I Am Not Buying That Rocker Blotter. No. I Am Not.

A public service announcement for fountain pen friends: one piece of blotter paper might last you 20 years.

I bought an old rocker blotter about 20 years ago which still had a sheet of blotting paper in it, and just kept using the old blue blotter paper sheet it came with. (Which was already well used.)

vintage wooden fountain pen rocker blotter with Art Nouveau brass design on top

YMMV of course! I tend to let my paper air dry, rather than use blotter paper.

I bought NEW blotter paper* about a year ago. Check it out: still going strong!

blotting paper, with layers of ink stains, attached to the bottom of a rocker blotter

This second vintage rocker blotter is literally window dressing. I love green milk glass. (I’m guessing it’s from the 1930s; Scottish terriers and milk glass were both very popular in the U.S. then.)

green glass rocker blotter with a figure of a Scottie dog as the rocker handle

So. I have two rocker blotters. Two.

Two is not a collection.

If I get that extremely lovely 19th c cobalt blue glass one at the antique shop down the street, then I’ll have three. But I am not going to do that, because I am NOT not not not not NOT, I tell you** , having a rocker blotter collection.

Budgets and shelf space mean we must make choices, and I do not need a rocker blotter collection.

And: collections don’t start until you hit the number three.

This is the Law of Three. Once you have three of something, when you do not need three, it becomes a collection. This is true for cats***, this is true for old cars you’re keeping for parts, and it is true for rocker blotters.

So I am NOT having a rocker blotter collection.

There.

I said it on the internet, so it must be true.

P.S. Nice article here about actually using blotting paper, instead of white-knuckling the urge to buy another old rocker blotter.

REFERENCES

Link to Dorothy and Toto photo – File:The Wizard of Oz Judy Garland Terry 1939.jpg - Wikipedia (no date). Available at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Wizard_of_Oz_Judy_Garland_Terry_1939.jpg (Accessed: 18 July 2022).

Bosley, J. (2019) How To Use Fountain Pen Blotting Paper, Fountain Pen Love. Available at: https://fountainpenlove.com/how-to/how-to-use-fountain-pen-blotting-paper/ (Accessed: 18 July 2022).

NOTES

* The two questions I’m pretty sure my kids will be asking after my earthly sojourn is done: “What IS this? Why did she keep that?”

** Okay, I’m telling me. Again.

*** Although I can think of many situations where one might need three cats. Maybe you’re opening a cat café, and they need to work in shifts.