The Epic Tale of the Life of a Pencil: Part 7 of 9

The pencil floated freely through the seas for many days and many nights. The pencil waved with friendliness at the jellyfish which drifted alongside it. It giggled with glee at the dolphins who played a game of fetch with it. It sputtered with indignation at the enormous blue whales that blew great plumes of spray all over it. All the while filling the hours of each day with the music of the ocean gently rising and falling in its steady rhythm. Until one day the pencil caught a new note that it had not heard in a very long time: the far off crashing of waves against a sandy shore.
The rising tide carried the pencil to the shores of its new home with tumultuous violence. The pencil was dunked and bobbed from the ocean floor and back to the surface again and again. It slammed into the beach with the crash of each wave, only to be dug up again as the offending wave receded. It was pushed and pulled and tugged and torn in every direction, sometimes all of them at the same time. Until finally, with one last ferocious blast from the sea, the pencil was thrown to safety and deposited high above the shoreline in a stand of sea oats clinging desperately to the dunes of the shore.
It was here, hidden amongst the sand fleas and fiddler crabs, that the pencil first spied its new owner. He was an odd looking man in his middle years, dressed in a fine black suit from head to knees. His pant legs were rolled up to protect them from the billowing sands as he wandered barefoot between the dunes. His furrowed brow weighed heavily on his slumped shoulders as he trudged forlorn through the sand. He carried the hefty responsibility of creating justice in his world. He was troubled by a recent case where he was forced to defend a crew of trigger-happy soldiers who had murdered the members of an angry mob in the name of the law and keeping the peace. This noble Statesman decried the villainy of men who would commit such an atrocity, but clung to the laws which gave them just that same power. Yet he believed irrevocably that an empire of laws, and not of men was the only way to overrule the unpredictable passions humanity's foibles.
It was at this darkest moment that the Statesman spied the crooked pencil clinging to the sandy dune. He lifted it out of the earth, astounded by the pencil's hypnotic twisting figure. He saw the evidence of how the hands of both Man and God had sculpted the pencil into a usable shape. The pencil's core was once long and straight, but now contained a subtle yet elegant curve. Its sleek flat side was almost perfectly honed to cover a formerly hideous scar that was still barely evident at its very tip. The months at sea had bequeathed a slight twist to the once near flawlessly flat edge.
The Statesman marveled at the resiliency embodied by the little pencil. He realized that the pencil had survived all of its innumerable trials not by rigidly adhering to its creator's principals, but by bending and shaping itself to suit the needs of whatever ordeal the world presented it at that moment. Inspired by the herculean tests which his little pencil had obviously overcome, the Statesman rushed home to capture the epiphany induced by his newfound treasure.
Safely enclosed in his study, the Statesman retrieved the pencil from his coat pocket where he had safely tucked it while still on the beach. Hesitant at first to record such blasphemous ideals as compromise and reasonableness, the Statesman began to write a treatise of his thoughts on government. The Statesman gasped after each line, amazed to find himself staring more at the enlightening pencil than the page upon which it scratched its wisdom.
The pencil beamed with pride at the extraordinary prudence which it helped the just Statesman to ascribe. It never realized how much all of its experiences had imbued it with discretion and reason. Most importantly, the pencil affirmed in its heart to always share its gifts wherever it went.
The Statesman worked furiously into the night completing his treatise just as the last of the sun's rays winked out for the evening. The next morning the Statesman awoke to review his work and immediately realized the importance and impact his newly penned treatise could have upon his fledgling country. So he set to work making multiple copies of his thoughts and calling for couriers to deliver his message far and wide.
The Statesman was so enamored with the work his new little pencil had created that he vowed to pen each and every copy of his treatise with it. Happy to be of assistance, the pencil bowed gently as the Statesman began each new copy. But soon the pressure became too much for the weathered little pencil. The weight of all of its experiences built up inside it as each copy of the treatise completed. Repeating the same story over and over again pushed the pencil into a dark place where all of the sights and sounds and smells of its life seemed too a heavy burden to carry.
Finally, just as the Statesman finished his final copy, the pencil relented and broke under the pressure. The Statesman leaped back in fear at the horrifying crack which echoed out from the pencil's core. He look down at the splintered remains of the pencil in his hands with dread and pain. In its urgency to release the built up pressure, the shattered pencil had released a small cascade of shards in every direction. Several shreds of wood and lead had pierced the Statesman's hand and now small droplets of blood dripped onto his office floor.
Cursing under his breath, the Statesman reached for a small cloth to cover his wounds. In his anger and frustration with the pencil's catastrophic failure, the Statesman threw the broken pencil out the window and into a wild field beyond his home.
As the pencil fell amongst the weeds and bugs of this new wild land, it thought back over its long life and of all the wondrous new experiences it had endured. It knew that it was a very lucky pencil to have been chosen to share such commonsense wisdom with the world. And if it never got a chance to embody such reason again, then it would consider itself to have lived a long and fruitful life.

