The Black Pen

As Numenius mentioned, we were in Portland this weekend. We found out after we’d booked tickets that the Portland Pen Show was going to be taking place while we were there. I’m not a pen collector, as such, not the kind that goes looking at the condition of bakelite through a lupe, but I always like a pen that works well.

This one called me from across the room. It was, it is, a Pen With Attitude. It was made in 1910 or thereabouts, hard rubber, but it was the nib that caught me by the jugular, a flexible italic. A contradiction in terms. A hybrid, a bastard.

I started to make lines with it. No, it said, not like that, like this. I want to do more loops, because I’m half copperplate. I felt wrenched by the power of this thing, unworthy to wield it, unable to stop.

Both Dale and the young Canadian red-haired man who was trying to sell me this pen with me were sort of in shock at what was going on. I’m afraid I was oblivious. I said anything, didn’t let the pen from my hand, kept caressing the paper with these lines from Somewhere Else.

I didn’t buy the pen. I have no business paying $125 for a pen, not when I have others in my drawers I hardly ever use. I went out for a cup of tea and came back, almost buying a lesser Levenger item.

But not.

The next day, after that damn thing had yakked at me all night, the insistent patter or scolding or seduction hollering or whispering, we went back.

I now own this pen. Or it owns me. I’ll let you know. Thanks to Dale and Susan (and Masha and Erik) for insisting I go back. I’d have regretted this one if I’d passed it up…