I must have hundreds, no…thousands of pencils. They seem to colonize in new regions of my house every day. I don’t even remember buying the majority of them.

And then it hits me. Why do people have so many things they don’t need or use in their lives? I don’t need a thousand pencils. A person probably would never use that many pencils in their lifetime.

In fact, the only time I ever truly remember using pencils was in grammar school. After that, everyone discovers the joys of ballpoint pens, and never looks back.

Yet, the pencil colony grows into a pencil nation, adopting their own language. I hear a flag is in the making. I’m starting to fear the dark corners in my house.

I think my problem, everyone’s problem, is that we spend our whole lives acquiring stuff. Does it really matter? Will our lives be better if we have the security of knowing that we may never again have to buy something as trivial as a pencil?

Yes, our fridge may be empty, but we have pencils!