Triumphant return? Or not...

I continue to be amazed by this weird and wonderful and thoroughly maddening hobby I have. Since this is my first blog entry on Rubberslug, I should probably give a bit of background (original, matching background, no laser copy for this retelling. XD).

My name is Hana and I am a cel addict. The fledgeling seeds of my addiction were first planted at AWA in Atlanta in 2000. I attended this con with my partner in crime/evil/cels, Yume. From Curt's table in the dealer's room, she made a purchase, a cel that is still in our gallery today (though not yet uploaded here), Mikage from Utena. It wasn't an expensive cel, but it was from that pivotal scene in the elevator and she wanted it and thus the practice of money being exchanged for pretty plastic began. I thought it was lovely, but just didn't know if I could ever justify owning a cel myself. It's plastic, right? With some paint on it? How could that be worth money?

Christmas...I received a present from said partner in evil: a cel. A Marmalade Boy cel of my favorite character, Matsuura Yuu. Oh, no, she wasn't trying to hit me where it hurts or anything. XD I graciously accepted and cooed over him and thought, okay, I have a cel. "A" cel. I'm fine with having just one.

Oh, if I had only known then what I know now. One cel is NEVER enough. To be fair, I didn't jump in with the willy-nilly instant spending many in the hobby did. I remember when paying $35 for a cel meant a lot of agonizing over whether it was really worth it. (I nearly didn't buy the pensive Nokoru cel in my gallery for just this reason. Obviously, I caved.)

I have fun stories about cels. We all do, I think. One of my favorites is how I bought a couple of cels off a site and received a bonus same-sequence sketch with them. I later saw a similar cel, sans sketch, on ebay. It was cheap, I bought it, and it turned out to be the cel that matched the phantom sketch I had.

I've met wonderful people in this hobby. For something as competitive as cel collecting can be, the kindness and generousity of cel collectors never fails to amaze me. Random IMs in the middle of the night because a cel from my series is up on YJ. Emails asking if I'm bidding on a cel already and if so, my friend will back out. Frantic last-minute bid uppings in the early days of Celga. The day someone first shared the Pocket url with me because they knew there was a cel I needed to have.

There are a lot of reasons I wandered away from the hobby, not the least of which was a wholehearted effort to get wholly out of debt prior to buying a house. The advent of CG anime. I have collected sketches, but I don't think they will ever hold quite the sway over me as cels. Diminishing time and new interests that sucked up the remaining time. Work. Oh, let's not forget work. My cels were all safely stored, patiently waiting for the day when I'd come back to them.

Once again, I have to blame my partner in crime. She's the one who found a wishlist cel and called me up and told me in no uncertain terms that I /had/ to have it.

She was right, and here I am. The gnawing is a little different now, the obsession a bit lessened simply because there are less avenues in which to feed it. But the passion, the love, and the willingness to throw dollars at the wall when the right piece of shiny comes along...I don't think that ever changes.

Tadaima. I'm really glad to be home.

~Hana