I’ve seen a few people on Steemit share some truly tragic stories about their experience with cryptocurrency (mostly those who have bought low and sold prematurely) - you know, the ones that make you cringe involuntarily.

I have one of those. It’s one I don’t like to repeat - in fact, I’ve spent a lot of time trying to forget it, mainly because it still makes me feel a bit like this whenever I think about it:

However, a common theme I’ve noticed between many of these posts is a glimmer of hope for having found a new and exciting entry into the crypto world in the form of Steemit, and it’s in that same spirit - and as a walking, talking cautionary tale for the kids at home - that I want to share my story.

A tale of misery and woe

This story begins around five years ago, in 2011. I was three years out of school and studying psychology in Cape Town. Having always been a bit of a nerd (but the cool kind, okay!), I was pretty hooked into the internet and considered myself up to date with all the latest developments. In fact, I was one of the first people that I know of in my country to get Facebook, back when you had to register through your school to do so. I even got my school added to the database - extra nerd points to me!

Urkel approves

I remember when a friend of mine (who was an even bigger nerd than I was) first told me about Bitcoin. Given that I was young and dumb and still trying to get a grasp on the ins and outs of real money, I can’t pretend I understood the technicalities of it all (to a great extent, I still don’t), but the concept interested me, and my friend and I decided we wanted to get in on the action.

We didn’t have any money to speak of, but his dad worked in IT and had a garage full of computer parts. So we got to work putting together a few DIY mining machines, and set up a wallet somewhere. For those unfamiliar with nerds, this was ‘fun’ for us.

Believe it or not, this guy is about to wet himself with excitement

Back then, you could mine maybe ten coins a week using a dual-core processor. I don’t even remember what we were running specifically, but we averaged somewhere between five and ten, as I recall. We kept the operation going for a good few months before his dad told us to pack it up, as he needed the space for something else.

By that time we’d amassed between two and three hundred coins. At around a dollar each, these weren’t worth a huge amount, of course, but we’d done it more for the fun of it anyway. Still, we figured we might as well hang onto them, just in case.

Can you feel the cringe coming yet?

My friend had set up the wallet, and had the key stored on his laptop and also written on a piece of paper which he taped to the underside of his desk. We understood the importance of this key - but again, we had no idea what the future held for Bitcoin, so we didn’t exactly treat it like something we’d be devastated to lose, either.

How about now?

By now you’ve probably guessed the direction in which this story is going. Early one morning I woke up to a frantic phone call from my friend. A fire had broken out in his home and pretty much gutted the place. Disaster. Of course, the loss of the laptop and that all-important piece of paper were just an afterthought at the time, but I was devastated for him nonetheless.

Yup, there it is

I forgot about Bitcoin for a while after that. I thought it had just been an interesting project for my friend and I to try out, and that even if there was any real money in it, the small amount we’d made would never be worth that much anyway, so I didn’t think much of it - until one day, a year or two later, I chanced upon an article with a headline that rang something like this:

BITCOIN - THE NEXT BIG THING YOU'RE GONNA WISH YOU HEARD ABOUT TWO YEARS AGO, FOOL!

You can imaging my reaction when I discovered how far the price had risen in that relatively short space of time. You can imagine how I feel about it now. Of course, I’ve since bought some more coins and have made some profit, but it’s nothing close to what I could have made on my original stash - which, again, cost me next to nothing in the first place.

The most frustrating part of the whole thing is that I know those coins are still out there, sitting all alone in their wallet in some dark corner of the blockchain, waiting for an owner who will never be able to find them. It breaks my heart - and my bank account.

The moral of the story: keep those keys (especially your new Steemit ones) in multiple locations, folks!

But now, the good part

When I discovered Steemit a few weeks ago, I had a feeling that I’d accidentally stumbled upon the starting point of something great again. But this time, I’m a lot less dumb, and a lot more informed - enough to know a good thing when I see one.

I’m convinced we’re sitting on a gold mine. The fact that I’ve already made a not insignificant amount of money just from writing on the internet is equal parts baffling and exhilarating, and it’s made even more so by the fact that I know I’ve gotten in way ahead of the curve. This is not to say that I’m not wary of sudden changes in the market and the (rapidly diminishing) chance that this could all fall apart, but I’m feeling better about regaining that long-lost fortune than I have in a long time.

Without trying to be overdramatic, I feel as though Steemit has given me a second chance at crypto life…

And I’m not gonna fuck it up this time.