SJ: Look at that, a new pencil just lying on the floor.

P4: That’s mine.

SJ: Ahhh, I hope it’s an HB. It is! Cool I need one of those.

P4: That’s my pencil.

SJ: Nah, you’d have put yours away. This one was just lying there. I’m going to use it at work for when I need to write or draw something in pencil. I have a mechanical pencil but it’s too hard and faint for writing. I need a softer one like this nice red one here that I found on the floor.

P4: (disgusted at my obtuseness) Uh, I keep telling you that’s MY pencil. I need it for my homework.

SJ: Nope. You always put your stuff away, couldn’t be yours therefore and so forth and so on - so it's mine.


When I was twelve my father gave me a pocket knife and later caught me throwing it assassin-style, trying to get it to stick in a tree. Twenty-seven years later and that pocket knife is still in the top drawer of my father’s tool box.

P4 however, got her pencil back shortly after I got bored tormenting her and calling it a life lesson.