I could keep office supply stores in business.  For whatever reason, I have a fascination with all things paper-and-pencil.  While I stink at keeping up a filing system, I love to set them up, color-coding and printing labels.  I buy sheet protectors and binders and would probably wear out a label maker if I had one.  I have a lot of trouble this time of year with all of the school supplies in the stores, where the idea of a fresh box of crayons or markers is intriguing enough to tempt me, though I would probably not find any use for coloring once I would get them home.  And index cards!  I have bought many packages of index cards in my lifetime, certain I would find some use for them, only to have them take up valuable storage space in my home.  When we moved back in October, I finally threw them all out, and I now have to fight the itch to buy more.

As for post-it notes, I have them stuck to the wall behind my computer monitor, with little reminders, thoughts, confirmation numbers from orders, passwords for programs, and a couple of pictures drawn by the daughters of a woman I met with two weeks ago (her kids were with her at the time and I only had the post-its to draw on).

In the movie You’ve Got Mail, Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks email back and forth (good old AOL!) about the fall and “bouquets of newly-sharpened pencils” and the smell of scotch tape.  I can appreciate that sentiment.  It’s one of the millions of reasons I love that movie, though to watch it now as the computers drone through the dial-up tones, it seems dated.

Most of all, my love of office supplies reminds me of the big-haired office supply manager that was in a commercial a few years back.  Remember him?  Now there is a great example of someone who loves his job and finds joy in the little things of life (even if it is a fictional character)!