Karla’s dad always had a cool green pen when he was at St. Pauls. All the other teachers were somewhat promiscuous, sometimes sporting a red pen, other times blue or black. Not Mr. Buesing, he was all green, all the time. A rock in a world of shifting sand.
When it was my turn to be a teacher, I decided to do the same. I first poked around to make sure that green wasn’t taken. It wouldn’t be right to horn in on someone else’s ink. If green had not been available, I would have chosen a dark, masculine purple (don’t tell Christina, when we were growing up I had to pretend to hate purple, because it was her favorite color). If purple was also taken, orange was next on my list, because nothing rhymes with it.