... like my mechanical pencil.
I bought it at a stationary store because I like the fine lines it can produce, and that unlike pencils, which become blunt, it consistently has a fine point. I also like very much that it is not a disposable object - though some might use it that way - only needing lead replacement now and then. I share many good memories with it - capturing spontaneous images and those that emerge in response to certain ideas and thoughts, writing parts of stories that may be - or maybe not - later developed in pen; underlining passages that I want to come back to, marking certain parts with little stars to indicate something I want to try out or do, or doodling little designs, shapes or mandalas as I think or let my mind wander. Over time, we have developed a little system of signs and musings we are very comfortable with each other now.
Lying among books on my table, the pencil reminds me of the pleasures of paper, how a new clean notebook feels achingly beautiful to me, like fresh fallen snow or undisturbed sand, and that exquisite moment when I finally muster the courage to make my first mark. It reminds of me the thousands of notebooks that I have marked that way, with a mix of regret for the purity of the untouched paper and of delight of making those markings, which in themselves mean nothing, lines and curves strung together, yet for me, and those who can read their code, deeply meaningful. Every time, for just a moment, there is a sense of magic, of sacred ritual in laying down those marks on clean paper, and a momentary thought of that paper as waterside grasses and reeds.
Is it any wonder, faced with so much presence, that I find writing those first words in a new notebook or on a clean sheet of paper so difficult?? But I do it, again and again, because holding that pencil, I also remember the joy and satisfaction of putting thoughts on paper, and of feeling a story, a scene, a person take form on the page … not always the form I had anticipated, either, for there are times when the pencil and my unconscious mind secretly conspire to override my conscious intentions. Like now, when I was writing about my mechanical pencil, and it drew me into daydreams and fantasies.
Dreams of writing the great novel, of lighting up the world with great ideas and inspiration? Yes. I once had those. But that was before my mechanical pencil, when I wrote solely in ink - real ink, with a real nib, because I thought that was the way true poets and authors should write. In a way, I could say, this object, this simple object represents a hard-won but ultimately very satisfying acceptance of ordinariness, of no longer striving to be Special. It symbolises for me the slow and sometimes painful, humbling of an overweening ego, and the beauty and simplicity of life without it.
As a student of Jung, I ask myself what missing or neglected aspect of me this pencil represent? Perhaps I have already answered that, for there is a small voice that tells me that I have wasted opportunities, that I gave up my early dreams of being ‘A Writer’ because I was too lazy, too impatient, too undisciplined, because I told myself that the world doesn’t need another Writer and all those other excuses that people give themselves for lack ambition. All true. I am not ambitious. Even though I had big dreams, I never was.
But somewhere in middle age, in the middle of growing an academic career and discussing with students so many books, I had an awakening that I don’t need to explain here, but that took me in a complete different direction, and led me to understand that I am not made for the limelight. It would corrupt me. My role is in the background, a supporter, a source of strength to others, a flint from which the eternal flame may be struck, not a star but an atom of stuff behind its brilliance. Yes, I do sometimes feel a sense of loss, but that’s my ego, not me. I am like the pencil, the one that lies unnoticed on my desk by all except for me, useful, in it own small way as itself, being itself, serving the infinite creativity of Being.
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