Many of us have a fascination for boxes. There is something about that first touch — when we smooth our fingers over the grains of the wood — or the cold metal or cardboard — that sets the seeds of wonder in motion. Questions flash through our minds. What is inside? When was it put away? Will we like what we see when we open the box? Or if it is our own box, we wonder, will it still be as interesting as the last time we saw it?

Everyone in our family seemed to have some kind of an affinity for boxes — and in our childhood, we pounced on parcels we received at birthdays and Christmas, opened them eagerly, then proceeded to toss away the contents carelessly and cherish the boxes! There were a couple of us, too, who single-mindedly devoted ourselves at a certain age to cardboard cartons — and used them as tents, castles, cars, beds, robots ... and spent happy hours pushing them up and down with a lot of hooting and tooting, or hiding inside them until we were ‘found’.

As we grew older and wiser, we realised that with so many other box-happy youngsters around, we would have to start putting our stamp on our boxes — and this we could not do with common everyday cartons and shoe boxes that were prone to have decorative labels pulled off or decorated over. We needed solid recognisable wooden boxes — though we were also ready to settle for old biscuit tins and chocolate containers. They were distinctive. We could ask: “Has anyone seen my Black Magic tin/my carved rosewood box?” and everyone would know there was just one in the house and who it belonged to.

Next, we started grading our precious collections — shells, pebbles, erasers, whatever our fetish of the moment — according to the boxes we put them in and they were there not because of their intrinsic value, but because of the value of the box to us for our own peculiar reasons. We were clearly getting more possessive about those boxes than the treasures within.

That was when Father thought the time was right for him to begin handing out a box or two from his vast collection (obviously our fascination for boxes had come down to us in our genetic make-up), as a reward for good behaviour or when we returned from being away from him or when he returned from being away from us ...

Thus, over the years, we each acquired quite an array of boxes, large and small. Some were from Father, some from others who knew of our predilection for containers and many from our own shopping sprees. Naturally, they eventually began to take up more place in our homes and in our cupboards than was available – but when it came to sorting out what should be kept and what should be thrown, we found it easier to get rid of the contents than the boxes!

But, we were in serious trouble. Those boxes had taken on an identity of their own: “The one Father gave me when I finished school”, “my brother-in-law’s first gift to me”, and so on. And all were too precious to be given away.

Until a nephew arrived from faraway shores. He wasn’t looking to acquire anything special from his parent country — until we brought out one of his grandfather’s old, well-worn boxes. His eyes lit up, his hands reached out, his fingers ran over the wood carving as ours used to. The slight warp of the wood, one missing leg, a loose latch — all that did not matter.

This was perfection for him – as it had been for us. Truly, the box had found its next owner.

Cheryl Rao is a journalist based in India.