401

I can vaguely remember the first comic book I ever read. I’m pretty sure it ’87 ’88, I would be 6 or 7 years old, and it was a Captain America comic. The oldest comic I own is an issue of Superman which I bought in 1989. I bought Superman comics and others for years from RS McCall at the Westwood Shops, but one year my mum brought me to Parnie Street in Glasgow to a shop part owned by an old English teacher, and friend of a friend of my family, John McShane. Back then the shop was called AKA Books & Comics but over the years and through a change of ownership the place would simply become known amongst my family as Craig’s shop. My Shop.

I don’t remember exactly when John sold the place or when his partner Pete Root moved his backlist over to the more commercial Forbidden Planet store in Buchanan Street(He would later return to Parnie Street, though this time a few doors down at Kollectables) or when I first met the owners David and his, I think twin, brother who’s name escapes me. What I do remember is that it was near this time that my mum had picked up a leaflet for me to fill in which would mean the store, now A1 Comics, would place an order of comics for me in a file to picked up at a time of my choosing.

My first File was number 311 and I lost it when I was 17 due to not having a job and spending what little money my parents gave me (not a complaint) on Laura Russell , my first and short lived girlfriend. People always say that I’m quite a lucky guy, but the day after Laura dumped me I got a call from A1 to say that as I had not emptied my file for over three months they could no longer continue to keep my comics on file. Honestly, to this day, I still don’t know what broke my heart more.

Before I lost my file my lunch and pocket money had been being saved up each week and every Saturday my friend, Peter Gardener, and I would go into Glasgow on the 18 bus. We had been doing that for three years at the time I lost 311, since I was 14, and every penny I saved went toward the purchase of what I would think of as my alcohol, my escape from the real world.

Two months after the loss of 311 I got my first job serving burgers at McDonalds on the Queensway. My first wage went entirely to the purchase of a Royal Dolton figurine for my mother, as was the tradition set by my sister and brother before me. The second pay however was mine and the first thing I did was open up a new file at A1 Comics – File 401.

As I had when I was fourteen, I visited the shop once weekly to pick up the comics from my shop. This means that until this day I have been going there every week, apart from my three month exile, for yearly 11 years.

I said until today. I said that because today I walked into my shop, had my usual banter with the surly long time employee and my friend Jim Frame, and then told Adam, the weekday manager of A1 Comics to close my file. I know this may all sound pathetic to those who read this post, this obituary of my life long and perhaps defining hobby, but even as I write the words now I can’t help but feel that I have lost a part of myself this afternoon.

That being said the decision to stop buying comic books on a weekly basis was my own and the reasons for doing so are, unlike before, not financial. I just feel I’ve come to a point in my life where I don’t need to find out what happens next every week, I’m tired of the trips in and out of that shop, My Shop which I have been a regular customer of for well over 10 years.

I’ll read the trade paperbacks (which collect storylines into a single book) I’ll still visit My Shop from time to time but there can be no denying that an era has ended today. I convinced myself to do this and I still believe it is what I want and will not turn back. I had told Michelle that I expected protest from the staff, especially Jim, but, as she had told me, there was none. When I told Adam what I wanted to do he simply looked at me then Michelle and back and saw that I was serious, he then sombrely and sadly nodded to me as he agreed to close the file and this significant chapter of my life along with it.