Turning a hobby into something you can make money off of, translated…
In the sixties, when there’s a LACK of resources, the kids’ interests and hobbies are solely based off of cost free, and, the musical instruments are mostly the guitars, and the harmonicas, and reading, writing are the cheapest, and best way to help develop one’s own intellect, but, all of these areas, my husband didn’t get involved into.
My husband was born into a poverty stricken background, his parents didn’t have stable jobs, without a steady source of income, he has seven other siblings, and, there are so many mouths to feed, and the pressures of the economics were pounding down hard. As my husband was growing up, he did everything for his jobs, anything from picking up the unwanted foods, cleaning up a post office, connecting the telephone wires, he’d done it all, for the sake of earning just a few dollars, so he could manage to keep himself fed.
As my husband got to midlife, he’d accidentally “befriended” the recycling business, he’d used his hours after work, to go to the recycling stations to seek out treasures, and, there is an assortment of “treasures”, and, his collections are primarily made up of paper. From these abandoned items, he’d even found the historical records of the old soldiers who’d come to Taiwan, when Taiwan was a colony of Japan, and, there’s the records of being discriminated against, and the accords of the person’s ventures too.
My husband has the professional knowledge of plumbing, he was able bodied when he was younger, got around very well physically, in midlife, he was not seeing well anymore, his hairs turned white too, he’d had the thought of retiring, and, started training younger workers, and slowly, he’d gotten out of the business, instead, he’d started collecting and auctioning off the items he’d collected. As he was about to change track, he needed to do enough research, he’d stayed up all through the nights, to research the histories, to classify the items, to make notes of them, allowing these things that others had thrown out, to become meaningful, and he’d gotten so much fun from it.
Thanks for the internet, he’d started learning to auction things off online, met a ton of friends who’d shared his interests, his middle ages became fulfilled, he’d gotten it all now.
And so, this, how a hobby can get turned into something that you can make money off of, like for this man, he’d collected the items that others had thrown out, and, gave new meanings to these items, giving them new life, and, he was also able to make money off of selling the items, a great second career to keep one busy after retirement…
Life, the Obstacle Course 