WRITE OF PASSAGE

Let’s just gloss over the fact that my blog-writing has tapered off. To say the least!

But here I am again and all set to talk about rites and writing. Prompted by some discussion of pens here and by a promise (yes, it IS a promise, Ms Scarlet!) by the talented Scarlet to post about her various pens.

It seems that there still some of us who are a bit fussy about our writing implements.Me, I can scrawl a grocery list with any old pen that comes to hand. But I do like a good pen.

I grew up in the days when penmanship was still taught in schools and until we were about 10 years old all our school lessons were written in pencil. My carpenter father made me a lovely wooden pencil case .And he taught me to sharpen pencils with either a pen knife or a chisel.Since knives were verboten at school I always sharpened my pencils at home.

And our first pens? Oh, dear! Those ghastly “school nibs” that splayed quicker than a bandy-legged jockey. And the school ink – arrgh! I think it came in big drums and was watered-down by the teachers who then chose well-behaved children to be “ink monitors” to fill the porcelain ink wells at each desk.No, I was never an ink monitor.

But I’d been given some money for Christmas or birthday and I added some of my savings to buy my first fountain pen. It came with a matching propelling pencil, in a leatherette case.. Of course, I promptly took it to school. And was just as promptly told I was not to use it in class.

At about this time, Mr. Biro’s invention had caught on and ball-points were being produced in mass quantity and their price came down. Sadly, so did quality and I never had one that didn’t go all blobby.

I don’t recall what brand my father used, but my mother’s pen was an Osmiroid and woe betide anyone who borrowed it! Over the next few years I owned several different pens, but the beloved Waterman was a favourite. A pricey pen for a kid;I think an uncle gave me his old one.

Spin the time machine forward some 50 years … for drawing I generally use a Staedtler Lumocolor or a ZIG or something similar. And I bought myself a Lamy Safari a couple of years ago! A cartridge style, I wanted to use various inks so  I bought a converter to enable that. These days, I find that my old fingers don’t do very well with skinny pens and the Safari is nice and chunky.

And did you know (I didn’t!) that Lamy developed it for German school use.

I used to have some good calligraphy nibs, but gave most of them to a friend when I left London. These old fingers will not be doing any more fancy writing.Mind you, I wouldn’t mind something like this! http://walyou.com/montblanc-steampunk-pens/

The Great Disposal of Old Stuff continues. With The Man no longer working full time we’ve embarked on re-painting the house. Well, he’s done all the hard work. I poured the wine! The walls (you’re dying to know, I can tell!) are a lovely sunny yellow. A little like Dulux Dandelion, but the shade changes with the shadows.

Work about to begin in the living room… old paint was a pale primrose.

 

In this, if you squint beyond  Geiger, resident ladderologist, you can see the original, pale yellow, with the new , brighter yellow.

 

And this is looking along the passage.See what I mean about the shifting shade!

Gradually, things are going back in place and some of the artwork is back on the walls. These are prints by a blogging friend http://havedogswilltravel.blogspot.com.au/  although she seems to be non-blogging these days. More will follow when we’ve re-wired some frames.

 

 

This blogging lark is thirsty work! But before I address that, here’s a natty bit of promotion…it is not my birthday, but the optician sent this as a reminder that I’m due for a test…