Today's fortune: June 14, 2011

Today's fortune: Now is the time for a new collection or hobby.

We grow out of collections and hobbies. It's a sign of maturity, I think, to develop new interests as you grow older, and in some ways a sign of immaturity if you still have the same hobbies you have when you were nine.

I don't say that to bash people who collected coins when they were children and still collect coins as adults. I was gaga over baseball when I was growing up, and I still love the game, probably even more than I did back then. I could argue this both ways: I could say I love baseball now for different reasons than I did as an adolescent, or I could admit that, yes, living and dying by the Kansas City Royals is a bit childish. Both are true.

I had other hobbies during childhood that are ancient history to me now. This is embarrassing to admit, but I used to collect ceramic bald eagles.

Yep.

I spent hundreds of dollars on these things. And I was proud of my collection, too. Back home, we had a table in our dining room dedicated to them.

I admit it: I was a nerd.

I grew out of the eagle hobby. But maybe this fortune is right: I haven't added any new hobbies or collections recently. Perhaps my cache of hobbies needs to mature as I creep closer to age 32.

Here's one possibility. My brother Marty collects autographs. One of the autographs he possesses is that of a survivor of the Titanic. A couple years ago, Marty was hoping to tap into one of my childhood hobbies - building model cars - and he asked me if I would build a model Titanic if he would buy the supplies.

I didn't feel comfortable starting in fresh on a complicated model, so I decided to practice on an easy one: the Spirit of St. Louis. This was before I read Philip Roth's "The Plot Against America" and discovered Lindbergh was a flaming Nazi.

The little airplane turned out pretty good, so Marty bought the Titanic model - it wasn't cheap - as well as the paint, glue and other supplies needed to build it.

I placed the unopened box on top of a bookshelf in my office. And there it sits to this day. I never found the time to build the damn thing.

I feel awful every time I see that box, but being the great brother he is, Marty never said a single word about it.

But I made a promise. It's time to get building.