The Epic Tale of the Life of a Pencil: Part 6 of 9

Then one day, many years later the old tome creaked open again.  The pencil blinked at the sudden invasion of light into its former world of solitude and discovered that it had been moved sometime in the intervening years.  Instead of the scientist's small study, the pencil now found itself in a great cavernous room with tall, narrow columns of shelves packed tightly with other books. The pencil had never seen so many books all together in the same room in all of its long life and was astounded by their variety.  There were tall books and short books, skinny books and fat books, brightly colored happy books and dark, dusty dreary books.  Some books the pencil even recognized as having helped to create in the hands of its previous masters.
But before the pencil could ponder this thought for too long, a scratchy pair of calloused hands reached down to lift it from the old book that had been its home for so long.  The grizzled old explorer had been searching the stacks for some insight on new and better ways to take accurate measurements at sea and had stumbled onto the pencil while perusing the now long dead scientist's writings.
The explorer's keen eye weighed the pencil's value at a quick glance.  Something about the pencil's unique form gave him pause and caused him to make a closer inspection.  He noticed the perfectly flat side that ran along the length of the entire pencil.  Intrigued by its unique shape, the explorer closed the book he had been reading and placed the pencil atop the book's flat cover.  He slowly lifted the book up off the table and began to tilt it slowly, first to the right, then the left. The explorer tilted it away from himself, then toward himself.  He rocked the book back and forth, up and down, and all around in wildly careening circles.  Yet throughout all these turbulent motions, the pencil remained stuck firmly in its place, anchored to the book's cover by its perfectly flat side.  Amazed at the rare ability of the pencil to steadfastly keep its place in the roughest of "seas", the explorer immediately snatched the pencil up and headed down to the docks to test out his new discovery.
The pencil was delighted at having found a new owner and was looking forward to the adventures that awaited it, when it was struck by the tang of the salt that suddenly permeated the air.  There was a whole new world of sights, smells, and sounds which greeted the pencil in the hands of the ruddy faced explorer.  Great sheets of white billowed atop tall masts. The smoky stench of fresh laid tar wafted between tightly packed berths. Long planks of pine creaked beneath the stout legs of weathered sailors.  The pencil watched in awe as crowds of barefoot sailors ran furiously up and down the docks without missing a step; on and off of neighboring ships without losing balance; skirting left and right to avoid collisions with other sailors, passengers, and crate laden pack animals.  While the pencil admired the chaotic waltz of the people, the explorer mounted his own ship and gave order to set sail.
All at once the air exploded with shouts from every direction as seasoned deckhands barked orders to unsteady young greenhorns.  The old boat released a gut-wrenching groan before lurching free of its moorings and heading underway.  The pencil churned sickly under this new sensation of incessant rocking, but soon settled into the rhythm of the craft's steady roll back and forth. The explorer kept a keen watch on his ship as they cleared the crowded docks and headed into the relative safety of the open waters.  Satisfied that his ship was in good hands, the explorer headed below deck to put his new pencil to the test.
The explorer opened a large chest bolted to the floor of his stateroom and retrieved several of his instruments along with his latest work, a still unfinished chart of shifting sandbars surrounding the local barrier islands.  He carefully gathered up his tools before heading back up to the poop deck that afforded him the best views from the ship.  The explorer carefully laid out each of his instruments along the deck after unfolding his incomplete map.  He placed the pencil down on top of his work and watched for a moment as the faithful pencil held its place despite the ship's constant swaying.
Grinning with pride, the salty old explorer pick up each of his instruments in turn.  He stood for a moment, gaining his bearings with each before taking a careful measurement, marking his notes with the loyal pencil after each weighing.  Soon his cracked and sunburned hands were able to find the dependable pencil locked reliably in the exact spot where he had left it just moments before, without the aid of his eyes.
