Is it possible to be both fiercely opinionated and terribly indecisive? If there lays a tension between the two then I am a permanent resident. I tend to speak with the forcefulness of a pen and the timidity of a pencil, adding endless caveats and disclaimers to robustly dogmatic statements.
My parents couldn’t put their finger on it. I wasn’t a defiant child in the traditional sense-lazy August school days weren’t jolted awake by some catastrophic temper tantrum, and punishment was received with nary a quivering lip or a spiteful word. Well, if I’m being honest, punishment was only “received” in the sense that I calmly listened to the information given and calculated a point-by-point rebuttal to the argument.
Every year in my town, we had a Christmas parade, revered with the same sort of awe as the Ice Cream Social that Anne was invited to attend within her first few weeks of staying at Green Gables. Alas, Anne was thought to have stolen Marilla’s brooch and I had definitely been on the computer after I was told to get off. Although Anne’s dismay at being banned from the social was legitimate, since Marilla had misplaced her own brooch, and my disgruntlement had no logical foundation, I viewed our causes as one, mourning with Anne over the injustice of being disallowed from attending what was sure to be the highlight of the social calendar. I carefully made my argument, practiced a few times in the mirror, and then went in with the same impassioned sense of justice of Esther (or so I thought), valiantly facing my heinous opponent and pummeling her judgment with my wisely crafted argumentation. My mother was no match for this finesse, and, purely borne of her own confusion in light of my articulate rebuttal, she allowed me to attend.
So it is with the pen. Ink dries and cements thought in an emphatic statement that leaves no room for questioning. Inwardly quivering with the faint whisper of lead, I march forward and leave the inerasable thought on paper, daring anyone to question its authority. Like the crazy street-corner preacher who alienates more than he heals, I’d rather die with a hoarse voice than an unused one.
But still it seems that pens are best used for copying. Perhaps it is ironic that I type such a strong statement and print it with ink, but the heart behind it is the same. Allow the thought to be written by pencil, edited with the wisdom of those above and before, scratched out in light of new experiences, and finally submitted with pen only when it has been scrutinized and deemed worthy of such eternality. Rather than reaching first for the pen and writing my life with a certainty that will inevitably be scratched out, edited, or rearranged, I must hold loosely to my writing instrument, recognizing that my Author wields the ultimate Pen.
catchingsomestars 