#42. An Interlude

This isn’t a prompt. In fact this isn’t even an attempt at a prompt. At the moment I’m not in any fit state to write any of my prompts. You see, I’ve lost my pen. Until this day, I never knew the lengths I would go to for a pen, but I’ve pulled up furniture, rooted through bins, and driven to a bus stop the next town over to look for it.

Now most people are probably thinking, ‘It’s a pen. It’s not a big deal. You can buy a pack of six for a £1 in a shop.’ The thing is, this pen was not just any pen. It was a Sheaffer fountain pen, a pretty decent quality one as well. It was one of those that had an adaptor so you could use both cartridges and bottles of ink with it. I have about 10 different colours of ink for it actually. It’s kind of a problem.

It’s not the fact that it’s one of the few pens I own that doesn’t make my handwriting look like chicken scratch, or makes my hand hurt after 5 minutes. As a dyspraxic with poor motor control, finding a pen that works well for me is a difficult process. Usually once I find a pen that I like I tend to stick with it. This pen was the easiest pen I’ve ever used.

It’s not just the fact that I’m a writer, and how am I supposed to write if I don’t have the tools to write with. I still like to hand write all my drafts out, and without a decent usable pen, it’s going to be very difficult. I’m already stressing about all the blog posts I

It’s not even that it’s gonna be very expensive for me to replace it, because it will be. I was actually looking for one to replace it with, so I could retire it to a box on my shelf, and have a newer, less sentimental one, for me to take with me everywhere. And therein lies the crux of the matter.

This pen has sentimental value. A lot of it. It was the first proper fountain pen I ever owned, and my grandparents bought me it for my 18th birthday. As an aspiring writer all I wanted was a good pen. I remember them taking me with them, because they explained to me that I had to find a pen that fit well for me. I remember trying out all these different pens, testing out the weight, the balance, the grip, the way they felt to write with.

I remember spending that time with them, while they patiently let me test out the ones I liked the look of. They even explained to me how once I started using that pen that the nib would adapt to my writing style. How I shouldn’t let anyone else use it as it would damage the nib. In fact, I actually lost it once before and luckily a friend found it. He told me it was crap because it wouldn’t write for him. It was so adapted to my style of handwriting that it just didn’t work at all for him.

Maybe this pen will turn up. I’m really hoping it does. And if it does then I’m buying myself a replacement and leaving that in a safe place. It can keep it’s sentimental value somewhere I’m far less likely to lose it.

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