A Love Letter to My Favorite Apple Product

This is a love letter to the wired headphones that came stock with my iPhone 5 back in 2013, back when Apple actually included extras with their products. That feels almost unthinkable now in 2025, especially from that poisoned orchard. These headphones have seen it all a few trips through the spin cycle, hundreds of hours of calls, and thousands of hours of music.

These headphones were also my daily drivers when I biked everywhere. I would run the cord down through my shirt and listen to music while I biked (probably not the smartest thing to do, but hey, I’m still here). The amount of sweat, grime, and abuse these little headphones have taken through the years is insane. The fact that they’re still trucking is a fucking miracle.

Even when Apple killed the headphone jack and forced me into the unholy union of AirPods, I kept these reliable wired warriors in my daily go bag…with a few dongles of course. I do love my AirPods though and they’re probably my second favorite Apple product, but AirPods come with one undeniable truth…they’re gonna die. It might be in a few months, maybe in a year, but it’s fucking guaranteed.

I won’t spiral into the doom of planned obsolescence or the sea of plastic we’re all contributing to daily. This isn’t that post 🫠. This is a happy post about my favorite piece of tech ever the one that’s been there longer than anything else.

Through these headphones I’ve had hours of conversations, listened to thousands of hours of music, and carried them with me across cities and countries. They live in my daily bag and will until the day they finally give out. I’ve had them longer than my daughter’s been alive and longer even than I’ve known my wife.

I trust these headphones more than any other pair I’ve owned. They’ve been washed, dried, beaten to hell and guess what? They still sound better than my current AirPods V3.