The Story Behind the Forgotten Stapler

I had just printed a stack of pages and was in search of a stapler.

I found three. Two were so flimsy they couldn’t get through all the pages. One of them was out of staples anyhow. The third one was a lucky find in a box of random office supplies. It was from my earliest tech job.

I smiled and started to think back on what that stapler meant to me. Yes, a lowly stapler, but this one meant business. Much better than the lame plastic ones we had.

On my first day as a tech writer in the pre-internet 1980s, I was shown to my cubicle where a computer terminal, keyboard, phone, pens, pencils and notepads were laid out carefully.

But what caught my attention was the brand new stapler. It was still in the box. It wasn’t fancy but it was big and metal, heavy enough to be a weapon. And they trusted me with it.

The Undeserved Stapler

Now, throughout my career I’ve been supplied with sometimes too many nice tools and supplies. Even new metal staplers still in the box. But that first day of my first tech job was special.

I had just invested a lot of time getting trained in the computer field and had now finally landed a job in it. And here I was being respected enough to be given a brand new in-the-box business-level stapler that might have actually cost about five dollars. It just didn’t seem like something I deserved since I hadn’t proven myself yet.

Certainly, this was silly, but it meant a lot just then. It wasn’t that the stapler itself was so important. In fact, I seldom used it and there were probably 12 of them in the supply cabinet. It was really a symbol of friendship shown me by the staff, many about my age. It meant work stability and a chance to explore and document the coolest tech stuff I was ever allowed to play with. It didn’t even matter that the commute was 120 miles round-trip each day.

Even though that company is no longer around, it played a part in the advancement of computer technology and got me to the next level. And I still have the stapler. Who knew?

We each have our own “stapler” stories. If you include mementos, you probably have many stories. Like that old wedding gift clock that hasn’t worked in 29 years that still sits in its place on the mantel. It’s there because that’s where it’s always been and there’s an important story behind it.

We have many mementos strategically placed around the house and they each have a story behind them. But since we can see them every day, we may not even notice them anymore.

Bringing Back a Story

It’s the things you unexpectedly find that instantly bring back the most interesting memories. I found a jackknife given to all the boys for Christmas by my fifth-grade Sunday School teacher. Probably not a good gift choice anymore. It could be something simple like an episode of Leave It to Beaver that reminds you of something. It’s why we love looking at old family photos where each one can bring back a story.

Whenever my dad showed old family slides to an eager crowd of relatives, any one of them could be expected to elicit a “Well, would you look at that!” or “Oh, my stars, I’d forgotten about that!” Each slide could generate several minutes of stories related to it. This was hard to endure as a sleepy kid who had seen the slides and heard the stories way too many times from old people jacked up on coffee.

Of course, the opposite could happen. You could find things that bring back bad memories. However, these are usually quickly discarded or packed away in the darkest recesses for someone else to deal with after you’re gone.

You’re more likely to discover a box with all the old dishes your mom left you. They had been passed on for generations so you just can’t break the chain. Except that none of your kids want them. Neither do they want what’s left of their baby blankets or teddy bears. So, you save it all for them to find and feel guilty about some day.

It may seem silly to talk about personal trivia. However, these are often the day-brighteners we need. We save them because we hope they will cheer us up when we see them. I wonder if this has any relationship to the proliferation of public storage facilities.

That old stapler did the trick. It punched right through that thick stack of paper.

Now I probably won’t notice it anymore.