Without realizing it, the explorer began to seamlessly move between each instrument without taking his eyes off the horizon.  His hands found both pencil and map notes without thought or effort.  He could take bearings faster than ever before and pushed his crew to increase the vessel's speed to its very limit to keep up with the progress of his work.  Mile after mile of sandbar and coastline were mapped with greater accuracy than the explorer had ever achieved before.  He worked past the waning dusk and late into the night: mapping the stars once his coastline drawings were done.
Finally, the moans from his exhausted deckhands broke through the explorer's trance. His eyes strained to focus on a nearby object for the first time in several hours.  Squinting with the effort, the explorer looked down past the pencil in his hands at all the new maps it had created. He was amazed at the delicate details the steady tool had captured.  And even more amazed to see dawn breaking on the grey seas.  Feeling the weariness in his old bones for the first time in the entire voyage, the explorer gave order to return to port and trundled away to his cabin with volumes of his work carefully tucked under each arm.  He held the steady pencil firmly in his meaty hands as he gently returned his newly minted maps to the sturdy trunk.  His grip remained unwavering even as he passed out in his cot.  He didn't even return to the deck until the ship was firmly docked in port, unnerving his entire crew.  This was the first time in their memory that he had been absent during the final approach to any port.
Bleary eyed, the old explorer emerged from his cabin at midday and immediately set to work making preparations for the greatest voyage of his life.  The explorer knew he could make his fortune documenting the geography of the new lands across the ocean.  With his trusty pencil tucked safely under his wide belt, the bold explorer intended to do just that.
After many weeks of gathering stores and recruiting a brave set of experienced crewmen, the explorer was anxious to finally get underway with his new pencil.  And the pencil was equally impatient to help the old explorer document new and wondrous lands.  Each night during the long voyage to the new lands across the sea, the explorer would sneak the pencil atop deck and practice taking bearings from the stars; just for the sheer joy of feeling the pencil leap to his hands so effortlessly.
Until early one morning, "Land ahoy!", came the cry from the crow's nest far above deck.  Delighted, every man on board raced to the bulwark to catch a glimpse of the far off new lands with the old explorer leading the way.  His keen eye confirmed the initial call and certain of his fortunate future he ordered his men back to work so he could begin his map-making.
After taking an initial reading from a well known landmark, the explorer immediately set to work.  Again he pushed his crew to drive the ship faster and faster to keep up with his well honed eyes and deft hands.  On and on they sailed taking readings and recording mysterious new shores until darkness forced the explorer to finally quit for the evening.  Each morning the explorer would awake anew well before dawn to start all over again.  Day after day, the endless ritual repeated, until the ships stores grew thin and the crew began grumbling words of mutiny.
Finally, the old explorer relented and gave order to gave order to put in at the nearest port.  Relieved, the crew worked with renewed vigor to gain dry land after so long at sea.  But just as the lights of civilization appeared on the last night of their arduous journey, a terrible storm blew in from the east.  With it came icy winds and sheets cold driving rain, soaking the once hearty sailors to the bone.  The old explorer had resumed his nighttime recordings of the stars to pass the time and was caught unawares by the turbulent seas carried with the deadly storm.
Confident in the pencil's well earned sea-legs, the explorer set the pencil down in order to blast orders at his unsteady crew.  But a rogue wave burst across the deck without warning, tossing the old explorer to his knees.  It was from this prone position that he spied his trusty pencil lose its grip for the first time aboard the ship.  All those long hours in the salty, humid air had finally warped the wood from its perfectly flat surface.  The wild rocking from the storm broke the pencil's timid hold on the deck, and a second rogue wave washed it overboard with the rest of the unfastened flotsam.  The old explorer howled futilely into the roaring winds, but his attention quickly returned to saving his ship and crew from the murderous storm.
As the pencil floated away with the tide, it thought back over its long life and of all the fantastic lands it had traveled.  It knew that it was a very lucky pencil to have been chosen to record such wild and untamed coasts. And if it never got a chance to draw another foreign expanse, then it would consider itself to have lived a long and fruitful life.

