The Joys of a New Pad of Paper

Upon acquiring a new legal pad the other day, to use for one of my academic projects, I had a sudden flash of memory of my first grade classroom. The teacher would hand out pieces of lined paper as needed, but one could also buy from the school one’s own pad of paper. I remember asking my mother if I could do that, her agreeing, and my then receiving my very own full pad of paper. What infinite riches that pad represented! Perhaps a hundred pages of fresh, clean, lined paper, all mine! I could fill those pages any way I wanted to! What joy! I can still remember the visceral pleasure of that moment. Hundreds of legal pads and notebooks later, I still occasionally get a flash of that same pleasure when I get a new pad or a new blank notebook. Each one is a clean slate, a new start, a new opportunity, a glimpse into the unknown future in which I will write something -- maybe something wonderful! -- on those so far unsullied pages. Hurray for the simple pleasures of life!