Confessions of a “Leadaholic”
by anonymous
Hi. I’m a gamer and I’m a Leadaholic. I could lie and say I don’t know how it started, but then I’d be violating parts of the 12-step recovery program.
My first steps down the road to “White Metal Fever” were the books of my youth. Battles illustrated with painted figures. The first rush of cracking open a new book and huffing the inky smell of the illustrations -- if I had only known then what I know now. Early in my youth, I experimented with that gateway material: Plastic. Marx was my plastic of choice, but I’d take a shot of Rocco every now and then, just to change things up. I remember hoarding my lunch money, and yes, stealing the last page of my friend’s comics so I could get the order slips for the plastic armies they sold in the back of them. American Revolution, Civil War, and WW II -- I had to have them all and both sides, too, because you never knew when your neighbor was going to move.
Then I started thinking “Big Battle” and was getting multiples of them. This was soon considered child’s play, though, once I found my first Airfix set. Oh yes, the real “fixing” had begun! So many different armies in so many different periods, that I couldn’t stop myself. I had to collect them all. My poor innocent parents and relatives had no idea that they were feeding my habit with every Christmas and birthday dollar they sent me. It was all going to my supplier (I’ll call him BH). BH knew what he was doing. At my every visit I was lead by the nose down the “candy” aisle to where the new Airfix was. It wasn’t fair -- I was only a child!
But soon, I had a second monkey on my back. Rule sets. I didn’t know what a symbiotic relationship was, back then, but I sure do now. Each fed off of the other in an orgy of never ending buying. With rule sets I started on the real hard stuff. Lead, pewter, whatever you want to call it. I soon had “White Metal Fever.” I sold off my plastics to children with contempt in my heart; I had the real stuff now. Heritage Ancients was my first taste. Oh, the ecstasy! Soon everything revolved around buying that next pack. The price of other things was measured in how many packs of miniatures that could have been bought instead.
To continuously feed my habit, I now got into the “industry.” My journey to the “Dark Side” was now truly complete. What mattered a healthy diet, a good looking car, or even a real girlfriend? I deluded myself with talk of the ever elusive “miniature gamer girl” who would understand me and my miniature collection. I didn’t need non-gaming friends. They would never understand me and protect me, like my miniatures would. Well, at least they’d protect me from the radiation as they lined the walls of my meager abode.
What brought me back to some sense of sanity, you ask? When I realized I couldn’t get all of my figures and the paraphernalia that goes with them into a moving van. Slapped in the face by hard, cold reality I broke down and confessed to myself that, yes, I had a problem and that I was a Leadaholic. Sadly, I convinced myself that some of my miniatures were “red headed step-children” who I didn’t really love and wouldn’t miss. As I passed them on to their new owners and accepted their filthy cash I whispered to them “You know I really love you.” But they didn’t answer me back in their old familiar manner, and I knew the spell was broken, never to return.
I haven’t sold off everything; I’m too much of an “LA” to do that. I still go to conventions and feel the pull of “fresh lead.” I find myself “Jonesing” for the newest rule set. But I’m better! I’ve admitted my problem! I shall persevere!
P.S.: Field of Glory looks great. A couple of packs of figs and I’ll have the entire Roman and Carthaginian armies for the Punic Wars! Those Spanish and Gaul’s can be the start of...
The Historical Miniatures Gaming Society - Great Lakes Chapter is dedicated to the study of military history through historical gaming with the use of miniatures. The Great Lakes Chapter members run five miniatures conventions each year. Our flagship convention, Advance the Colors, is held in Springfield, OH every September and draws over 300 attendees.