The Epic Tale of the Life of a Pencil: Part 5 of 9

Then one evening, as the room's newest attendees arrived, the pencil noticed a strange young man accompanying the evening's beauty.  His eyes seemed to wander idly about the room, distracted by some inner turmoil.  Until they alighted on the pencil and immediately burned with the same passion usually reserved for the lady of the night.
The young man grabbed the pencil from its resting place on the bedside table and was immediately fascinated by the unique gash in its side, running his fingers incessantly along its edge.  Mumbling something incomprehensible to both the pencil and his compatriot, the man rushed out of the room, down the hall, and into the night without a second thought to his previous plans for the evening.
Upon arriving in his study at home, the young man pulled out all manner of strange contraptions.  There were big beakers and frothy phials of strange liquids; great globes and odd oblongs of blown glass; twisted tweezers and crooked calipers of shiny metal.  There were compasses and sextants and squares; levels and protractors and plumb-bobs.  Every manner of instrument cluttered the young scientist's study, each precisely calibrated to aid him in measuring the forces of his world.
After arranging several of these instruments on his sizable desk, the young scientist pulled out the pencil which had piqued his curiosity so virulently that evening and began his inspection. He measured its length, width, breadth, and depth.  He measured the circumference at various points, from tip to tail.  He weighed it and balanced it and appraised it, using every device at his disposal.  Each time he completed a measurement of some aspect of the pencil, the scientist would pause to make a note in his meticulously organized notebook which sat in a place of honor at the center of his desk.
Finally the scientist picked up the pencil in earnest and began to add new notes into his book.  This writing was like nothing the pencil had ever seen before.  There was a whole new alphabet of strange symbols; mixing letters and numbers from many different alphabets together to form whole sentences without words.  There were carefully annotated sketches and strictly regimented lines, short defining sentences and long paragraphs of explanations.  Each line of text seemed to build upon the conclusions of the last line, leading to some unknown ultimate epiphany.
Until suddenly, "Eureka!", the young man cried into the glowing light of the pre-dawn.  The pencil was startled by the sudden outburst of its new owner.  But the pencil barely had time to catch its breath as the scientist began furiously writing with it again.  Only now the once tidy, well organized lines of symbols careened wildly all over the page.  Letters and numbers came streaming out of the pencil's quickly dulling tip into the scientist's notebook faster than ever.  Page after page was filled with these strange equations.  Until the scientist, spent from his evening's exertions, finally completed the solution to his problem and marked his finale with three simple letters: Q.E.D.
Satisfied with the evening's progress, the scientist lovingly ran his fingers along the pencil's scar one last time before putting it away for the day.  The pencil sat quietly in the darkened study after the scientist left.  It was completely worn out from all the furious scribblings it had created.  But still the pencil sat pondering this new language it had inscribed into the scientist's notebook and was satisfied with a good days work.
The next morning the scientist arrived in his study and again examined the pencil's ominous defect.  He glanced at his notebook with the extraordinary new ideas that the blemish had inspired.  It was while he was reviewing the notes from his previous nights' efforts that he discovered yet another solution.  The pencil need not be permanently scarred.  In fact, the very formulas created from the gash's inspiration could be used to alter and repair the flaw.  Immediately the scientist set to work renewing the life of the pencil which had given him the gift of insight.
He calculated the angles, measured the lengths, and figured the exact plane that could remove the defect without permanently damaging the innate beauty of the pencil.  After finding the solution, the scientist immediately set to work gently whittling the pencil down to its new dimensions.  He scraped and scratched and scuffed, pausing frequently to check his measurements all along the way.  Until finally, the scientist lifted the pencil from his workbench to inspect the product of his labor and wept with pride to see the last vestiges of the old scar removed.  Satisfied at having solved the problem of the disfigured pencil, the scientist tucked the pencil safely into an old book and promptly forgot about it.
The pencil didn't mind having a nice quiet book wrapped safely around its new form.  In fact, with its newly acquired flattened side, it found that it fit quite nicely between the pages of the stuffy volume.  And it gave the pencil some time to look back over its life and stunning journey that had brought it this far.  The pencil had pondered the mysteries of the existence in the hands of the monk, seen the wonders of the world in the hands of the composer, and plunged through the depths of humanity in the hands of the artist.  But in the hands of the scientist it had comprehended the workings of the universe. It knew that it was a very lucky pencil to have been chosen to record such wondrous proofs. And if it never got a chance to formulate another argument, then it would consider itself to have lived a long and fruitful life.

