Here is a question I was asking myself for a while.
Is it better to be rich and own all the pens I could dream of or be able to afford only 1-2 pens a month and slowly build up my collection ?
I was talking with one of our members here and he was telling me about a friend of his that has thousants of pens (yes he is very reach).And then I was thinking to myself-How much fun can a man have if he has all the pens he wants ?

I think being able to afford 1-2 pens a months keeps you "Hungry" and keep your interest up all the time.So I am happy where I am right now cause I think if there is a sure recipe to kill my love for pens would be to give me all the pen I want!!!

Ha-ha! You know, sometimes I think that as well -- that it is more satisfying to be "poor" and acquire pens gradually. But then I realise that thinking this is just a defense mechanism, a way of making myself feel better for not being in the position of the person you describe .

The thing is, money is not the only issue when it comes to getting the pens you want. There is also availability -- the hunt for impossible-to-find discontinued pens, NOS vintage pens from the 1930s, a specific # in a limited edition series (for example always trying to get #79 or whatever your birth year is), and so on. Finally, there is an entire world of possibilities when it comes to customised orders, bespoke pens, even working together with your favourite brand to create an entirely unique, special design just for you. For example, I like Maki-e, and I can totally see myself endlessly commissioning Nakaya or DaniTrio with new maki-e designs, or even entire collections. The truth is, there are plenty of ways to entertain yourself if you have unlimited financial resources.

QM2

It's better to be happy with what you have until you can get what you want.

I'm not rich, but even if I was I don't think I'd become a collector (as opposed to a user) on any grand scale. I find nowadays that I'm content with very few pens, provided that they are comfortable to hold and balance well, have good, reliable filling systems, and of course absolutely first-class nibs. The nib's the thing! So any increase in my disposable income is most likely to mean a corresponding increase in that of the nibmeisters.

Of course...you can't always get what you need...

It is better to be rich. The rich condition gives you more freedom: you always have the option to be poor. The reverse is not true. The rub comes in having the disipline to really enjoy the riches. If you keep your acquisitiveness in check so you can use each pen long enough to really get to know it and enjoy it, then riches are a wash.

A corollary: Your brain gates at a constant rate (unless you are being chased by a jealous husband). The person with a thousand pens has learned as much as the person who has only one. One's knowledge is broad and the other's is detailed.

Paddler

It sounds like you're suggesting that wealthy people have no control over their obsessions purchasing habits. I think that most wealthy people have learned the value of a dollar and don't buy up everything in sight just because they can. Personally, I think it's better to be able to buy what you want, when you want it. Being able to afford almost anything doesn't mean you want to buy everything.

Some of us are rich whether we have money and pens or not. Let's not confuse the 2.

http://thoreau.eserver.org/lifewout.html

'Nuf said.

Given a choice, I'd rather be wealthy than poor. However, I do not think being wealthy would significantly affect my pen purchasing rate. At the moment, I have about fifteen pens and I only use three to five of them on a regular basis so I'm pretty content with my small "collection."

Ben

From your previous pen acquisition posts, I assumed you were rich!

So true.

How does the song go? Something like "Happiness is wanting what you have. Not having what you want."

Wealth is a tricky thing... sure it can bring the short term happiness of acquiring expensive things. But true happiness must be at the core. Wealth only makes a happy life a little happier. And it can just distract a sad life for a little while.

Some people have enough money where they could cease other hobbies and then afford to buy every pen they've ever wanted. But I can't imagine that would bring any long term satisfaction. A great part of the fun is the process of acquisition over time. Having a few elusive rare pens on your mind that you watch out for, to step up and grab when they eventually come around!

Also, some people get more into the collecting than the using. I've been guilty of that... and since I've now been putting pens to use that I previous looked at as "display only", I'm happier.

As my dad told me at a time when I needed consoling, "If you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with."

...I don't know if that's good advice or not.

Let's keep this dilema focused on pens.

I think that the question can be framed in a slightly different way and I think it is more general than about simply being poor versus rich. Do you buy as many pens as you can affford, regardless of your wealth? I would venture to guess that many people, with different levels of wealth, "get by" with far fewer pens then they could afford. I think we all exercise such judgement about everything: just because you want something and you can afford it doesn't mean you can rationalize the purchase to yourself. All IMHO.

This thread reminded me of one of my favorite bits of Talmud (loosely quoted and message abused):

"Who is strong? One who masters his passions."
"Who is wise? One who learns from others."
"Who is rich? One who is satisfied with what he has."

Since I'm neither strong nor rich, I want more pens!

Andy

So true ....... the tendency is always equate the word "rich" with money ..... Why is that? You can be rich in many things .....

