Precision, Concision, Style, and Tone

Passage III — The Lead That Isn’t

[1] Despite its name, a pencil’s “lead” contains no lead at all. Its gray core is a blend of clay and graphite, a soft form of carbon. Manufacturers control it’s (21) hardness by adjusting the recipe: more clay produces a harder core that leaves a lighter line, while more graphite produces a softer core and a darker line. Many artists therefore keep several grades on hand. A hard (22) pencil for faint sketch lines and a soft one for deep shadows.

[2] The eraser at the other end—usually made of synthetic rubber, is (23) held in place by a thin metal band called a ferrule. Because graphite marks rest on the surface of the paper instead of soaking into its fibers, they can be removed and taken off (24) with a few strokes of that eraser. Pencils are sold in many stores. (25)

[3] At the factory, powdered graphite and clay are blended with water and pressed into thin rods. The rods are then baked in a kiln at a high temperature that is very hot (26) until they harden. Next, workers lay the rods in parallel grooves cut into a thin slab of cedar and glue a matching grooved slab on top. This wooden sandwich is sliced into individual pencils, each one is (27) shaped, sanded, and painted. (28)

[4] Two centuries later, the basic design has barely changed, and its appeal is easy to understand: a pencil (29) needs no ink, never leaks, and can be sharpened again and again. Pencils remain popular with students and artists alike. (30)

Passage V — Mapping the Curb

[1] When Marisol Vega’s grandfather began using a wheelchair, the two of them discovered that their neighborhood was full of obstacles they had never noticed. A curb without a ramp could turn a short trip to the pharmacy into a long detour. A cracked or tilted slab of sidewalk was even worse, it could (41) tip the chair forward.

[2] Nevertheless, (42) Marisol, then a high school sophomore, decided to record every barrier within a mile of her home. Armed with a phone, a tape measure, and a notebook, she walked and covered on foot (43) each block, photographing missing ramps, broken slabs, and poles planted in the middle of the path. At every stop, she recorded what she found. (44)

[3] By winter, Marisol’s notebook held more than three hundred entries. She typed them into a free online mapping program, marking each problem with a colored pin: red for barriers that blocked a wheelchair completely and yellow for those that only slowed it down. In January, she presented the finished map to the citys’ (45) public works department. The engineers there were super psyched about (46) what she had built.

[4] Marisol’s map arrived at a useful moment. (47) The city had money set aside for sidewalk repairs but no complete list of where repairs were most needed. Within two years, crews had installed forty new curb ramps and repaired and fixed (48) more than a hundred broken slabs. Several of the new ramps sit on the very corners that had once forced her grandfather into long detours. (49) Marisol, now a college engineering student, still updates the map every spring.

Passage II — Learning the Grain

[1] The canoe had spent eleven years upside down in my uncle’s barn before I dragged it into the daylight. Its cedar strips had turned gray, and the varnish had cracked into a pattern like dried mud. Covered in dust and pigeon feathers, my uncle had clearly forgotten the boat. (11)

[2] Restoring it would require three things; patience, (12) a heat gun, and a great deal of sandpaper. I already owned the last two. Patience, as my uncle kept reminding me, I would have to learn off of (13) the wood itself.

[3] I have always enjoyed working outdoors. (14) For the first week, I sanded in quick circles, the way I had seen people do in online videos. The wood came up fuzzy and scarred. Then my uncle ran his thumb along one strip and pointed out the faint lines inside it. The fibers in every strip, he explained, leans (15) the same way, like the hair on a dog’s back. Sanding with the grain leaves the surface smooth; to sand against it lifts (16) tiny splinters.

[4] After that, the work went faster. Over the next two months, I stripped the old varnish, patched a long split with a thin piece of new cedar, and brushed on three coats of marine varnish. The patch was a shade lighter than the rest of the hull at first, but after a few weeks in the sun it blended (17) into the surrounding wood.

[5] Last August, I finally carried the canoe down to the lake. It floated level and dry, its hull glowing amber in the late sun, (18) and my uncle, standing on the dock, declared it more smoother (19) than it had been on the day he bought it.