Mama Says Om - Letter(s)

My thoughts go drifting back many years to early days at convent school; to the varnished wooden desks with their hinged lids, ink wells, glass bottles of ink and fat fountain pens, to lined notebooks (or scribblers) in which we practiced writing our vowels and consonants in a perfect cursive script. My own efforts were anything but perfect of course, and scribbler is an excellent word for the notebooks in which I was beavering away, but I delighted in the texture of the paper, the fragrance of the ink in its little pot, the contentment of holding a plump fountain pen in my hand.

Then there was the magic of books - I learned to read a few years before I went off to convent school, but long before that, I would sit quietly for hours with books, touching the paper, looking at the shapes of the letters on the pages and tracing them with pudgy fingers. I badgered my elders until they finally caved in and taught me to read, and they probably did so just for a little peace and quiet.

Books, words and letters were magical - they were sheer incandescent magic to my child self, and they still are. I often use a fountain pen (and purple or peacock blue ink) for writing letters and cards, although my handwriting is truly appalling in these arthritic elder days, and the passionate delight in books, fonts, deckle edges and fine creamy paper remains. In my next life, I would like very much to be a wandering scribe, a creator of fonts, a paper maker or a book designer, and one of the finest gifts one can bestow on her children or grandchildren (or great grandchildren even) is the love of words and letters.

Written for for the lovely mamas at Mama Says Om.