Today, I lost my pen

There is a meeting going on across the cubicle wall in which a group of grown men in suits are seated around a tray of assorted miniature pastries and talking about flow. The conversation could be happening in a doctor's office, centered on prostate enlargement, but this flow refers to something more abstract than urine. A small table topper near the donuts reads "synergistic strategies for productive flow".

The hallway out to the press is 200 yards of shiny tile and high, florescent lit ceilings. Since they do not make the shoes with little wheels built into the heel in my size, I am forced to find other ways to make this trek more interesting. My current game of tossing my pen high into the air and trying to catch it without looking up was brought to an abrupt end today.

The weight and shape of my pen (a Zebra GR8 gel- blue) spins exceptionally well, like a juggler's pin. I was thoroughly enjoying the zip with which it left my fingers, and the snap against my palm on it's return. But then it didn't, return that is. I looked up.

Above me hung a convex mirror suspended on a chain, the kind designed to alert you to the forklift approaching the intersection, operated by an inebriated high school dropout who will undoubtedly strike and crush you to death.

There was a hole in the side of the mirror.

After my initial alarm, I realized that had my pen caused this hole, not only would there have been some sort of breaky-noise but debris would have definitely fallen around me. So either my pen had gone into the hole or landed on top of the mirror. I proceeded to the press, hurrying past the security cameras which constantly pan over this entire complex.

"Noah," the press tech said. "Come over here and take notes."

"Um, do you have a pen I can borrow?"