Parker 135 (3x45). Leitz Summicron 50mm DR.

It's been a long while since posting, but I have not been idle.  I was given the Rolled Gold Parker 45 in the middle as a gift in 1971 by somebody who could ill afford it.  This pen has followed me through life: high school, undergraduate and graduate schools, letters home before computers took all the charm out of letter-writing, and most recently, writing cheques and condolence letters.  It's been quite a journey.  There’s not much left of the original pen save the gold cap.  The original barrel cracked years ago from some abuse, and was replaced.  I’ve burned through three or four nibs, and the original ink cartridges were replaced by converters to suck up the ink of choice from the bottle.  Recently, I went on line looking for a new bottle of ink, and in the process opened Pandora’s Box.  I found a website selling spare parts for fountain pens.  For the princely sum of $8 the vendor was offering the matching rolled gold barrel for my pen.  What are the chances?!  So the pen got an upgrade and facelift.  In my window shopping, I discovered that Parker 45s, never an expensive pen, and produced in various colors and finishes in great numbers, are easily available and don’t cost an arm and a leg.  They are definitely the poor relative to the fabulous Nouveau Watermans and Montblanc Meisterstukke. My hands were tied.  The green one on the right was bought in bits and pieces of new-old stock from the 70s. This is essentially a brand-new pen disinterred 50 years later.  I bought a bottle of Montblanc Toffee Brown ink with which to fill it.  On another site I found the Harlequin pattern 45 from the 80s.  Since I already had the matching Harlequin 45 fiber tip pen, it seemed fitting to snap up the fountain pen.  There’s a world of ink out there.  Not surprisingly, Japanese people like writing with beautiful pens and they produce the most wonderful palette of ink colors sold in exquisite bottles.  The Harlequin 45 has Pilot Persimmon ink for a little pick-me-up.

One of my current projects is writing down some thoughts on little two-foot Narrow Gauge railways, and their charm and usefulness in years past.  I thought it would be nice to write it by hand, the old-fashioned way.  In fact, I have found that, for me, there is a much more direct connection from brain to hand than there is when typing.  The thoughts and words just flow.