Thoughts on Paper
While on the last page of Nicholson Baker’s The Mezzanine, my attention shifted to the feel of the paperback. The neat, fresh and crisp feel of the paper sort of enhances the reading experience isn’t it? Compare this to the prints sold by underage kids in traffic signals or in the shade of a plastic tent setup in one corner of a footpath. Well, I could bargain with nimgu beda namgu beda lines, but the paper quality wouldn’t be the same. Thinking of quality of the paper, a quick top 3 comes to my mind.
There’s the polished Sunday supplement of Times Of India — Times Life, which was polished and felt like silk of papers, taking the highest place in my own mental hierarchy of papers. The paper most times adorned the Physics and Chemistry lab records. Why not wrap the observations of hydrogen sulphide and its pungent smell with the details of trip report to Ladakh?
Then comes the thin crinkly brown paper that contained the banana chips. Yep banana chips, before all the Hot Chips shops decided to universally pack chips in cheap plastic, this brown paper ruled the roost. The satisfying sound of shaking the packet and feeling a mini version of Brownian motion unfold within. And importantly, the ability to crumple the paper entirely after you are done with the chips.
Last on the podium is the grand old Indian Express! The best paper, not for any big journalistic feats but just because it absorbed water like none other. Washing white canvas shoes on a Friday night and stuffing it with loads of Indian Express papers and finding the shoes completely dried up next morning was a blessing from heaven! Just for saving my ass on most Saturdays, I owe Indian Express this one.
Other worthy mentions are the ruled paper I wrote all my exams in(No Om was ever drawn), the Times of India newspaper on which I ate all the chiwda and the annoying scrolls of paper from CVS receipts.
You might be confused as to why I am discussing papers here but it all ties back to the book The Mezzanine. The book which is about a guy whose shoelaces give away, so he goes to CVS to buy one during lunch time and comes back to work made me think all this. It made me pay attention to those fleeting thoughts. Like for example, take the design of a sugar packet. Just before I am about to add my regular 2 packets of brown sugar, I would shake the packet, create an empty space to tear the paper away and then add the sugar to the coffee. Sometimes I would wonder, well that design was convenient!
It’s not often I’d pay attention to these thoughts. My mind is constantly bombarded by thoughts of the doomsday, the world ending, COVID, about exponential growth and the stock market crashing in their portfolios. However, amidst all this a simple run-of-the-mill thought would pop up for a fleeting moment once in a while and that’s what this is all about. Nice to notice that thought, right?
