Roadblock II
Restored in October 2026 from a 2003 copy of the original PenBase page saved by the Wayback Machine; Pentrace’s own database copy had been cut short.
Of course, I knew that. Anita and I have been friends for ages. In fact, I can trace the beginning of our friendship back to the year Dora Clarence moved to town and began to teach art at the high school.
Dora had come here from Wyoming, her widowed mother in tow. Within a couple of months of their arrival, they’d bought the old farm house where Anita now lives. They renovated it and moved in within the year. Soon thereafter, they rented a small storefront in town, not far from where they’d lived when they first arrived. Dora claimed her mother had always wanted to run an art gallery, so they opened one in the storefront, and it quickly became the town’s only cultural center, which it still is to this day (though it’s now run by a consortium of local residents who hire a different manager every time I sneeze).
It was at the gallery’s official opening that Anita and I had our first real conversation. We discovered that we had something significant in common: neither of us knew or cared a whit about modern art.
I had come to the opening because it was good for business to be seen at public functions. Not that there was any competition for us to worry about. My husband, who was twenty years older than I, had recently suffered a minor stroke, and I knew that I’d have to run the business someday soon. Even if he never suffered another, which turned out not to be the case, he was no already no longer able to endure the rigors of running the business. I’d left him in the care of a nurse, and I felt guilty for having abandoned him but relieved to be out on my own instead of stuck in the house with him. I had never tried to verbalize my ambivalence, but I found myself talking about it to Anita that evening. She seemed to have no trouble understanding mixed feelings.
“Just because you need some time away from your husband doesn’t make you a bad wife,” she said firmly but kindly. You have obviously been taking care of him and are distressed by his suffering. But you are also a person in your own right.”
“What a novel idea!” I mumbled, then smiled when I caught her looking at me quizzically. “And you?” I continued quickly, “why are you here? Are you a modern art aficionado?”
She smiled. “I wonder if that ought to be aficionada. But no, I have little interest in modern art and even less knowledge. I am one of Dora’s colleagues at the high school, and she invited the entire faculty and staff. It would have been rude not to put in an appearance.”
“I know you and Dora teach at the high school,” I replied, “but I don’t see too many other faculty members here, do you?”
She flushed brightly. Only a handful of teachers were present and even fewer non-teaching staff. “I am not,” she said softly, “responsible for the manners or lack of manners exhibited by my colleagues.”
I felt a twinge of remorse for having baited her, but it was brief. Dora and her mother approached us, and Anita began to make appreciative noises about the lay-out of the gallery and the artistry with which the pieces were displayed. Ah well, I thought, at least she’s not talking about the art works themselves. I chuckled and made my way to the table full of drinks and a small assortment of hors d’oeuvres.
A short time later (though it felt like an eternity), Anita approached me and invited me to call her if I wished to take a break from the travails of nursing my disabled and increasingly more irascible husband. “I’m in town during the week, of course,” she explained needlessly. “My classes run only until two in the afternoon, so we might meet for coffee or for a walk, weather permitting.”
I was touched by her offer, but I never took her up on it until my husband recovered enough to return to work part-time. Two years later, he suffered another stroke from which he didn’t not recover, but by that time, Dora’s mother Alexandra had passed away and Anita restricted her social life, such as it was, to being the primary consoler and emotional support for Dora.
Anita had been at Dora’s side from the moment Dora was notified at school that Alexandra had been rushed to the hospital. I attended the funeral, of course. It was clear that Alexandra’s passing had come as a shock to Dora and that she was relying greatly on Anita. I was not aware that they had become such close friends, so I was rather surprised when I phoned Anita at the number she’d given me and found a message directing me to call her at Dora’s. When I reached her there, she invited me to dinner out at the farmhouse. I accepted and found that she had all but moved in. That took another six months and she’d lived there ever since, first together with Dora in a surprisingly amicable way, given that they were both extremely opinionated, and later alone, after Dora had died.
Yes indeed, Anita and I were old friends. I looked at her across the small, round, café table. Her expression was rather blank. Clearly her mind was occupied elsewhere. I cleared my throat and she made eye contact just as the tea and cookie arrived.
“Will there be anything else, ladies?” Patricia twittered brightly.
“No,” I replied, before Anita could get a word in. “We’ll take our check though, as soon as you have a moment.”
Patricia simply nodded and walked away. I felt Anita’s eyes on my face. “Now what,” she asked finally, “is it that you wanted to talk about so urgently?” She stirred the steaming cup of tea that she’d just poured for herself.
I stared at her hand for a second. “Why in heaven’s name are you stirring your tea?” I demanded. “You haven’t added sugar or cream.”
She laughed. “You always ask me that, Marian. And I always answer the same way. I am stirring it to cool it.”
“Ridiculous!” I grumbled. “If you wanted cold tea you should have ordered it iced.”
“I don’t want to burn my mouth,” she said calmly. “And you’d better pour your tea before it becomes too bitter to drink.”
“I like it strong,” I retorted. “Tea should not be the color of dishwater.”
“Nor the color of coal,” she insisted.
I knew she was right, so I poured.
“Well?” Anita intoned as I bit into my cookie. It tasted extremely good, fresh and flavorful, so I chewed the mouthful appreciatively and at great length before I swallowed. Then I replied, “A very deep subject.”
Anita groaned. “Marian…”
“Very well,” I said. “I won’t make you suffer.” I grinned at her, then reached into my purse, saying, “I bought myself a fountain pen and two bottles of ink.”
