Thinking Outside the Pencil Box – PPC

The Disappearing Pencil Box

I was browsing my Google Alerts for pencil-related news tidbits when this article by Ed Flynn at NorthJersey.com caught my eye. In it, Mr. Flynn discusses the changing landscape of school supplies and, specifically, the disappearance of the pencil box.

This disappearance has me all nostalgic. No more pencil boxes? Say it isn’t so!

I don’t need to tell you the importance of the pencil – after all, you’re reading a blog solely dedicated to those miracles of graphite. But for me, a pencil box holds a special place in my heart and in my memories of elementary school.

In the hierarchy of school supplies, pencil boxes held a special place near the top of the heap for myself and my elementary school classmates. Sure we all compared Lisa Frank Trapper-Keepers on our first day of class, each of us trying to out-neon, out-glitter and out-unicorn each other. And the wackier the pencil, the better – I doubt that my childhood self would be impressed with the severity, sleekness and superiority of a Blackwing. No, the pencils we wanted were glittery, came with erasers shaped like animals and left bright streaks on our paper, and bound in colors not found in nature.

But the real trend-setting began not with a mere pencil or binder – coolness was decided on the quality of one’s pencil case.

Canvas pouches that snapped in our binders were functional, durable, and saved space. Needless to say, they appealed to exactly none of us. There were holographic cardboard pencil boxes for sale at the student store, covered with cartoon characters entirely unfamiliar to those of us who watched Saturday morning cartoons (I always wondered where those mysterious boxes came from). And there were, of course, pencil boxes covered with characters from popular movies, more mainstream cartoons, and pop groups (for my older cousins, many hours were spent debating who was the cutest New Kid On the Block, and those pencil cases were often called in as evidence).

However, the top of the heap among my friends and I were Hello Kitty pencil boxes. Often bright pink or bright blue transparent plastic, Hello Kitty pencil boxes were distinguished by there adorable, tiny locks that held each of them shut. The lack of logic inherent in these boxes were completely lost on us – if something were so valuable that it needed to be locked away, chances were leaving it in a highly portable, easily concealed pencil box would not deter potential thieves. But it didn’t matter; those pencil boxes were the ne plus ultra of cute to our fifth grade selves, and when a dear friend gifted me with one for my birthday, it felt like I had been granted entry into a special club, in a way that you can only feel when you’re eleven.

I’m hopeful that pencil boxes still remain part of the American school-child’s school supply inventory, because you never can tell what will serve as a memory of a bygone-era of innocence and silliness as the years go by. iPads won’t do it, and I doubt that many people will save their old smartphones as a testament to childhood. But I still have that Hello Kitty pencil box tucked away in a box of childhood mementos, if for no other reason than to remind me of a the days when everything, even a pencil, was precious.