This was 2005. After some years in the "college apartment," and post 2005 G.I.Joe Convention with the Steel Brigade Sky Hawk on the Transportable Tactical Battle Platform. Maybe it was nearing into 2006, I'll have to think about that some.
That's my old "childhood" dresser, it's now in my daughters room at the marital residence. That's a dresser my mom got on the cheap and stained for me back in the 1980's.
I had the gray shelves from before, possible back in the mid-90's. I bought the two white plastic shelves for the vehicle display shelves. I like a matching set of things and I had wall bracket shelves but I didn't want to put holes in the "brand new" rental construction we were renting in.
On top of my old original 1983 Headquarters I had a foam core "roof" of sorts built on top. At this point in my life I was only a couple/ few years away from my college education and I had somewhat hoped to get back into school to keep on going on the Toy Design path.
Unknown to me was that the person I settled for as a mate was a covert narcissist and I had already been hooked with marriage and the next goal post was pregnancy. This room was my son's first room for the first year of his life (born in 2006) and most of my G.I.Joe stuff was organized into Rubbermaid containers.
My collection never recovered and about 19 years later after this photo was taken only one of those A.W.E. Strikers remains.
It was good collection and I don't where to go or if there is a higher purpose to life but I am looking at some old photos and sharing some online elsewhere, too. There's a lot of good stuff. It's not as flashy as the latest, greatest, or the biggest.
Here, I don't know if I should attempt to rebuild my collection. I miss it but I am also a little more picky as to what I have. I am not going to settle for some beat up worn out loose product that is, frankly, overpriced. On the other hand, to get what I want is going to take more effort or, the MIB route, which is even more costly.
Originally I scanned this photo to share some thoughts on a type of shelf that makes a good display with the Headquarters and Battle Platform. Looking back, I like this a lot now. I ultimately picked a lot of steel shelves for my former basement HQ, and I didn't get that much farther past that point. But here, I like this HQ and the roof that I had entirely forgot about. That shows a former me and the creative side I used to have.
Narcissistic abuse is no joke and they do not teach this in school. As you read this on a random G.I.Joe blog, unless you have the experience, you might not even understand what that means. And that's okay. I am starting to understand it more and I now pick up on it with people I meet. It is a problem on this planet.
But here in my old G.I.Joe room photo. Or, well, it wasn't even a full room, it never got that far. I can see my creation and now I can revisit it and I can see what was good and now I have the experience of multiple iterations of a "G.I.Joe room" or space and all the hundreds of items I have had.
What was good, what was fun, and what got tossed into the Rubbermaids or storage boxes that rarely saw the light of day.
Perhaps I will rebuild my G.I.Joe collection.
Perhaps it should start with the rebuilding of the Pit at Icebreaker's HQ?