Member-only story
Paperweights: Unseen Helpers in the Office Workspace
Like many other things, we forgot these, too.
For non-members — link
Today, I surprisingly found a paperweight sitting on one of my colleagues’ tables. I went to her and enquired about it. I took that in hand and just checked it.
The same oval shape, a glass one, made with colourful designs inside and a flat base at down side.
She laughed, and she, too, had no idea where she got it from. She said that while searching for old documents, the peon brought it to her along with the old documents.
As a kid, I saw it at a clinic, our family doctor’s place. That was some 30 years back. Our Doc used to have 3–4 paperweights on his table, safeguarding the prescription pad, medical reports from the ceiling fan.
I still remember that family doc’s way of speaking to my parents about my illness, taking that oval paperweight in his one hand and swirling it, while talking to us.
Then times changed, and the paperweights too changed. They used to come in different shapes — square, triangular, and a few with the shape of logos of various pharma products.
That gave paperweights another important task of branding while still doing their primary job as a paperweight.
