It’s been a week since my dear pencil was declared out of service.
The Meeting
I bought the pencil in 2004, back when I was still in senior high school.
Several weeks after my enrollment, I went to a local bookstore on my way home. I used to have this weird habit of dropping off some distance away from my home and then walk the rest of the way. It’s stupid. I still think it is.
So, on that particular day, I went to the bookstore which is located in a mall. At first, I just wanted to do some window shopping. I had nothing to do and I was on my own. As I was taking a look at all the stationeries sold, I randomly picked it up. Then I remembered that I haven’t a pencil in my bag. So, after playing a bit with it (it was a mechanical pencil, after all), I decided to buy it. It cost me a mere 1,500 Rupiahs. Quite a bargain since I’ll be using it for the next seven years.
The Time Together
All the way from when I was in the first year of my senior high school to the graduation, the pencil had accompanied me through the days. It had left its traces in my binder, notebook, exercise book, scrap book, text book, and even exam papers.
I used it to scribble numerous things:
- Song lyrics on my textbook and binder
- Weird doodles on my textbook, notebook and exam papers (yes, exam papers)
- Little notes on my notebook, textbook and exam papers.
- Story ideas and samples on my scrap book
There’re still a whole lot more down the list of scribbles, but well, I guess it’s almost the same for everyone.
Then, after I graduated from my senior high, the curiously long-lived pencil went with me to Singapore as I furthered my studies there. For the whole year I stayed there, it accompanied me in almost everything that concerned writing. And, just like how we went there together, I brought it back with me: safely placed in my pencil case which I brought around with me to everywhere I went.
During the days of my “incubation period”, it was not of much use though it never left me. Or rather, it never had the chance. :)
Since I enrolled in a piano lesson, it was put to great use as I did the theory exercises. And things happened so fast after that. I started my college life at a local campus, where my dear pencil was my primary weapon. I used it every single day.
I was really proud of it (and I still am). I would show it off to others, saying how long I’d used it and how it’d accompanied me through these years.
As I started to write again, my faithful pencil journeyed with me to the world of my imaginations. It put to words what my mind had to say.
The Goodbye
On the 15th of July 2011, I accidentally dropped it during my piano lesson. It had experienced numerous of such falls since I bought it. But so far, nothing had happened.
But that last fall was an exception. It was the pencil’s fall to demise. Something in it broke and caused the mechanical pencil to lose its mechanical ability. I couldn’t use it anymore.
At first, I didn’t realize anything that was out of the ordinary. I clicked on it several times. Nothing happened. I opened it. Something dropped out. It was then that I realized I’ve lost my faithful companion for good.
My heart thumped a bit harder for a second. I felt a sudden loss. It sounds exaggerating, but it’s true. If you have something that has accompanied you for so many years, you’ll know the feeling when it leaves you ever so suddenly.
It has experienced so much. It was crooked because of the way I hold it when I write. The iron ornament has rusted. The insides were somewhat black (the colour was transparent blue). So much different from how it was before. But still, it’s my precious pencil.
To the pencil that has accompanied me throughout the years,
R.I.P. My Faithful Companion
Pencil Of Mine
2004-2011
P.S. I’ve bought a replacement for it by the way, from the same bookstore. I sincerely hope that it can accompany me for as long as its predecessor did, if not longer. :)
Yours sincerely,
Lidya Yang
