I knew I had turned into my mother when I started saving boxes shortly after leaving home and moving into my own (tiny) efficiency apartment. Let me just say that I’ve always saved gift boxes because my mother always saved gift boxes, and she passed that gene down to me. It didn’t matter that whatever-sized box a particular gift required, there was never one the right size.

But I also save plain, brown, slightly dented cardboard boxes. The kind that once carried a blender, or a pair of boots, or an Amazon shipment. I started saving cardboard boxes “just in case.” Just in case what? An emergency return of my new coffee maker? An appliance recall? A sudden need to transport the machine across state lines under cover of night? Well, one never knows. In my defense, I’ve managed to trick and surprise a lot of people at Christmas by doing things like wrapping up a pair of new socks inside an old cell phone box. Imagine their delight at receiving socks instead of a new cell phone!

The storage room off our laundry room now looks like a cardboard nesting doll situation. Big boxes holding slightly smaller boxes, all carefully stacked, because you never know when you might need a good box. “This one is perfect for mailing cookies,” I tell myself, as if I’ve ever mailed cookies. I do fold up the gift boxes so they fit inside the cardboard boxes, but then, just as with my Tupperware, I can never find a bottom and top to a gift box that fit together. Doesn’t matter. I smush them together and make do.

Hubby has started to notice.

“What are all these boxes for?” he asked the other day, tripping over a computer box from 2012. I think the computer is a thing of the past, resting somewhere in a computer graveyard.

“I’m saving them,” I said.

“For what?”

I stared at him blankly. For what, indeed? How could he ask such a silly question? I’m saving them JUST IN CASE.

He sighed. “You realize we don’t need a separate box for every gadget we own, right? The toaster will survive without its original packaging.”

Maybe he’s right. Maybe I don’t need the box for the vacuum cleaner I bought six years ago. But what if someone asks me for it? Like—officially? What if there’s a government agency in charge of Original Packaging Compliance, and they come knocking?
“Ma’am, we’re going to need to see proof of box ownership.”

“Wait! I have it right here! Just need to dig past the Instant Pot and my backup air fryer box…”

At this point, I think I’m emotionally attached to the boxes. They represent optimism. Potential. The fantasy that someday I’ll be the kind of person who mails thoughtful gifts, sells decluttered treasures online, or moves spontaneously to a charming rental in Vermont.
In the meantime, I’ll be right here, surrounded by corrugated dreams, refusing to admit I’m one Amazon Prime order away from being featured on a cardboard-themed episode of “Hoarders.”

But if you ever need a box? Call me. I probably won’t have the size you need, but call JUST IN CASE.