You do not necessarily have to be "rich" ($$$) to get a buzz from old pens. Some of the ones I treasure most actually cost very little.

Some are very battered but have given good use for nearly a hundred years. A real testament to those that made them and those that used them.

It's quite a buzz simply to hold that same pen .... with the same old nib .... and to feel it write the way it always did.

Thats the "richness" in pen collecting for me .... and it does not cost much.

Enjoy the collecting ............... whether you have money or not ... just buy what you can afford .... and enjoy it

John

I'm not sure about it being better, but rich is much more satisfying. Those who say that money cannot buy happiness never owned a good flyrod.

I don't know about being rich enough to afford all the pens I want...because I think I would wind up with more than I need (which is where I'm at now )..... I would love to be able to find more nice pens "in the wild" (antique shops, flea markets, garage sales) for decent prices...or even a sumgai find or two per year...That would please me a lot!

I think the hunt for pens that I like and can afford is half the fun of collecting pens. I buy no more than one or two pens per month. Later, when I am out of school and making money, I will still buy one or two pens per month; they will be slightly more expensive though. But not being rich keeps me honest.

Lisa

It is always better to be rich.

Anyone that tells you otherwise isn't, and never has been, rich.

Money doesn't buy you happiness - but it does allow you to be miserable in comfort.

But seriously though, in my opinion, acquiring something slowly allows you to appreciate it over time. Would you appreciate 500 pens acquired simultaneously more than 500 acquired over several years? I wouldn't think so.

I believe the searching and deciding is more fun than getting it. The anticipation always gets me excited.

Kurt

In terms of absolute liquid bucks (for those in other climes, insert euros, pesos or whatever the coin of your particular realm is...) I would rather have more than less. Having more income...and more disposable income...beats the holy living s*it out of having less.

In terms of monetary wealth...liquid, semi-liquid and real assets...again having more is better than less. Enjoying what you have and managing to live well within what you have...without being bitter about those who have more...and to seek, without avarice, to increase one's gross and net worth, is admirable.

In terms of wealth measured as the intangible combine of monetary "well-off-ness" (of whatever level one wants), enjoyment of one's life (jealous husbands notwithstanding) and life pursuits, both vocational or avocational, and one's prospects for the future...and beyond...

If each of the preceding are in some reasonable balance...one is wealthy...

The following might be cast-off as one of Wright's Flights...but it isn't, since I have long felt that movies are, in fact, the replacement for shamans imparting wisdom around campfires...

In ALADDIN--the Genie makes the following statement..."Ah, but to be free--that is truly to be rich---"
In THE THIRTEENTH WARRIOR--the Nordic chieftain, knowing he is dying, speaks this line---"If a man's life could be drawn in sound, he would be thought of as truly wealthy"

What does this have to do with the subject?

Being "rich" or being "wealthy" is always a comparative. So...whether one is gathering pens at one or two per month or spending profligately on whatever pen one wants because one has the big checking account to do so...is all a matter of perspective.

I can afford pens of greater MSRP than I purchase. I don't purchase the higher priced pens...because THEY DO NOT ATTRACT ME. And I am "shopper" and haggler by nature. I want a deal. I also have predilections...damn well known. The big buck pens don't meet my criteria...

So maybe what we are discussing is not the absolute ability to buy, but the ability to buy AND the ability to walk away if something does not meet one's criteria...

Yah, that sounds good...

But it is better to have more liquidity than less or none...especially if you live in coastal New Jersey...or California...or Tokyo...

Bill...who better clean up the kitchen...Kappy's new forever family is coming today....

I'd have to say that being rich is definitely better. I say this as someone who is just the opposite of rich. The rich can afford health care!


Maybe that friend of a friend is having tons of fun with his or her thousands of pens!

If I were rich I probably wouldn't fret over the problematic fountain pens. I'd just ship them off to a nibmeister and have them fixed!

No, I suspect that being rich is a lot better than being poor. And life is more than fountain pens. I could be wrong about that, of course .

Rich or whatever the consensus the inverse constitutes...current production problematic FPs are a quality of manufacturing issue and need not be tolerated...

Given enough $$$ or euro or whatever, I would buy the offending company and close it/them down or fold them into my new pen company

WRIGHT-RIGHT FOUNTAIN PEN COMPANY.

I would be CEO/COB and let Richard B and Kurt run the place AT A PROFIT but with due regard to quality and value... and yes, with a decent mix of both SLEEK and TRAD models.

Just no bird poop...

Bill...hell, I can dream...why stop at buying pens. Buy the whole f**king offending company and do away with it...

Some people can do more than dream....

I remember my father telling me a story about someone he knew who was in Germany during and just after WWII. They were stationed near a brewery which refused to sell them any beer.

