Throughout my life, I’ve had several pairs of headphones, from the little cheap ones they give you at the airport to the big, bulky over-ear ones I now use religiously. But from the very beginning, I’ve loved the power they had to transport me to a place that wasn’t the airport, the train, or the car during a cross-country road trip (the one where you learn a lot more about your family than you ever bargained for), or anywhere else I’d happened to throw them on.
They’ve seen a lot, my beloved pairs of headphones. I remember this MP3 player my dad had bought me and how I first brought it to this summer camp I went to when I was eight or nine. I absolutely fell in love with the whole thing. I had all this music on it, from Sir Duke to the Nutcracker suite, from Neon Trees to music from my dad’s old band (which was fairly popular in the city in the early-to-mid-2000s). I could listen to whatever I wanted, whenever, for as long as I wanted to. It didn’t matter that these headphones were of the worst quality; you don’t know any better as a little kid. I certainly didn’t, judging from how, by the second month, the rewind button had already faded and was lodged out of place from my perpetual jamming and clicking.


Then, I remember I had this funny-looking blue-and-green pair of headphones in eighth grade that I used up until freshman year of high school. I had just gotten my first cell phone around this time, so no more MP3s—on to bigger and better things like YouTube Premium! With this, I could download whatever I wanted on the app and my bleen (or grue) Boses would repeatedly hurl the song into my eardrums. This was also the time my interest in classical music began to spike, so I have a lot of exploring and discovering to thank this pair for.


A little while later, in my freshman year of high school, a close friend of mine bought me a bulky over-ear pair of off-brand headphones from Amazon as a Christmas present. Not only did I love how they looked, but they sounded way better. They also withstood the beatings I put them through up until my last year of high school, at which point, they promptly snapped into two. They now rest in my desk drawer—I cannot bring myself to part with these types of things if I can help it. I actually came across them a few days ago in the middle of a room remodeling. Seeing them now, I thought that they looked a bit ridiculous, but I remembered thinking back when I used them that they were perfect. I guess they really were.
And now, I’ve got my Audio-Technicas. I found them after a great deal of research and recommendations from my friends after my last pair broke. I wanted headphones that not only sounded good, but would last me a long time. You end up developing an emotional connection to these things after a while and I didn’t want to keep shoving old stuff into drawers to make way for new stuff.
Anyway, they’ve served me very well this past year. They’ve withstood a fair amount of drops, rips, and twists, and they still work perfectly. They’ve also got an equalizer if you connect them to their app on your phone which I love.
Each pair has meant so much to me when I was using them ... It’s really crazy how an object made of plastic and metal brings so much comfort and pleasure. I think it’s because it’s a good way for me to stay connected to my interests when I’m not at home playing music; it’s also a medium for exploring more of what I love. It’s like if you’re a sea captain and you love being at sea, you’re going to love the boat that allows you to travel wherever you want, whenever you want.


A memory comes to mind that really drives this point home.
About a month ago, I was invited to play piano at this networking event in the city. I came right from school and, when I got there, I put my stuff in the backroom. However, I must’ve forgotten my headphones there when I left because a couple of days later, I realized I hadn’t seen them in a while. A few weeks and several phone calls later, we were finally able to retrieve the headphones, but not before I realized the hard way that, without those things, my life is shockingly lower in quality: I can’t eat, I can’t sleep—every second of the day, I thought about how I shouldn’t have lost them so foolishly, and how much I want them to magically appear in my hands. Is that even healthy? I’m not sure.


Being connected to my interests is definitely a good reason to love my headphones, but lately, I began wondering if there’s another, possibly deeper, reason. Why do I keep old pairs in drawers? Why do I love collecting them (along with old bottles, cans, ticket stubs, and enough things to make my room look like a shot from one of those hoarder shows on TLC), and why do I despise parting with them? And then I realized.
Some of my favorite memories as a little kid were watching my parents, specifically my dad, talk about their old hobbies, passions, and things, reminiscing about the past. And then, they’d get up, walk over to the closet, and 45 seconds later, out would pop an old ream of Polaroids, an old camera, an old pair of drumsticks, or some cassettes, and I’d think to myself, “Damn, I should collect my old stuff too! I’d love to show my kids the things I used every day when I was a teenager, all in a different time.” Maybe that’s why I keep all of these old things, even if they’re broken or have lost their purpose.
Being a musician, I essentially listen to music (and certainly play it for hours) every day, so having a pair of headphones that I can sit with that lets me feel like I’m inside of my favorite songs means a lot to me. Even though many things have changed over the years—I’ve matured and my music taste has expanded and evolved—I still feel the same sort of freedom when they’re on that got me hooked all those years ago. It reminds me of Theo Van Leeuwen’s definition of authenticity in “What is Authenticity?”
Van Leeuwen writes that authenticity is about validity, which can come from anywhere. Because I felt so free, and that was my reality, that’s all that really mattered as opposed to the quality of the headphones or what I was listening to.
My headphones made me realize how much I enjoy what I do. Every time I’ve lost a pair, even for a couple of days, missing them made it that much more obvious. I really hope they last forever, even though that’s a bit of a stretch considering how they bang around in my backpack every day to no end. There isn’t much space in my room anymore for old, broken stuff. Maybe I should protect them more. Maybe invest in a case or something. We’ll see.