A Tribute upon the Death of my Inkpen

I imagine that most of you may not share my obsession with ink pens. Then again, I imagine that perhaps I may imagine wrongly.

My common grade BIC ball point ran out of ink this morning in the middle of a sentence. I wouldn't have thought much of it except...

I've been using this pen to take notes in my notebook, notes on the books I've been reading mostly, and occasionally notes on ideas that come to me in response to my readings. I've also been using it to take notes in a separate notebook on my Bible reading. I grip the pen too tightly. It bruises my fingers. I press down too hard with its point. It imprints the paper. I realize as I write with it that I actually love the smell of this ink, that part of the pleasure of writing is the pleasure of putting ink down on paper, not just the compositional aspect of writing, but the physical experience of writing. When the ballpoint runs out of ink I have to switch to a Pilot rolling ball pen. It is not the same.

Now here's a curious observation. The two notebooks I've been using for my book notes work better when using a cheap ball point pen. I have a smaller notebook, a more portable one, that I use for meetings and planning and such. It works better with the Pilot roller ball. By works better, I mean the ink looks and feels better going on the page.

I very much dislike using this roller ball in my spiral bound book note notebook. For some reason this causes me to enjoy the writing experience less, my wrist (because I write as though I were a left-handed person even though I write with my right hand) runs into the spirals more, and form fails to follow function.

I may have to find another pen.