This particular gentleman had more than a little bit of loose change lying around (came from a very wealthy family, apparently), so he bought the brewery!

[sigh]

Oh, the pen companies we could run...........

Cas...
Two items...

What department do you want to run at WRIGHT-WRITE Pen Co. Inc.

I have not forgotten about the Lenten Letter. The pen you requested and your address are sitting front of me. Things here a Summer Breeze Dachshund Rescue have NOT BEEN CALM... Rest assured it will make its way to you...before next Lent...

Oooooooooh! Um.....let's see - testing.....or design?

I always envied the designers I used to work with in the theatre - they could design wonderful, impossible things and it was never their job to make them work! That job belonged to my friend Tiny, whose favourite phrase was "Tell me what you want and I'll tell you what you can have!"

But testing........getting to play with all of the pens (.....and inks! Will the WRIGHT-WRITE Pen Co Inc make ink as well?)

Um.....can I kind of be a 'floater'? You know - I can be sent to whichever department needs help on any given day? I think I'd like to do that......



Now I'm picturing receipt of a letter which has very few words but lots of little inky paw prints...... I'll look forward to it!

The question you ask yourself is already a matter of being affluent and rich. In both cases you can already own pens and don't have to worry about the necessities of life. Fountain pens are, expensive or not, just a luxury.

If "rich" is defined as having large amounts of money, possessions, or any other material goods, then being rich is not ipso facto better than being poor. It's fairly well known that people who are rich (by this definition) are not, as a class, happier than those not rich. For a significant number of these rich people, richness itself is the pursuit, and there can never be enough money or possessions to satisfy the obsession.

Being poor, conversely, is not necessarily better than being rich (by the above definition).

The better condition, as several people have said in various ways, is the condition in which one is satisfied with one's life. Yes, I want certain pens that I do not currently have, but I am not compelled to acquire them. My true wealth, the thing that gives me the biggest and most satisfying return on investment, is people.

(Edited to unfumble funble-fingered fumbles)

I have to agree with you richard. It is better to have a smaller pen or watch collection that you really enjoy than a too big collection that you don't enjoy or enjoy partly. Yes, money helps you to buy the rarities but there are sometimes good deals that can be done in antique shops or on flea markets.

In my job working for a bank, I get to observe a lot of rich people and sometimes their children. Too bad none of it rubs off on me.

Obviously, money adds to happiness at least until basic necessities are achieved. After that, it is more complicated. Many studies have found that there is no correlation between money and happiness above a certain basic level. Happiness and money are on average correlated if you went from poor to rich or average to rich. Your happiness increases as your wealth increases. If you were rich and stayed rich, you are usually no happier than if you were poor and stayed poor. If you went from very rich to rich, you are usually unhappy. It's all relative, as they say. And of course, these correlations apply on average to a large group of people. There are obviously other factors involved.

That is why the children of the rich are often not very happy. So you better think about that before you make your fortune! You'll be happy but your children may not be.

The fountain pen analogy here is that if you inherit a large collection of fountain pens, you're not going to be as pleased with them than if you accumulated them yourself over time.

Oh, I don't know about that. I think that if I were to inherit a large collection of fountain pens I'd be thrilled and go exploring through them all. I might be more pleased at not having had to pick them out myself. So if there are some that I dont like I don't have myself to blame for it.

Of course [acronym="Everything I've said is absolutely correct and incontrovertible. There are no variations."]YMMV[/acronym]

Being rich in terms of having a ton of money is fine and dandy as long as it does not cost you your happiness and family. I speak from harsh experience.

I used to be rich and unhappy. Now I'm poor and happy. Go figure.

Thank you,that's exactly my point.

Yeah, but the other song says "Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose..."

Two quick and (for a change) relevant thoughts..

In one of O'Henry's short stories, a young man's grandfather, who had become very wealthy (money and property) conspires successfully, using his monetary resources, to ensure the young man can meet and woo the woman he desires... At some point in the story, toward the end, if memory serves, the grandfather is asked about his plan. He remarks that since he became rich, he decided to read the encyclopedia to see if there was something money couldn't buy. He was into the Rs and had found nothing unavailable so far...

The Buddha, as we all know, was a prince before he saw the world beyond the palace walls and renounced all for a life of poverty and wandering to seek Enlightenment. (Hey, give me a break...I'm trying for brevity...it is close enough). He accomplished this, and set in place a wonderful theology and value system. But he died of bad pork or bad mushrooms (I really do not remember...will wiki it later and edit...)

Two different stories, both involving wealth and riches of monetary and philosophic types...

I cite them...I do not chose between them. I personally like to have both...

Bill


(See...for those doubters, I CAN do a straight bit...)