the Pen

OK, back to minimalism. The disposable pen is one of those everyday things we take totally for granted and give no thought whatsoever to a low arc toss into the wastebin. Recently the BIC company announced the sale of their 100 billionth disposable pen. First introduced after the final days of WWII, the early pens replaced fountain tips which were very messy. The appeal of the disposable pen became universal and the entire world quickly adopted it as the new standard in writing instrument, no more ink bottles or spills to clean up, just a simple plastic tube with an ink barrel that no one gave a shit about and threw away when no longer useful. This success inspired BIC - and many other company's, to reconsider the needs of daily life and quickly produced disposable razors and lighters, setting off a "disposable revolution" of sorts.

100 billion pens. Every single one destined to be thrown into the trash.

I went looking for a refillable pen after this announcement and I have to admit, I had a hard time finding an alternative. Ball point pens are hardy creatures, reliable and dependable with few faults. I got quality ballpoints and reloaded them with new ink barrels, but admittedly after three or so refills I just dropped them in a drawer. I decided to go for the old school fountain pen because they have a quality that inspires good penmanship. There were a lot of options I found, but these pens are more for symbolism, given as gifts to bankers and the like who would use it to authorize a big money deal - not for daily use. I found a good many prohibitively expensive pens and few modestly priced calligraphy type pens, but they both had the same disposable ink cartridge that held a limited reservoir of ink.

In the end I went with a pen that I found kicking around the house. Years ago I picked up a set of drafting pens from somewhere and they turned out to be the perfect pen. Large ink reservoir that can be easily refilled from a bottle and since it was designed for production work they are easy to clean and maintain. I am still apprehensive about throwing it heedlessly into a backpack, but for daily use it has totally replaced ballpoint pens in my life. Frankly, with computers there is little use for pens, so why even bother with disposables?

Moral: If its made to be thrown away, how much can it be worth?