I'm Sure Brazen Hussy Will Roll Her Eyes At This Post

Suddenly I'm 14 again.

I used to love comic books. I was never a "serious" collector - I didn't buy one copy to read and one copy to put in a vacuum seal for investment purposes. I just enjoyed the stories. While I liked moody anti-hero stories well enough, my favorites were always the good old-fashioned fantasy-fulfillment laser blasts and damsel in distress variety. Yes it helped if the writing was good, but come on- comics are supposed to be fun!

Through some combination of my own (delayed) maturity and changes in the comic book industry, I pretty much quit reading. I'd put a toe back in now and again, but it was never the same. When I moved to New York, I left my comics with my brother, knowing that he was as big a geekboy as I was and would take good care of them. I'd visit Georgia every so often, but it never seemed convenient to bring the comics with me.

Then came last weekend. It was my brother's wedding, and we all gathered at his apartment beforehand. I said "hey, aren't my comics here?" and my brother was like "sure, do you want them?" Little did I know that there were 4 of those long boxes worth waiting for me (maybe I was a more serious collector than I thought)! I loaded them into the back of the car, and started looking through them when I got home. And, as pathetic as it sounds, it was like finding an old toy that you really loved. We were both a little worse for wear, but other than that nothing had changed.

Yes, I'm prone to nostalgia. And yes, I was never willing to completely abandon the adolescent loser in me. But I'm very happy to have those comics back. There are just some things you should never get rid of - no matter how silly them seem.