I extracted my pen and held it out to her. She took it, glanced at it, and handed it back to me.
To say I was disappointed was an understatement. I don’t know what sort of reaction I’d expected, but I certainly had expected something.
“What’s the matter?” Anita demanded. “Did you find a bug in your cookie?”
“You’ve been pestering me for ages to use a fountain pen,” I complained. “Is indifference the best reaction you can summon up?”
Anita shook her head. “Why didn’t you ask me for help? I could have found you something more interesting.”
“Interesting!” I shouted. “I don’t want something interesting! The only reason I bought a fountain pen was because you’d assured me that it would make writing easier on my hand.”
“Well,” Anita said with a faint smile, “is it easier on your hand?”
I nodded emphatically. “It most certainly is.”
“Good.”
I took a deep breath to calm myself, but when I spoke up again my voice was still a bit shrill. “I’m not about to spend an arm and a leg on a fountain pen, you know. Heaven knows this thing was expensive enough.”
A momentary look of alarm crossed Anita’s face. “How much did you pay for it?”
“Twenty dollars for the pen and nine more for the two bottles of ink,” I said, smirking at her. “The nice young man at the stationery store threw in some cartridges for free, though he certainly disapproved of my using them.”
Anita chuckled. “You did very well, Marian. Are you happy with the pen?”
I shrugged. “Happy? A fountain pen is hardly a source of happiness, Anita. Except to you, of course. But then you are a bit absurd about things in general, aren’t you?” I didn’t give her a chance to reply. “I wanted a writing implement that would alleviate some of my arthritic pain. Happiness had nothing to do with my purchase.”
Anita sighed, but I continued my tirade. “I’ve never understood your obsession with fountain pens, and I never will.”
“Has the pen alleviated some of your pain?” Anita asked patiently.
“Yes, it has.”
“Well then, I’m glad you bought it.”
I sniffed and took a sip of my now tepid tea. “All right then!” I replied, my pique all but gone. “I accept you apology.”
Anita opened her mouth to protest that she had not apologized at all, but then she thought better of it.
“So,” she continued conversationally, “you have come to fountain pen use as a result of adversity. She smiled at me mischievously. “You’re not the only one.”
I waited for her to say more, but she just drank her tea and looked out the window. I knew she had a story to tell, but she was going to make me ask. I hated when she did that, but I knew I’d give in sooner or later. I just can’t resist a story. I fidgeted and mumbled incomprehensibly, but Anita was better at pretending to be oblivious than anyone else I knew.
“All right, all right!” I said under my breath. “You win.”
Still no response.
“So tell me, please, my friend,” I said aloud, “who else has come to fountain pen use out of adversity?”
The mischievous smile turned into a broad grin of the sort that had “gotcha” written all over it. Anita shook her head. “Not so fast. If you want an answer to that question and the story that goes with it, you’ll have to drive me across town and a few miles north. Then you’ll be able to hear it from the horse’s mouth.”
“A horse that uses a fountain pen, Anita? How interesting!”
She rolled her eyes. “Finish your cookie!”
I smirked at her. “You’ll say anything to bum a ride, won’t you?”
She nodded. “Do you remember Laurel Clausen?” she asked.
I thought for several minutes while Anita finished her tea and my cookie.
“I don’t think I know anyone by that name,” I replied.
“Of course you know her,” Anita retorted, “but you know her as Laurel Wayne.”
“Oh, that Laurel! The one who married Handsome!”
Anita’s face fell. “I do wish you wouldn’t call him that. Dennison Wayne is not handsome. He is simply conceited, and being called ‘Handsome’ just encourages his vanity.”
“Everyone has called him ‘Handsome’ for as long as I can remember,” I protested. That’s his nickname and always has been.”
“Not always,” Anita observed. “Only since his return from his two year stint in the navy. In high school he was known as Denny.”
“I never heard anyone call him Denny,” I objected, “and I was around when he was in high school.”
“I taught him,” Anita said firmly, “and he was Denny to everyone, teacher and peer alike.”
“Well, I bet Laurel calls him ‘Handsome’,” I argued. “His looks are probably why she married him.”
“That may well be,” Anita assented. “But they certainly haven’t stopped her from divorcing him.”
I sat looking at her with my mouth open.
“Handsome is as handsome does, and Dennison Wayne has never done a handsome thing in his life, as far as I know,” Anita concluded and stood up. “Are you going to drive me out to see Laurel or not?”
Sometimes it’s pointless to argue with Anita, especially when she gets a bug in her brain the way she seemed to have about Handsome. So I shrugged and said, “Have it your way!”
It seemed to me that Handsome had just needed a nickname that didn’t sound like a fast food restaurant, but I knew if I said that to Anita, she’d just launch INTO another tirade. So although it was hard, I resisted the urge to lecture Anita about how she wouldn’t recognize what handsome was if it bit her because she was just too busy paying attention to her damned fountain pens to have eyes for anything or anyone else. I knew that was only a partial truth, of course, She just didn’t care much about appearances, which didn’t bother me, though I wished she were a bit more tolerant of those of us who did.
“Well,” she asked with a wink, “are you going to drive me or will I have to throw myself on the mercy of Lambert’s Taxi Service?”
I shook my head. “Anything but Lambert’s Taxi Service. I wouldn’t do that to my worst enemy, let alone to a good friend.”