In one corner of my parents' basement, the kids boxes sit. I wasn't sure how long it would take to go through everything, but it was Tuesday noon before I decided, well, maybe I should get started. It might take more than a day. And then I began bringing the boxes up the stairs into the sun room (with towels on the furniture to protect them from the dust and grime years had placed on the contents). Maybe it would be a few days.

The point was to separate it all into trash, recyclables, collectible things to sell, garage sale stuff and then, generally, the things I actually wanted to keep from my grade school to high school years.

A few boxes went quickly into the trash or garage sale piles (boxes, sacks). And I had a small pile next to me for little stuff I wanted to keep (interestingly, this pile stayed rather petite through the four days of sorting). Then I hit collectibles.

Breyer models of horses and other farm animals. These had been sold at my grandfather's "mill" in Portales, New Mexico. Mostly it was a grain wholesaler, but they also had a retail component that sold farm animal medicines and food, pet food, chicks and ducklings in the spring, clothing and such to make one look like a cowboy and these Breyer models (they were molded plastic, not put together models). I had a few of these, and after checking eBay (which became normal after discovering stashes of collectibles), it looked like they would be worth trying to sell.

There were also a few Steiff stuffed animals (German stuffed items--mostly bears--made of mohair, which, I think, is the hair of cave dwelling "mos" in German hills). In the mid-80s while living in Clovis, a doll and stuff animal store was going out of business. So I picked up a lot of these bears and other stuffed animals cheaply (comparative to regular prices), even though I wasn't interested in many of them aesthetically. I also had a relatively large collection of other types of stuffed bears and animals (including a large dolphin), so it wasn't out of character when I was younger. Now, well, I still have a few sitting in corners or on top of shelves at my house.

Baseball cards (which I didn't go through, but merely put in the stack to take home--I will begin to sort them in the coming weeks) were a collecting past-time when we lived in Kansas City (with their major league Royals--who were pretty good in the late 70s and 80s). We had a few boxes of those, along with assorted other cards (a complete set of the E.T. collector cards among them).

Boxes of rocks and shells, which would be great for an interesting rock garden--if I owned the house I lived at. But after taking a few I liked (and having to pitch a couple of starfish which were half rotted from mold), I left those back in the basement for a later date.

Rock t-shirts from the late 80s (which I wore in my senior year of high school almost every day, even though I wasn't one of the long hair stoner guys who also donned the black concert t-shirts regularly), some of which I can still wear with a kind of semi-ironic nostalgia air. Have you noticed that everything 80s is cool again? In the 90s we dreaded this day, and now, well, you have to kind of embrace it. But no way am I paying to see Ratt again.

And much more. Boxes and boxes filled my car at the end of the week. One box I'd opened let loose a few small flies. There was a bit of mold and a great mustiness to it all. One night I let loose a congestive cough from breathing all of this old air. I could smell the years. And looking in the mirror, as my hair grows longer, I can see the streaks of gray and white. The non-smoothness of the skin. There is age there, and it comes from instantly remembering things sparked by seeing all of this from way back when. I don't really dwell on the past, but I do remember it. This is my line when people ask me if I can believe I've been around so long (35 years): "I remember it all." It's not like the mid-30s snuck up on me. I've been busy. And yet, I still get carded regularly.

Now, as the boxes fill my living room and will eventually get filtered to other places (and new homes with people I won't ever know), the passions of the past might give me a months rent or a few nights out on the town. Or maybe just pay for the gas I used to get from there to there and back again.

Matt Worley used to collect many things, and now he mostly just gets older.