I'm obsessed with a pen

Really, I'm obsessed with a pen.  A few years back a coworker showed me the Pilot Varsity, a disposable fountain pen. Only now did I finally splurge and buy myself a set of three--black, blue, and purple, for $8. It writes differently than a ballpoint, obviously, but not much unlike some modern ballpoint alternatives. And it is clean. There is no leaky splatter I might have expected with a cheap fountain pen. The biggest downside for me is that it bleeds just enough through the page that it might not work for me if I want to write on both sides.

This is a really fun toy for me. I find myself writing pages and pages of gibberish and writing completely random and unnecessary lists, such as all the addresses where I have lived and every school I've attended. I even started thinking about whether to take some time to improve my truly terrible handwriting.

I've been and on-again and off-again journaler throughout my life. I might like to journal with a fountain pen because I enjoy using it so much. But I really don't need to have a paper journal again. All my journaling in recent years has been on a computer. But before I went exclusively digital, I filled a few composition books that are in a closet downstairs, some loose notebook pages that might be in a folder in the bookcase behind me, and some Word files and emails saved as drafts. I don't know if it is good that my journals since 2008 or so have all been in Microsoft OneNote, a very useful program, but one that I don't think has been updated since. (Strike that. There is a new version that I probably wouldn't pay for.)

The fountain pen is a pleasure to write with. It produces a lovely swoosh as it slides along the page and it has an inky smell that modern pens lack. I'm wondering if I should go ahead and write with a dip pen by candlelight to get a more complete retro experience.

Maybe there is a parallel to eating with plastic utensils versus fine silver. A better pen makes writing more enjoyable and makes the experience seem more important.