May 23, 2007

Office Supply Fetish

We all have little things that get us through the day. When I've finished a particularly tiresome project, I like to reward myself. Sometimes (OK, frequently) it's with a bowl of ice cream and an episode or two of "10 Years Younger." If you haven't seen this show, the host puts a frumpy looking woman inside a glass box and asks people on the street to comment on her looks and try to guess her age. After this public humiliation, she is lasered, sanded, buffed, trimmed and tinted so that she looks (you're way ahead of me here) 10 years younger.

Sitting on the couch consuming fat calories wasn't making me look any younger myself, so now I reward myself with another indulgence: office supplies.

Hello, my name is Mary and I'm an addict. It's been 34 days, 3 hours and 16 minutes since I bought my last accordion file.

For people like me, Office Depot is the Promised Land. Aisle upon aisle of binder clips, staple removers and notepads call to us like the Sirens to Ulysses. A clever product, like my brand new highlighter with tiny post-its in the cap, makes my pulse race. Like a fashionista and her Jimmy Choos, I must have one in every color.

My love for office supplies was learned early. One of my favorite toys as a kid was a date stamper and a stack of index cards, with which I played library. I would stamp the cards with the due date and check my books out to myself. I imposed severe fines on myself for overdue books and I would collect the payment in my plastic cash register.

Despite my predilection for stamping and fining, I did not become a librarian. My first job was as a secretary. As a bonus to my typing and filing duties, I was in charge of ordering office supplies, which in those days included carbon paper and typewriter ribbons, and because I was a dreadful typist, a lot of WiteOut as well.

Now that I have confessed my office supply fetish, I'll bet you're wondering how I've kept myself supplied. Did the occasional box of Bics find its way into my briefcase? Were there purloined post-its in my purse? I'm proud to say, because I consider it a test of character, that I have never stolen any office supplies from any of my various employers. In fact, I used to bring supplies from home because it's extremely important to have the perfect pen if one if to perform efficiently and the kind that you order by the gross just won't do.

Now that I'm self-employed, a trip to the office supply store means I get to select any binder, gel pen and mousepad my heart desires. Best of all, they're deductible.

Now if we're through here, I've got to go pick up some tape for my labelmaker and return some overdue library books.