oppose to my other hobby, gaming, which I feel like I get a great deal more for my money than from a comic book.

As a comic collector, I'm almost purely interested in either newspaper strip collections or history books, but only if I get a good deal on something. So relatively few additions throughout the year. Most of my reading is digital. I sold off about 80% of my floppies during the pandemic collectables craze, keeping a few choice books for sentimental reasons and other things that are tough to find elsewhere and/or am still adding to here and there (eg. Blackthorne Dick Tracy's). This thread has made me think what I will eventually do with my collection and all the other books and stuff I've amassed over the years. We have no children so not sure who I could pass it all down to. Maybe I'll just leave it to the library of my alma mater, the University of Victoria, if they would even take it