Article by Kole Petersen Art by Riley Diehl
An orange skateboard, whose body has rusted from underuse and whose wheels will never be replaced.
A set of dinosaur magnets, whose scientific names (Pachycephalosaurus, Plesiosaur, Triceratops) were once memorized and held close, but who are now forgotten and out of sight.
A Weird and Wacky Contraption Lab box, whose Velcro pieces are worn to the bone, yet who long for one more session of gear turning, “egg” laying, and stunt pig launching.
An eight-foot basketball hoop, who has been compressed to just four feet, and who hasn't seen a basketball since its shrinkage.
A collection of monochromatic drawing pens, half of whom were never uncapped, the other half of whom were opened but ignored for their more colorful cousins to transcribe imagination.
A collection of “I Survived” books, who miraculously survived a decade of constant use, but who are now entering their second decade of neglect.
A set of three green juggling balls, who were intended to be used alongside a set of three blue juggling balls, but who never saw the light of day.
A box of rainbow colored dominoes, whose days of being assembled into lines and toppled and assembled into pyramids and toppled and assembled into Rube Goldberg machines and toppled again are long behind it.
A box of markers, all of whom have been used to half capacity for illustrating books about Christmas and Easter, but who now embody the same fate as their monochromatic cousins.
A bike tool kit, who has been left unopened, even though it was intended to mend a triathlon bike for many years to come.
A Tupperware container of marbles, whose contents no longer experience movement through a track, but through the rumbles of an unfurling ladder and stomping feet.
A Bananagrams game, who was never interacted with in the way it was intended, but who now misses the organized chaos of its past.
A container of Lego bricks, who used to be stars of many a stop motion video, but who now have stopped moving entirely.