My comment was always, “I never bought a pen in my life,” whenever Charlie would show me his latest writing utensil acquisition. Sponsor booths at conferences related to my work always had free pens, so naturally I wound up with at least 2 years supply of pens from sponsor booths at every conference I attended. I will admit that some already had their ink dried up and others fell apart soon after using them, but their price was right.
My favorite time with pens was when I had to thank all the sponsors at an aging services conference that my agency hosted. I went around to every sponsor booth and got a pen. I headed to the plenary session with pens filling all my pockets. When it came time to thank the sponsors I went up on the stage without notes. “Now I’d like to thank each of our sponsors and um, oops I forgot my sponsor list. I uh – wait I know. “ I spent the next several minutes pulling pens out of my pockets, reading what was on each pen and cracking some stupid related joke like, “Hmm this one just says Alzheimer’s Association on it. I forget what they do.” I ended with, “Please visit our sponsor booths. These folks provide many more resources than just free pens and candy to make your work more successful — Oh and some of the pens even have blue ink!”
Okay so Charlie posted a blog about pens that had nothing to do with fungi and he wasn’t sure how it connected with faith either. Well I have thoughts about both.
http://www.sutleywildlifeart.com/mushroom-art.html
If you’re in a woods there is always a writing or drawing medium because of fungi. My son Will proved that when as a Boy Scout he had to draw a map of where he walked for the Orienteering merit badge. Being my son, he of course forgot pen and note pad when we went for our map-making walk. Undeterred, he found a large artist fungus (Ganoderma applanatum), sharpened a stick and proceeded to draw his map on the mushroom’s white undersurface that turned dark brown where the point touched. The scoutmaster scratched his head a little and called it good.
For centuries pens were sharpened goose quills and they still can be. If you live near the Mississippi or any other waterway sooner or later you’ll find goose quills, but other kinds of feathers might work too – although you’ll want to leave them when you’re done writing with them so as to not get busted for harvesting feathers illegally. Some kinds of inky cap (Coprinus sp.) mushrooms are almost always present in the woods too. At one time these mushrooms were used as an actual source of ink, and they still could be. However it takes about 12 hours for inky caps to melt. So I’d recommend not expecting to use them in the woods unless you plan to camp over night or unless you are so totally lost and starving in the woods that you need to use a feather and inky cap ink to update your last will and testament on a piece of birch bark. If I were in that situation though, I’d just eat the inky caps along with many other edibles that all woods provide if you know what to look for.
Actually, mushroom inks, pigments and dyes are good for much more than declaring a final statement when lost in the woods. In fact there’s a large community of artists and artisans who are as devoted to using mushrooms for color as Charlie is to his pens and I am to my fungal appetite. Sally bought a cool book, Mushrooms for Dyes, Paper, Pigments & Myco-Stix by Miriam C. Rice She hoped I’d find some of the mushrooms it mentions so she could try making mushroom dyes herself. Now I have to remember that I’m in the woods for more than just filling my belly
So what is the moral that Charlie wasn’t sure about? Maybe it’s that God’s love and compassion come in many different forms, and Charlie reflects that love when he lovingly restores old pens and imagines the stories, verse and lives they may have chronicled. I now have a better understanding of the joy he gets from restoring old pens after reading his essay. The next time he shows me his latest acquisition I won’t just roll my eyes and make some smug comment about how much I pay for pens. There’s a world inside his pens just as there’s a world inside every mushroom.
Recipe: Creamed Shaggy Manes on Toast
{Chuck says:} A saying that I’ve based part of my life on: “Life is too short to write with an ugly pen.” I don’t remember where I first encountered this, though I think it was on a fountain pen website.
That may be right, but you haven’t seen that much of my handwriting ability. I do know that life’s definitely too short to write with ugly thoughts
Is there a link to that recipe: Creamed Shaggy Manes on Toast ??
Hi Roy It’s on the Recipe page. We still need to figure out how we want to do links to different blocks on the website. We might be seeking your advice. Thanks