The Greatest Story Ever Pulled.

Every TCG collector has a booster pack story; a tale of incredible luck and circumstance in which the normally uncaring booster gods finally reward your devotion with a card pack so pure, so divine, that your collection is forever changed for the better. Mine occurred when I was 10 years old. The Pokemon Base Set was in its unlimited print and after opening dozens and dozens of packs, my little brother and I had nearly completed the set. However, the two most coveted cards in the expansion remained at large: Charizard and Zapdos. One fateful afternoon, Grandma Cardpletionist stopped by for a visit. She brought with her a booster pack for each of me and my brother. I was playing outside when Grandma arrived so my brother received his pack first. I remember walking into our house to the sound of joyful screaming. My brother ran up to me as fast as his 7 year old legs would allow, his hands clutching his prize with trembling enthusiasm. He spoke no words as he feverishly held up his trophy for my view, but the light in his eyes revealed the unmistakable message of the booster gods, he had been deemed worthy. Zapdos.

I was thunderstruck. Here was the object of my ten year old desire, a card so beautiful I would have traded nearly my entire collection for it. I was not worthy. And I was jealous to the core of my being. I begged my brother to let me just hold the card, that I might bask in its radiance.  His lordship refused. Who was I to ask such a favor from one so blessed by the booster gods? For the first time in my life I understood the story of Cain and Abel from the perspective of Cain. My brother scampered off with his prize, leaving me mentally alone in a room full of relatives. My mother offered her condolences, “don’t worry, Grandma has a pack for you too.” Great. I couldn’t wait to receive my fifteenth copy of Lass while my brother communed with heaven in the other room. How exciting.

I forced down enough darkness to politely thank Grandma for the booster pack, and another opportunity to add to my growing collection of duplicates, with minimal fatalism and sarcasm. So great was the loss of Zapdos on my soul that I contemplated not even opening the pack, but I had to uphold my end of the social contract. I put on my best happy face, which likely appeared as a mixture of constipation and dread given the circumstances, and opened my booster pack. I moved through the commons so quickly I barely recognized them. Garbage, garbage, garbage, garbage, garbage, and then, the Rare slot. I moved away the last common to see my prize. My heart, along with all human perception of time, abruptly halted. I felt as if I was hovering outside of my body, watching someone else with my appearance opening my card pack. My adrenal glands fired, pulse quickened, lungs sent a friendly reminder that air is necessary for survival. I took a breath and my brain returned to the third dimension, still struggling to process what just happened, what I was holding in my hands. And finally, it clicked. I was suddenly no longer myself but Julius Ceasar returning from the conquest of Gaul, Joshua at the fall of Jericho, Rocky Balboa at the end of Rocky IV. I was victorious. I was complete. I was worthy.

 Charizard. 

Never before and never again will a single card more clearly define the difference between the haves and have-nots, the commoners and kings, in the elementary schools of the world. And it was mine. It was suddenly, amazingly, miraculously mine. My ten year old being could scarcely process the emotions and reverted into something more primal. I let out a barbarian scream and leapt from the couch, racing around the room, holding my prize with a reverence and adoration not felt in my bloodline since the last of my Viking ancestors clutched a sword centuries ago. I could barely organize my thoughts in my frenzy. What should I do? Where should I go? Who should I tell? And then I remembered. My brother. I barged into his room to find him sprawled out on the floor, admiring the Zapdos that had given his spirit wings. “What did you get?” he asked. “CHARIZARD!” I bellowed, the Viking impulses still coursing through my veins. He was seven and I was ten. I was older, wiser, better looking. I should have been more humble. I should have shown more restraint. But in the heat of victory, I could not. “Trade me!” he pleaded, our roles from earlier reversed.

“No.”

That rejection would have been too much for even the most stoic of seven year olds, and he began to cry. In that moment, I remembered that the Charizard, while extremely important, was probably not as important as my brother. I thought back to how I felt when he had pulled Zapdos not 20 minutes before, and I knew I had gone too far in my celebration. So I extended an olive branch. Between the two of us, we had the cards with the two strongest attacks in the game. Perhaps, I sighed, we could share them. My brother dried his eyes. We agreed to a series of ground rules. We would each take turns using Charizard and Zapdos in our decks. If we needed a card to use against our friends, we would share. He would still own Zapdos and I would still own Charizard, but we would work as a team to use our newfound resources in a mutually beneficial way. With a set of fair ground rules established, joy returned to my brother’s bedroom and we spent the rest of the day cheerfully testing out new decks with the latest additions to our collection.

The day my brother and I pulled a Base Set Zapdos and Charizard remains one of my favorite memories of the hobby. What is your booster pack story? Be sure to share it in the comments below. 

Thecardpletionist has been collecting Pokemon TCG cards since the game’s English release in 1999. You can read more from the author at http://thecardpletionist.blogspot.com/