Nostalgia is a big reason that people collect coins, but for me there is a deeper reason.

I have been neglecting my registry sets for a while. They are a humble bunch, but I enjoy adding to them very much.

My father gave me his Lincoln penny set when I was a teenager and I have dutifully kept it all these years.

Some time ago I got it out of moth balls and caught it up to date. It now has all the memorial coins, along with the 09's and the 2010's. These are raw coins, but they are unc down into the 20's.

Last year I added an unc 31-S, 14-D and 09-S. The other two are circulated, of course. My budget would never allow for uncirculated specimens, but, staying true to the original intent of the collection, they don't have to be.

As with most collections, it has a few holes. Mine, without considering some of the variety coins, has 4. I am missing the 24-D, 12-S, 11-S and the infamous 1909-S VDB. Three of them will be added within a very short amount of time. The 09-S VDB is a different story altogether.

I look upon this set with a certain amount of responsibility. I look over it and the word, "legacy" always comes to mind. It is almost a haunting feeling, emotions that what I would not normally associate with a coin collection.

My father and I have never gotten along well, but this is something that he entrusted me with. I would very much like to show him a completed collection before he passes on. He is only in his 70's so it would seem that I would have plenty of time to plan out the completion of his/my set, but I feel time catching up with me. I no longer can say that there is plenty of time to do this or that. That sense of mortality looms over everything these days.

It's all very depressing, and not by choice, but it doesn't change anything.

I will begin planning for the acquisition of that last elusive coin. I would very much love to take that last coin, the 1919-S VDB, to him and have him place it in the humble plastic 2X2 slot. It would be a shared success, something that both of us labored over, at last come to fruition.

It's all very dramatic, and not by choice, but it doesn't change anything.

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