September 08, 2005

the perfection of pencils

I love pencils, I prefer them over pens and have begun to collect various different ones. All those that can be sharpened of course, none of this mechanical bullshit, although they do have a nice tip. I have a black round one and triangular shaped yellow ones, one with a black eraser that says “Xtreme rollerbladin” and one the says “happy birthday” as that is one of my favorite phrases. I made a list in class the other day of the reasons I love pencils. This list included but is not limited to the following ideas. The vulnerability of being erased. The old fashioned-ness of writing on paper, rather then typing. The organic sense of using parts of our breathing system (trees) to communicate, to me writing is like another sense of breathing. Not having the messiness of ink. If you write on the back of a piece of paper you already wrote on it goes through to the next page of your note book. Its like an imprint that you were there and you were writing. How the dullness can be so easily rejuvenated which a quick sharpen. I like to bite them and the wood is so impressionable, almost naïve. The loss as you sharpen and how your good friend begins to dwindle. At the same time however the comfortable of a short pencil that has written many things and withheld the test of time versus a new pencil with length and perfection. The phallic-ness of it all (of course this could be the sole reason) it reminds me of writing old letters and the kind of people that wrote them. The satisfaction of a perfectly sharpened point, I always have at least two perfectly sharpened pencils in my back pack for school, I sharpen them the night before. The way that the wear down of the lead affects your penmanship whether good or bad. I guess I have become some kind of pencil romantic but I really recommend breaking out a good old No. 2 and giving the fellow a try, you wont be disappointed, ok I guess I wouldnt be disappointed.

2 comments:

Cooper said...

I'm going to reconstitute some of my older much maligned number two men right now.

Doug The Una said...

And don't forget the smell of the shavings.