I’ve always become interested in how people form and maintain habits.

A good friend of mine picked up walking some months back, in an attempt to curb a vaping habit that had grown out of control with the stresses of fatherhood. Walking has since been upgraded to jogging, the amount of FAT COTTON he rips is at a minimum, and he’s lost some significant weight. I’m super proud of him.

I, meanwhile, dropped Magic: the Gathering cold turkey, and the only replacement I’d had until recently is a sweet double dose of Imposter Syndrome regarding my field of study and anxiety that I’d never go anywhere in said field. That sure hasn’t gone away, but at least now I can stop thinking about it for a second and look at some sweet pens. Fountain pens, to be precise. Get your Bic Crystals out of here; it’s real writing instrument hours now.

That’s a joke, of course. I can’t begrudge you for going out and getting a 120-pack of ballpoints for $12. There’s a reason ballpoints run the writing market; they’re cheap to make and they do the job. Hell, there was a time when I thought the Pilot G2 was the best pen ever (in my defense, the G2 is a gel pen, and reviews back me up as to its quality). A friend had traded some cards for a Lamy 2000, which was neat, but not an expense I could justify, even when I was willing to pay an even higher premium for a particular piece of cardboard. Eventually, I did some research into less expensive fountain pens and settled on the budget-conscious but universally-praised Pilot Metropolitan for a nice note-taking pen. I filled it with Diamine Oxblood ink (my favorite ink to this day) and figured it’d be the only pen of its kind I’d ever need or want.

That picture is from tonight. The two leftmost pens were handed to me yesterday. I may have dropped the play of Magic, but I sure haven’t kicked that collector’s impulse. At least I can make a case for the utility of the pens, an argument that didn’t really fly for Magic cards even when I was selling them. They write wonderfully, are fun to use, and are pretty easy to take care of. I know another one is coming up as a future gift, and I’m hyped for it. When I get it, I’ll probably grab some nice paper, ink it up with something neat, and make a quick writing sample to test it out, because using fountain pens has also taught me the value of good-feeling paper and the fun of inks beyond standard blues and blacks. It’ll join the collection, and like my other pens, I’ll find any excuse to write with it.

And with that, we go back to habits. Changing my preferred tool for writing made me want to write more. Wanting to write more has led to me making a daily to-do list, something my ADD brain would never have allowed me to keep up with without the fun of writing with fountain pens. I now have notebooks immediately available on my desk, ready to quickly jot down an idea, even if that idea is occasionally just “Robert Oster Blue Water Ice looks amazing and I need a bottle of it” written in Robert Oster Blue Water Ice. Having a written record, even with miscellaneous silliness added, helps me to remember to actually do things, instead of sitting on the couch, wondering if there is anything to do. The big thing to do currently? Make sure these Jinhao Sharks my friend and I picked up as presents make it to our tabletop friends. They’re not the most expensive pens, to be sure, but they’re something we really enjoy, and we hope they can enjoy them too. At worst, they got a neat novelty shark pen. At best, we drag someone else into the fountain pen rabbit hole with us. They’re really fun tools, and having another person to chat with about them would be great.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be chuckling at the price of the Lamy 2000 while trying not to impulse buy a Vanishing Point or this Edison Ascent that is definitely my aesthetic.