The bizarre part of childhood was that we had to follow some weird rules growing up. It may have differed from culture to culture. One of the rules we had to follow growing up in India was the one regarding the use of pens.
I don’t know who can relate to this weird childhood norm, but Indian millennials must have some experience with this!
From my childhood, pens had a distinct allure. The shape, color, and pattern of the body and the smoothness and flow of the ball nib signified how good a pen was.
There were these small cylindrical ones that the office-going folk used, called the Cello Papersoft Pens.
Then there were these slender ones with white and blue bodies that were looked down on for being cheaper and low quality.
The regular ones like Gripper, Techno Tip, and Pin Pointers were used by everyone alike.
Despite being introduced to all these pens, we weren’t allowed to write with them until we were 8 or 9 years old. We had to graduate to the 4th standard to be able to wield a pen! Until then, our only instrument for writing and drawing was a pencil — also a reason why I hated writing with pencils for a long time.
The closest thing we had to a pen was the “pen-pencil” — the plastic mechanical pencils with a line of tiny graphite tips we can rotate and use. Nobody really wrote with that, but many owned it in school. It served the twin purposes of denoting your place in the social hierarchy and playing with it in your free time by loading and unloading the nibs!
The pens like Gripper, PinPoint, and TechnoTip belonged to the bigger league back then. These were a rite of passage for a child- owning it meant you’d graduated! Now, you are in the big league!
I used pens in school only from the 5th standard; that too with a lot of monitoring and regulation. The handwriting was a big thing back then, and teachers were always warning us that pens would ruin our calligraphy. We may have gotten caned for that as well!
Honestly, I learned to typewrite in my mother’s office before I wrote with pens. Of course, at home, we could do whatever we wanted. But, “officially” we were not pen owners! And I couldn’t wait to become one!
Finally, when we started owning pens, we learned about the lords of the pen world!
Only a few people in the big league had the guts to use them! Obviously, I loved them. But with my butter fingers, carelessness, and a habit of losing everything, no way I could ever own one!
If you don’t understand what I’m talking about, it’s the fountain pens!
With a sleek black body, metallic cap, and stylish fountain nib, it was a crowd-puller!
My sister had one, which she never gave me! For good reason! My mother had one, which I had privy to. I spilled the ink from it everywhere and damaged the nib by throwing it to the floor!
By the time I was old enough to have one, the allure of the pens was long gone! But to this day, I love the idea of writing with a fountain pen. Since I left school, I have bought a Parker Ink pen and always written with it. This blog post is also written in ink, before typing it in!
Today, pens have become a niche thing. It’s better to have typing skills than beautiful calligraphy.
Typing is an inevitable part of life now, but the flow of writing with a smooth ink pen that is eager to put down the letters on your mind beautifully to the paper is unparalleled.
I can never get into the flow when typing on the keyboard. A clean sheet of paper, dim light (preferably golden), and a quiet desk by the window are my jam! That’s how I finished my first novel, Life In a Ziplock Bag! And I loved every second of that amazing journey!
What is your ideal writing space? What makes your creativity explode? Let me know in the comments!
Please check out my first book on Amazon here:
