green ink

Scottie Bowman (rbowman@indigo.ie)
Thu, 11 Mar 1999 16:15:20 +0000 

    You know me.  I'm the last person on earth to upset 
    anyone - least of all such decent old sticks as Rick 
    or Tim, or an enchantress like Meredith.  But I'm afraid, 
    yes, the green ink will have to go.

    Purple ink, of course, was always known as bad news.  
    Any editor will tell you that a letter in purple invariably 
    calls for the advice of the libel lawyers.  And any shrink 
    worth his salt recognises it as one of the really reliable 
    secondary indicators of paranoid schizophrenia.

    Green, on the other hand, is pathognomonic not so much 
    for the paranoid as for the kind of narcissistic individual 
    who is aware of others only insofar as they serve his own needs.

    I remember the first two characters I knew well who were 
    devoted to green ink.  

    One was the absolutely marvellous headmaster for much 
    of my schooldays.  He was unusually youthful, innovative, 
    liberal & spectacularly effective in attracting large sums 
    of money to his school.  It remains something of a mystery 
    how, at the end of his career, he (only JUST) managed 
    to escape a long term of imprisonment for misappopriation 
    of funds. 

    The other was a Friend of My Youth.  He wrote everything 
    in a tiny, bright emerald green hand.  He looked rather like 
    Lord Byron was much adored by the lady teachers & 
    a large group of aspiring mothers in law.  He finished up 
    as a Very Senior Official of the United Nations.  Before 
    his premature, yet long awaited demise, he was responsible - 
    through incompetence & high ideals - for the deaths of 
    countless numbers of helpless & innocent refugees.

    They were simply the first two green ink men in my life.  
    But they set the pattern for all who came later.  
    You could always tell.  Whenever I saw that fresh, vernal 
    writing my heart began to sink - & with every justification.

    (Incidentally, Meredith, a 'yuppie' would NEVER use 
    green ink - seeing in it the kind of eccentricity fatal to 
    anyone seriously concerned with the acquisition of a grip 
    on the central levers of power & wealth.)

    Scottie B.