Week 725: “Collector” by Searows

Beautiful Song Of The Week

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Several times during my childhood, I tried to start a specific type of coin collection. The goal was to accumulate one type of coin for every year. It didn’t matter whether that was quarters or nickels or what; I just wanted a complete set.

After scouring my own coin jar (and that of my parents) I quickly realized that such a collection would be very difficult to complete. Finding coins minted in the past twenty years was easy, but finding coins from the 1960s, 50s, 40s…with each step further into the past, it became clear that I couldn’t do it.

But then, an idea: Canada had recently (1987) discontinued its one dollar bill, replacing it with a coin, lovingly known as a “Loonie” in honor of the bird featured on its tails side. If I didn’t need to find anything older than 1987, I could easily grow my collection one year and one coin at a time.

For a while, it worked. And it was exciting. Each January, every handful of change offered the possibility of a coin from the new year.

The problem was that about ten years into the project I fell into a predictable cycle. Every once in a while, I’d find myself in need of ten bucks. I’d look at my pile of Loonies and think, “well, it’s only ten coins, I’m sure I can re-start the collection.” I’d spend it, re-start it, and soon enough find myself ten dollars short of whatever it was I needed.

Years later I eventually got the chance to collect a piece of currency – pennies – and since Canada stopped producing them in 2012, when the collection was complete, it was truly complete. And as cash becomes less and less a part of daily life, that collection seems even more antique.

What makes this a beautiful song:

1. It fades in gradually, which is sometimes how a collection starts; you don’t know you’re collecting something until it’s too late to stop.

2. The acoustic guitar, tuned down so that its lowest note is lower than usual, sounds simultaneously rich and fragile in a way that makes me imagine the guitar itself is a collector’s item.

3. It begins and ends with the same simple but sweet lyric: You are the collector / Running out of room / I am gonna be there / When you do.

Recommended listening activity:

Passing down an incomplete collection to someone much younger in the hopes they can complete it.

Buy it here.

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