By Killian O’Boyle
Yesterday it was reported that second-year college attender Alfred Doink upon passing an Eason’s shop window and witnessing the various sale percentages presented on the promotional back-to-school poster, felt absolutely nothing. “Usually, I would think Oh I’m out of green pens this would be a good time to stock up or something along those lines, but this time I felt a great emptiness inside me. Like time is this force that marches on forever and as my life progresses, the once small moments in life that brought joy now barely eke out a millimetre of serotonin. Yet that won’t stop me chasing the idealised high that only exists within my memory. I guess that’s how I feel about the stationary sale.”
Responding to Doink’s comments on the sale, Eason’s head of marketing Lacey Greenbottom wanted to assure Doink and other customers that the percentages present on the promotional image for the sale is as good as it gets in the stationary world. “A 15% mark down on all stationary products before a school semester is a wonderful thing that should bring joy. At least, it brought me joy to design the poster and add the various sale percentages, because it gave me something to do at work. It gave me a purpose and a goal that I could complete within a day or two and then I rode that feeling of completion until I got a call to do this interview, which depending on how it goes, will give me a feeling of completion that I can ride until next Tuesday or so. Joy is not an achievable end goal or even an obtainable state of mind, it is a passing wind that is as contemptible and fickle as the weather.”
However, Eason’s has come under fire in recent years for the use of plastics in their disposable pens, with some saying that this ongoing sale could cause significant damage to the environment if the public isn’t informed on how damaging improperly discarded pens could be. “The problem is that pens are such a part of day-to-day life that it’s hard to imagine a world without them” said a spokesperson for the Zero Waste Alliance. “But let me ask you this: How many of you have feared something about the future, only for it to come true so gradually that you didn’t even notice? Yes, it’s hard to imagine a world without creature comforts, but most people’s comforts will gradually erode anyway so why do we hold on so tightly? If a younger version of yourself looked through your current eyes, would they even think they’re within the same body? I might talk a big game about the environment, but I will also grow old and attempt to insulate myself from this harsh world in whatever cocoon feels more comfortable. It is as inevitable as a back-to-school stationery sale.”