The Time Machine in the Mailbox

I opened the mailbox the other day, and during the short walk from my driveway to our kitchen table, I was transported through a weird space-time continuum. Think the best of Marty McFly and Doc Brown, H.G. Wells and Outlander’s Claire Randall. All I needed was my very own Marty-inspired DeLorean or like Doctor Who, my own Tardis.

One minute I was a father and a husband, worrying about work and figuring out what my wife and I were going to do over the weekend. And the next moment, my mom was back in our childhood kitchen working on the Thanksgiving turkey. My father was at the table, hunched over and writing on his notepad. My brothers had the Thanksgiving Day football game on TV, and I was on the living room couch flipping through the Sears Wish Book.

Reading the fine print

At its peak, the Sears catalog ran between 600 to 800 pages, weighed nearly five pounds, and was an inch thick. The thing weighed as much as a huge phone book. To a kid who loved toys, it was pure heaven. I read the toy section from cover to cover, studying it the way a stock trader reads the financial pages. I read every line, every description, nothing got by me.

Once Thanksgiving hit, the catalog took on a whole new urgency. It meant Christmas was only weeks away.

I would turn a page, write down on a separate sheet of paper in elaborate detail every single item on my list. I would write the name of the toy, the long code in front of it, and page number. I would make sure to use my very best penmanship so there was no mistaking what I wanted. My wishlist would extend down the page.

I’m sure my mom hated to see me turn Christmas into a cash register—but at the same time, I suspect she beamed with pride seeing me focus so intently on doing a thorough and meticulous job. Oh those were the days.

The Reality Behind the Magic

I would go to sleep that night imagining myself playing with everything that I wrote down on my Christmas wish list. I knew I wouldn’t get everything. I was aware that we struggled financially, but I knew I might get one or two. Little did I know at the time, my mom rarely shopped at Sears for toys anyway; our local store had a relatively small section, and mail-order catalog shopping just wasn’t really a thing in our house. It took weeks for packages to arrive on our doorstep, certainly not in time for Christmas morning. I wouldn’t figure out those small details, though, for at least another ten years.

But for ten-year-old me, it was pure bliss.

Neverland in October

I was taken right back to that time this week when Amazon—yes, Amazon of all places—sent us a physical Christmas catalog. It was their version of the Wish Book—Amazon’s Holiday 2026 Kid’s Gift Book. Of course, theirs had a few new wrinkles: a follow-the-dot game and stickers. I would’ve killed for them back in the day.

The toys still looked as cool as ever. Yes, I’m 58 going on 8. I’m Peter Pan saying, “I want always to be a little boy and to have fun.” Ironically, I’m not even sure when the Amazon catalog arrived. It could’ve just arrived or been sitting on our kitchen table for weeks. It was just strange to see it sitting out amongst other ads promoting Halloween.

Uneventful, But Good

For a brief few moments anyway, I was back in another world. I was a kid again. I was looking through the Amazon book the way I used to review the Christmas Wish Book. I might have stayed there in Neverland a little longer, but my wife came home and asked how my day was. I considered telling her I’d spent the afternoon flying around with Peter Pan, but I stuck to the truth.

“Oh, my day was good, honey. Uneventful, but good.”

Your Turn!

Do you remember the Sears Wish Book? What was the one toy you wanted more than anything else? Was it one of these holy grails?

• The Millennium Falcon or AT-AT Walker (Star Wars): Opening that massive box on Christmas morning would’ve been the pinnacle of boyhood triumph.
• The G.I. Joe Command Center: A playset so massive that it would’ve taken over a whole corner of the living room.
• Castle Grayskull (He-Man): A trapdoor and skull drawbridge, say no more.
• Atari 2600 or Nintendo (NES): Staring at those tiny screenshots in the catalog for hours, trying to imagine what the games actually felt like to play.
• Evel Knievel Stunt Cycle: Guaranteed to send plastic flying at top speed across the driveway.

Let me know in the comments below! (And for good measure… it is now officially 11 weeks until Christmas!)