As far back as I can remember, my dad had a short, squat box in one of his dresser drawers. I used to love it. It was some lame brown leather personal organizer-like thing from the early 70’s. It was dotted with lids and compartments and, most importantly, it was full of stuff, full of essential dadness, the flotsam that washed up and into his pockets during each day. The arrangement was almost geologic; despite not being very deep, there were layers of stuff. Old business cards littered the collection along with several long-expired driver’s licenses showing off my dad’s once-hip glasses and bushy sideburns. A disused money clip or two along with a couple silver dollars added weight to the collection. Ancient cufflinks hid under an old pair of glasses. Golf tees from resorts I vaguely recognized turned up in corners, odd since I remember him playing golf exactly once. Each visit to the box turned up something new yet it seemed to me that my father had forgotten about the box long ago.

My daughter, now entering her I must pull absolutely everything out of every drawer and cabinet in the house phase, discovered my nightstand digging up a pair of old reading glasses and a slinky along with a few books I gave up on reading long ago. Yet she’s fascinated, so I occasionally find something new and throw it in the drawer for her to discover. While doing this a few days ago, I realized that maybe this is precisely what my dad was doing. I figured he’d forgotten about the box but I don’t think he did. Instead, he added to the collection to keep it interesting. It was just a boring old box to him, containing a few pointless possessions but, like the haunted cul-de-sac and endless street, it was mysterious and exciting to the two-foot version of me.

There are many responsibilities as a dad but on of the more important ones, I’m learning, is helping kids hold on to their sense of wonder. Like my dad did for me, through a simple, nondescript box, tucked away in a dresser.