I claim as a badge of honor that not one of the figures in my collection are in good enough condition to fetch more than a few pennies on eBay. They are a much-loved relic of my childhood.

I will not pretend to have had all of them, although I had pretty close to most of them. This was thanks in large part to my parents, who bravely navigated the rows and rows of tightly-packed toy store shelves, looking for ones I didn’t own. Scanning each row of blister packs was a real pain. You had to sneak your arm between the rows of figures and use your fingers to flick each box just enough to reveal the contents of the one behind it. Repeat with each one on the peg hook until you get to the end, preparing yourself for cleaning up the boxes that had inevitably fallen off the hook, regardless of how careful you had been.

Like I said, a real pain.

And this, more than anything else, is how I know my parents loved me.

Sweet Star Wars action figure portrait is from ratherchildish.