once tjan and i were walking through some bookstore's stationery section and looking at those colour pencils we all used when we were little - double ended, orange box, with the number of colours stated in flabby blue on the box. if you had the 12-colour set you were unenvied and probably had stinginess in your family, 24 was the standard that nearly everyone had. with 36 colours your family was probably better off than most, or more extravagant to their children, and if you had the 48 colour set, boy you were an ostentatious brat, weren't you?
there are so many little things to be take pleasure in, to help you forget for a while. i opened up a brand new box of coloured pens from kinokuniya and my heart danced over the shimmering xylophone of colours. kenneth gave me my first box for my birthday three years ago. stationery is my obsession, and coloured pens i thoroughly adore, and a whole box of them for me! how i loved that boy when i opened the box. opening this box i feel a light tinge of regret (no one buys me cool stationery anymore), a slight denting in the mind, at the thought of kenneth (i wonder what that boy is doing now), and deep satisfaction at the spread of familiar and exotic colours.