It is a dark world out there. A state of war, each against each. You are all alone. It is mere penarchy.
Despite all our progress as a species, despite our eminent legal institutions and our many esteemed documents banning torture, protecting free speech, prohibiting the wearing of a fake moustache in church if it makes people laugh (Alabama), when it comes to possession of writing implements the only rule is that there are no rules. We are no better than the beasts.
The Trib office sucks up my pens. I come with three and leave with none. It is only a room, with four walls, and I imagine that if I’m losing pens it means someone else is gaining pens. I also know that whenever I see a pen lying around unguarded, especially if it’s a clicky-top that is satisfyingly smooth, I take a quick scan around the room and go in for the kill. I feel like an early hominid stealing a rival’s woman when he is out on a hunt. I’m prepared to defend myself with force, if necessary.
The banks have the right idea, as they so often do. Most chain their pens to the counter, recognizing their value and wishing to avoid the lawlessness of the streets and the Tribune office. Thomas Hobbes, the political theorist who originally conceived the idea of an primordial, pre-legal state of nature as a state of war, and famously described life in it as “nasty, poor, brutish, and short,” saw very clearly what this means. Responding to a hypothetical person unsympathetic to his description of the lawless state of nature, Hobbes wrote in Leviathan: “Let him therefore consider with himself … when going to sleep he locks his doors; when even in his house he locks his chests.” Hobbes is unclear as to whether he believes these behaviours indicate that we are still to some extent living in a state of war. I wonder whether he had any anxieties regarding the security of his quill.
Showing up for class without a pen, especially at a school as competitive as McGill, is like showing up for battle without your sword. You ask a fellow to borrow his spare and he looks at you warily. He assumes he will never see it again. You promise he will. And then you forget—honestly, you tell yourself later. It totally escaped your mind.
A recent mass clean of the Tribune office turned up scores of dusty pens, under couches and between cushions. I’m told this disproves my penarchy theory. I remain dubious. Pens are never found precisely where you left them. There are dark forces at work here, and they do not discriminate, clicky-top or no.