The Epic Tale of the Life of a Pencil: Part 4 of 9

Then one day a young man sat down beside the bench.  The pencil thought this was most unusual because most people sat on the bench and not beside it.  But the young man carried great pads of papers and set those on the bench instead as he stared up at the frolicking birds.  

It was late in spring and most of the pencil's bird friends were furiously competing to impress their potential mates.  The young man was enthralled by the sight of all the wild birds swooping and diving in ever more nimble aerial dances.  So much so that he did not notice the approach of one of the pencil's older friends.  A haggard old bird that was well past the age of lively acrobatic displays, but he still loved to sing for his old pencil friend just has he had every day of his life.  Timidly, he approached the pencil nestled in the grass so near to the strange man.  And steeling himself for this giant creature's reaction, the old bird sang the pencil's favorite lullaby.  The same lullaby his father had taught him to sing to the pencil when he was a just a chick, just as his father had taught before that.

Startled from his reverie by the lovely tune, the young man looked down into the grass just in time to see the frightened old bird flutter away disappointedly.  But there beneath the grass, the young artist spied the pencil just poking up out of the soil.  He reached down and released the pencil from its grimy hiding spot.  Taking a moment to wipe the years of dirt and sand from the pencil, the artist was astounded by the uniqueness of this pencil which the old bird had drawn to his attention.

It was long and elegant as many other pencils, except that it possessed the slightest curve at one end, barely perceptible to even his trained eye.  As the artist placed his sinewy find in his hand, he was amazed at how natural the pencil felt cradled between his fingers.  Other pencils had always caused his hand to cramp after a short while, with their rigidly straight lines.  But this pencil settled into place easily, caressing his hand like an old lover.

Immediately the young artist began to draw on the stack of pages piled on the bench before him.  Inspired, he drew great sweeping strokes, tracing the flights of the birds that had so enraptured him just moments before.  He drew the sharp angled planes of the bench that once hid and protected his new treasure.  He shaded and stippled and cross-hatched for hours on that park bench without tiring in the least.  When every last page before him lay covered with new sketches and the sun eked out its last rays over the park, the artist finally stood, stretching his stiff legs.

The artist was ready to head home after feeling the lateness of the day in his sore legs and back.  But he was surprised at the lack of pain in his drawing hand and wrist.  Quite the contrary, his entire arm felt refreshed and invigorated by the hours he had spent over his designs.  Thrilled with his new tool, the artist gathered up his papers and safely tucked the pencil into his breast pocket, the better to keep his new love close to his heart.

Meanwhile, the pencil felt both exhausted and exhilarated at the same time.  It had never known that it could make such wild careening curves across a page.  Nor that it could stretch out lines across the sheets, back and forth and back and forth again, without ever being lifted from the paper.  Excited by the seemingly endless possibilities, the pencil snuggled into the artist's pocket, eager to explore these new vistas. If only after a short rest first.

But that rest proved to be short lived.  For upon returning to the artist's home, the pencil was bombarded with an array of sights, sounds, and smells it had never beheld before.  There seemed to be a great party afoot.  There were beautiful women in brightly colored clothes with great plumes of feathers and sparkling jewelry adorning every limb.  The pencil heard a constant, if irregular, tinkling of glasses clinked together in toast after toast, each interspersed with coy giggles and great bellowing laughter.  A heady aroma of spiced meats, mulled wines, and sweet breads wafted through every room mixing with the ladies' heavy perfume which barely masked the carnal musk exuded by the people there.

Delighted by the sight of his jubilant friends, the artist dove into the revelry with the wide-eyed pencil still tucked neatly into his breast pocked.  The evening stretched on and the party slowly quieted as two by two, couples paired off to disappear into one of the many private rooms down the hall.  Until finally the artist was left alone with his own lady friend.  It was then that the artist finally pulled the pencil from the safety of his coat pocket.  

There stood on an easel before the artist the greatest sheet of canvas the pencil had ever seen.  It was as tall as the artist himself and twice again as wide.  The sheer blankness of the canvas stood before the artist as intimidating as its size.  But armed with his new pencil, the artist rallied his spirits and calmed his fears. And there, just behind the easel, sat the beautiful lady from the party, reposed in her most natural of states.

The artist began sketching his model to the clean white sheet, unwearied despite the lateness of the hour. With trembling fingers, the artist traced the elegant curves of the woman's body onto his canvas.  Over and over he sketched her form, stopping periodically to check the proportions, determined to capture only the perfections from her beauty.  

As dawn broke, the artist paid the fine lady for her labors and finally collapsed from exhaustion into a heap on the floor, the pencil still clutched gently in his hand.  There on the canvas stood the results of the artist's night's labor: a single perfectly sketched foot.  The artist slept soundly, quite proud of the evenings accomplishments.

The next evening brought a new party, with new ladies, each more exquisite than the next.  And again the artist employed the greatest of them all to serve as model for some small part of his Venus.  Night after night the cycle continued without end as he worked himself to the brink of fatigue with the wonderful pencil that swept away his weariness.

Until finally the sketch was complete with each and every detail painstakingly laid out on the canvas.  Finally satisfied with the drawing, the artist set aside his trusty pencil and pulled out his paints to give his creation the color and depth it deserved.  Poking out from a tiny corner of the studio, the pencil watched in awe as the composition whose creation it had aided began to burst forth from the painting.  The swirling curves became rosy cheeks, the shaded crevasses became shadowy depths, the angular strokes became sharpened corners.

The sun dawned early one midsummer morning as the artist put brush to canvas one final time.  The artist's shoulders slumped from his Herculean efforts to complete the portrait.  He knew without a doubt that he had finally completed the greatest work of his life.  As he stepped back to admire his painting as a while and completed piece, the artist accidentally bumped into the table where the currently unused tools of his trade were stored.  The pencil was jarred from the safety of its perch in the corner where it fell onto an unused palette knife waiting below.  The trajectory of its fall was such that the pencil let out the humblest of screams as the knife etched an indelible gash along the entirety of its side.

Startled at his own clumsiness, the artist quickly spun around to survey the damage to his wares. He carefully inspected each brush handle, pen tip, and knife point as he returned them to their storage place while cleaning up his mess.  Lastly he came upon his magic pencil which had enabled him to work through so many nights without fatigue thanks to her special shape.

Horrified by the violence wrought upon its gently sloping side, the artist tried not to look at the ugly scar which stretch along its length.  But no matter how hard he squeezed his eyes shut, his hand could not escape the feel of the notched curve slicing into his fingers.  His once flawless beauty was now marred beyond repair.

With tears pouring down his eyes, the artist carried his deformed pencil down the long hallway and into one of the many private rooms.  He left it there on a table beside the bed in hopes that his lost pencil could at least enjoy the beauties offered by the building's nightly rituals.

There the pencil sat, appreciating the nightly parade of ladies, each lovelier than the last, reminding him of the wonderful nights it spent with the artist crafting a vision from the the most beautiful of the ladies.  It knew that it was a very lucky pencil to have been chosen to create such vivid illustrations.  And if it never got a chance to sketch another stroke, then it would consider itself to have lived a long and fruitful life.

