Even though I am a writer in the twenty first century with a laptop and Microsoft Word and all the other gadgets and geegaws I still sit down with a blank piece of paper and a pen or pencil when an idea is starting to form in my head. I guess it's conditioning from all those years in school when I was sitting behind a desk trying to express myself with a pen or pencil. I can still picture the scene, thirty kids leaning over their desks, straining to form those letters with big fat pencils clutched in their hands, and a few of them even let the tip of their tongues slip out the corner of their mouths, the ultimate sign of concentration.

Anyone who grew up in the United States and went to school here will probably remember those big fat pencils we used to get when we started our academic careers. I sometimes wonder about that. Our hands were very little so they gave us bigger pencils. Hmmmm. It doesn't really make sense, but somehow it works and really does make writing easier. Now that we are adults we write with skinny pencils clamped in our larger hands.

As I get older and arthritis sets in, I enjoy the fat pens they are making now. Apparently someone who designs pens has been paying attention and remembered those fat pencils from his or her early school days. They really were easier to hold, so why not just make all pencils fat?

We didn't realize it back then, but as trying as our learning experiences were in grade school, they were nothing compared to what we would face later in life. I have days now when I am hunched over my desk, the tip of my tongue straining to get past my lips, clutching my pen or pencil and trying to scratch out something that will sell. There are other days when I don't get to write because life has thrown another pop quiz at me. Sometimes when life is really zinging me with one fast one after another whizzing over the plate, I think back to those early school days and wish just once I could go back and have another of those fat pencil days.

Since time is linear in this domain, and we can't go back, I do the next best thing, when it turns out to be "one of those days," when just hanging on is hard to do, I ask life to give me a fat pencil.

Wil Langford, R. Hy., is a 54 yr. old. Clinical Hypnotherapist, Integrated Energy Therapist, spiritual guide, author, and teacher. His many experiences with psychic phenomena, and mystical experiences led to a lifelong search for answers to the meaning of life. His experiences as a consciousness explorer looking deep into the human mind, tempered by his experiences as a father and therapist have helped to shape his view of the world and the meaning of life. His book, Your Loved Ones, Your Self; Finding and Raising the Family Within" may change your life and you will never look at the world or the people in it the same way again.