After a long break and after all the fountain pens that I once fancied have come to be preserved as exhibits to the sundry visitors to the heritage house where I still stay because I could never afford a more shining accomodation in the flourishing parts of the city, I suddenly realized that a lot of time has passed and the world has changed immeasurably and perhaps irretrievably from the one that I inherited from my grandfather and father.
Pens, fountain pens that is, have become a tool of the past. Inkpots have disappeared from the stationary shops. Sulekha has perhaps become Sublog. I still cherish the innumerable occasions when I would sit and practise handwriting. Ball Points were a taboo and the sight of it would make the English and Hindi teacher write a serious note to my parents enumerating the indiscipline that has been displayed.
Now I do not even use a ball point. Not a Gel. I use the keyboard to express the beautiful thoughts in suitably impressive words. From a three-finger exercise it has become a ten-finger exercise that does not attract the ire of the disciplinarian.
