One of my favorite features in RePlay magazine is the Blasts from the Past that Key and Ingrid produce from time to time showing photos of those “good old guys and gals” we once met along our journey in this business.
For many readers, it’s a peek back into the “good old days” when things were supposedly better than any at other time in their lives. This last thought is, as people well know, questionable. It’s like the guy who famously said: “My time in the Army really sucked, but when I look back on it, I really had a good time.”
Memories get pushed through a strainer, leaving mostly the good ones and pushing those bad ones into the dustbin of personal history. Many operators look back on the video game glory days with longing, remembering more frequent trips to dump the cash boxes and lug all those quarters to the bank where everybody was on a first name basis.
But, do they also remember all those demands from the bar owners to buy and bring in games they heard make nothing but money while running the “past due” stack of distributor bills up another notch and then the game turned out to be a stiff? Or when you put big money down on a new piece that was “closed out” the next week for hundreds less than you paid? If you were a machine distributor back then, do you miss chasing all those strangers who hung you out on the line on debts personally guaranteed by…themselves? Fun? Nah!
My view is that your “good old days” might be right now…and that if you jump out of bed with a spring in your step ready for another day’s business, they probably are. All of which means you should continue doing what you’re already doing. Or, as that old saw says: “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” But, if you hate when the sun comes up each morning, examine why and then do what you can about it. I know it sounds easy to say: “work as if you don’t need the money” but like “love as if you’ve never been hurt,” that’s more wishful than useful (but it sure sounds nice).