Join me, if you will, on a trip down memory lane as I unbox this mystery box containing joys from those days of yore. Or, more commonly known, the 1990s.
Over the years, on occasion during the weekend trips to my childhood home, I'd find myself going through boxes, containers, and closets. These places held the remaining leftover possessions from my youth.
A bat bag from my high school baseball days, with stray sunflower seeds hibernating for the past 26 years. Sports cards and collectibles, with far-too-many Dell Curry cards to count. Star Wars action figures, random toys, and more. At one point, I believe I had close to every issue of Sports Illustrated from late 1989 to 1998. (I've long since downsized this collection, though I managed to hold onto most covers with the Boston Red Sox, from the Splendid Splinter to Marvelous Mo Vaughn.)
These trips, and purges, down memory lane don't happen every return trip home. The last exploration of overstuffed boxes was in 2020, with the nieces and nephews in tow. An itch of the mind this weekend had me crawling into a crammed closet, searching for the next hidden gem but not looking for any one object in particular. Simply on a mission for a grasp at nostalgia.
On these jaunts, I tend to have a good idea what will be in the containers. Even when it's a Quaker Oats container repurposed as a time capsule in the sixth grade. Items of which include Kool Aid sunglasses (took a lot of points to earn those), a friendship bracelet, and a newspaper clipping.
The box I tracked down today in the corner of the closer, under board games and a basketball, was an unknown entity. Ideas were in place but few were confirmed as I dug in.
The unboxing commences
Throwback baseball jerseys were all the rage in my junior high days. For, you know, like six months. I finally was gifted one towards the tail end of the fad, a New York Giants jersey, and looked to wear it as often as possible.
Which, truthfully, was probably a grand total of less than five days. I practically swam in the thing and, rather than deal with the excess (even in the days the style was "baggy"), simply let it hang in a closet for years.
And then moved to a box, to be opened on this very day. This shirt was the first thing I saw upon opening, so I decided to try it on. Lo and behold, nearly 30 years later, it finally fit.
Further in, and underneath a windbreaker, it's a hodgepodge of trophies and plaques. But it's not them I am too dialed in on. Somehow pushed from brain from this era (age 13 to 18, give or take) was an obsession with collecting keychains. Some were sentimental, like one from my trip to Death Valley, Marvin the Martian from a trip to Disneyland, or the 1-800-Collect, Class of '97 keychain. Others were random, an assortment of swag from insurance agencies or car dealerships and it makes me wonder, "Did I go wrong in not pursuing this hobby further?"
Digging deeper, I find a lot of items related to graduation. Pictures from that day I'd forgotten were even taken. A program. A handful of graduation cards from friends and family, which no doubt contained a few dollars (that I probably spent buying keychains).
There was a handheld electronic soccer game that I spent hours perfecting, from the third-grade on. Ribbons from Field Day in elementary school, participation and otherwise. Stats from my junior varsity basketball team and... wait. Hold up. These I knew I wore but had no clue a pair remained in possession all these years:
The dream of the goggle-wearing NBA All-Stars from the 1980s and 90s lived through me into my first two years of high school. The bespectacled jewel of the Ruby Mountains is what they called me... Okay, that last part I made up. But these were my go-to in basketball games, until the jump to contact lenses was finally made and the Rec Specs retired for good.
The bottom of the box was reached, with a few surprises but nothing too outstanding to report. One thing I was expecting to find in this box was a shoebox (a box within a box? You betcha) full of letters and notes from those formidable late-elementary, junior high, and high school years. Once, I remember owning all of these, from exchanges with classmates to letters written to and received from the girl from North Carolina I met and got to know at the FBLA National Conference in Anaheim, whose name now escapes me.
Alas, there were no such letters (but plenty of FBLA mementos). This leads me to believe the letters and notes did not survive one of the many purges I did back in my early college years. Though, I do hold an ounce of hope there is another box somewhere, tucked away behind a stack of puzzles or an X-Wing fighter.
Or maybe they truly are gone. Not for good. But relegated to the chamber of the timeline where lost memories sit. Meant to be rediscovered in dreams or, like a in the case of today, a cold, February afternoon in a random unboxing of old-time glory.
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