Ballpoint Pens and Life Lessons

I don't know exactly how many it took. I know there were 11 at the start, but I didn't write with all of them. At least 3 of them went MIA, all of which I searched for, for what were surely unreasonable amounts of time. Even this one managed to get ghost a few times. I do know that I set this goal about two years ago. It took much longer than I anticipated, but after months of class notes, creative writing, and various lists (all covered in ridiculous amounts of doodles) I finally came to the end of a pen. Mission accomplished.

I know it doesn't seem like much to get excited about, and I shouldn't make it more than it really is, but the process of writing a pen to it's death spoke volumes about perseverance. Oh, how many times did I want to buy new pens because the looked so awesome. And how many times I almost didn't look for a lost pen because I thought I would never find it. It also gave me some insight into the "journey vs. destination" discussion. I'll take the "journey" side of the argument, but that doesn't make the destination any less awesome. Life lessons learned from a ballpoint pen that's worth about $0.12. Ain't that something?

Doodles with notes

Doodles

Geometric doodle.

More doodles.

Even more doodles.

At this point, just lines on a page to use up ink.

The Bic Cristal with an empty barrel. Success!

The final strokes while I was working on a poem.

The pictures above show only a fraction of a fraction of all the writing and drawing that pen went through. I must say, I am very proud of myself. I've already started on the next pen. This time I intend to kill it off with more words than doodles.

50 points for reading, even though it's short and I usually don't give points for short blogs. Have an extra 100 if you've emptied a pen, another 30 if it was a Bic Cristal, and 500 if you have pictures.

JOSH, THE SHERM