School Supplies and "You've Got Mail"

Quotage:

Don't you love New York in the fall? Makes me want to buy school supplies. I would send you a bouquet of newly-sharpened pencils if I knew your name and address. (from the beginning of You've Got Mail)

For my 21st birthday, I received precisely two gifts from my sister (or, at least, I think it was just two; I could be forgetting one). One was a fantasy-themed trashy romance novel (of which I have not gotten past page two to this day, and my 21st was a considerable time ago), in response to an ongoing inside joke we have. The other was a beautiful bouquet of newly-sharpened pencils. And it was one of the best gifts I've ever been given.

I adore You've Got Mail. It was released when I was in elementary school, and Mom fell in love with it, and like dominoes, my sister and I fell for it too. I remember standing in line for lunch one day, talking to Jeremy, a classmate, who had started talking about something related to The Godfather. After he was done talking, I looked at him and said, without a trace of silliness, "What is it with men and 'The Godfather'?" That's what the movie meant to me.

As the years have gone on, I've grown to appreciate it for more and very different reasons. It's not just that I can understand and fully appreciate the 'adultishness' of it now, but what understanding of it I had transcended itself naturally as I grew. The movie was put out at a time when the internet was just beginning to take hold. There's Frank, with his three typewriters, who is yet distrustful of computers and what they have to offer. The common form of social networking was strictly chat rooms and email. The depiction of New York City is lovely; whenever I get to visit NYC, I hope it to be as magical and bustling as what I've watched over and over on screen. And I have to visit it in the fall. That is a must--at least for the first time, anyway.

The moments of beauty that one might miss, like Kathleen talking about twirling, the butterfly on the subway, the emotion and the honesty of each of the exchanged emails, the arrangement of Joe's family, Joe's time spent in a broken elevator, the shot of Kathleen preparing to go to the mattresses, the caviar garnish, twinkle-lights, the music...it almost comes to a point where there are so many things with which I'm overcome with adoration that I lose my words.

And then there's the bookishness of it all. References to Betsy and Tacy, Ballet Shoes, and Pride and Prejudice...and don't even get me started on The Shop Around the Corner.

My personal bouquet of newly-sharpened pencils currently sits on my desk under my bulletin board. As pictured above, it's framed by two illustrations Heidi gave me from her sketchbook and the Macbeth finger puppets I bought in Stratford-Upon-Avon. The gift itself may seem strange to some people, and I get that: who are you to just sharpen pencils and never use them? That's such a waste.

It's something deeper than that, though. It's the magic of Kathleen's and Joe's relationship, the way it's constructed, the purity of it, the fact that words themselves are the energy driving their lives, both literally and figuratively. The simple things, the beauty of the idea. The creation from something so everyday. Little things that tie people together, whether it be a story of a butterfly on the subway, or the daily endeavors of one Brinkley.

But also, and most importantly, the gift surpasses the meaning the movie has for me. I look at it daily and think of my sister: our shared love for the movie, our mutual adoration for the idea of a bouquet made entirely of school supplies. Our childhood and the memories which we share and differ. Sisterly love and understanding. A bond. In a way, she gave me a piece of us, as cliche as that sounds. That bouquet will always represent that for me. And it will always be just in sight, the first thing I see in the morning, the last thing I see before I sleep.