The Pen Dilemma

I do believe I have more things to write, mark and highlight with than Staples on 611 has for sale!  The day before yesterday, I went through a container of pens that were next to my bed and got rid of several that were dry.....I actually threw them out instead of my usual practice of taking them to the pottery studio for signing in clay, where ink is unnecessary!

Last night I went into my jewelry craft room and to get the container of pens and markers from there to check for "dry" ones that I could throw out....I managed to find three that didn't write, threw those out but am still left with 17 that do (and a dark cherry wood stain repair stick).

Now there's one more container in the sewing room, another hanging in the kitchen on the wall next to where the phone used to be, two under the computer table on the bottom-most shelf and another near where the phone is in the TV room!  And I would dare say, there are pens in lots of other places that I can't recall at the moment...

What, say you, do I have all these pens for?  Especially when, if I need to jot something down, I can never find one?  I just love them.  I love to write, always have, but now most of my writing is done on the computer---no pen needed.  I guess they are a reminder of simpler days:  doodling on paper; penmanship awards in school; outlines and term papers; writing love letters that hardly ever got sent; then writing sad, tearful poems when those loves didn't work out; applying for college; cards and greetings to friends and family by snail mail; trying to balance a check book that defied balancing; taking orders when waitressing to make ends meet in that darn checkbook! ... all the things that went into making my life what it is now.

I won't get rid of the pens that are left until they, too, dry up and run out.  But I will put them in a more accessible place and try to take some time to doodle again.

Oh, the count!  53 things from the studio glaze table, 5 pens that were dry, 8 things from the medicine chest, and one more book!  803 more things left!  I feel 700's in the air.