Ticonderoga #2

On my walk this morning, near the high school, I came across a pencil lying on the sidewalk, apparently dropped from the pocket or backpack of a student. It was something of a surprise, like coming across a fossil in a streambed. Do they really still use pencils? Why? And for what? Don’t they have computers and iPads and calculators and, in a pinch, pens? I tried to think when the last time I used a pencil was. I have two large coffee mugs on the desk in my office with a few pencils in each, but can’t recall using any of them in at least several years, maybe five or eight or ten. If I ever have to write on paper – not very often, phone messages and shopping lists mostly – it’s always with a pen. I thought it might be at a hotel, where they provide a slim pad of paper and writing implement beside the phone, but it’s been I don’t know how long since the writing implement was a pencil and not a pen. And several times in the past few years there hasn’t been any pad of paper or pen or pencil, the assumption being that you had a computer or smartphone for any notes – written or oral – you might need to make. The world is digital and probably will forever be, and that’s probably for the good. But for a moment this morning, striding across that dropped Ticonderoga #2 on the sidewalk, a pang of nostalgia crossed my memory. And I wondered – did the student who drop it even ever miss it?