The Epic Tale of the Life of a Pencil: Parts 1, 2, & 3 of 9

A long long time ago there lived a great tree deep in the heart of the Black Forest of old Germany.  This was the most magnificent tree in all the forest as it stood head and shoulders above all the other trees. Its branches spread out far and wide engulfing all the smaller trees nearby.  Its broad green leaves beamed up at the sun soaking in her daily rays.  Its roots delved deep into the earth drinking in the buried waters from ancient rains.
One day a man came into the forest with an axe in his calloused hands.  He stood gawking before the great tree in silence, awed by her majesty.  He then humbly knelt before the tree and prayed for its blessing, "Dear Glorious Tree, I am but a poor woodsman and carver.  But if you will grant me the gift of your wood, I swear, by all that I am, that I shall create the finest crafts the world has ever seen to befit your grandeur."
Touched by the penitence of the man's words, the tree decided it was better to share its wondrous gifts with the world rather than spend all its days reigning over the lonely forest.  Without a second thought the tree promptly drew up its roots and came crashing down onto the floor of the forest below.
Shocked by the sudden uproar, the wood carver leaped up from his prone position and stared with jaws gaping at the sight of the once magnificent tree now sadly keeled over on its side. He stood perplexed for a moment, careful not to tumble into the massive crater left by the tree's once intricate root system. Finally realizing that the tree had heard and answered his prayer, the wood carver bowed before the great fallen trunk to thank the tree for its tremendous sacrifice.  Then, true to his word, the man set about chopping up the tree to return the pieces home and begin the monumental task of carving the innumerable crafts suitable to honor the tree's memory.
Upon returning home with his bounty the wood carver wasted no time in crafting many fine wares.  He made walking canes for old men, and rocking horses for young boys; broad flat planks for bookshelves and intricate detailed clocks for cuckoo birds; large stately desks and tiny fanciful chess pieces.  He chipped and chiseled and cleaved until his calloused hands cracked and bled, and then he carved some more.
Each time the wood carver emerged from his workshop to deliver his wares to market, the villagers there would hail his latest creation as the best one yet.  Until he returned the next day with an even better craft, sculpted, shaped, and sliced to utter perfection.
The poor wood carver grew very famous from his work.  Townsfolk would gather in his tiny village from hundreds of miles away to buy a piece, any piece created by such an artisan.  Whenever one of his many satisfied customers would complement his on his outstanding work, the wood carver would merely bow his head and say, "Don't thank me, for the power and the beauty is in the wood."
The wood carver spent his whole life sculpting goods from the wood of the great tree.  He made enough profits from selling his crafts to easily provide for his wife and many children.  As he grew into an old man, he decided it was time to retire.  After all, he had used up nearly all of the wood from that enormous tree and was left with a single slender twig plucked from the very top of the tree where the oldest wood had grown.
As the man sat staring at this twig pondering what he could possibly carve out of it or even if his hands still had the strength to complete it, he began to reminisce about his life and the many blessings he had received thanks to the sacrifice of that grand old tree.  Remembering his oath to the tree on that bright spring day so many years ago renewed his resolve. He set to work one final time, determined to create a final masterpiece that would outshine all of his previous works combined.
The old carver rushed to his workshop flushed with inspiration.  He worked tirelessly and for three days and three nights he neither ate, nor drank, nor slept for he was so inflamed with the passion of his life's work.  Finally, exhausted from his efforts the old carver came staggering from his workshop.  Breathless from his exertions he collapsed into his aged wife's arms.  "I've done it. I've finally finished it," he whispered as his heaving chest rattled on his last breath.  The carver's wife wept over her dead husband's body and she looked down to find what had driven him to the brink of his own life.  There, clutched with both hands to his breast, was his final creation: a long, slender pencil.

Now this was no ordinary pencil.  Its delicate tip was finely shaved to a perfect point.  Its shaft stood true and straight as an arrow.  Longer than most pencils of its day, this pencil was sure to have a long and fruitful life.
Still despondent over the loss of her husband, the carver's wife could hardly stand the sight of the pencil.  While it's true that this was certainly the most beautiful pencil ever created, it merely served as a dreadful reminder of her husband's death.
One day she saw a young monk traveling along the road to study at the local monastery.  She ran up to him and pressed the lithe pencil gently into his hands saying, "You are a young and pious man.  Take this gift from my late husband.  May it bring you blessings, for I can only see it as a curse now."
The monk looked at the gift the old woman had bestowed on him and was amazed at the beauty that was infused in this fine pencil.  Taking it as a sign, the monk was instilled with new sense of purpose.
Upon arriving at the monastery the monk was given the task of illuminating manuscripts for the Holy Bible.  Diving into his charge with great zeal, the monk would often stay up late into the night illustrating the great miracles of saints or terrible tribulations of martyrs with the elegant tip of his pencil.  He drew and drew, painstakingly copying the illuminated works.  All the other monks worked tirelessly by his side, but none of them could imbue their manuscripts with the same level of beauty and piety as the young monk with the very special pencil.
Until one morning when the monk arrived at his desk, he looked down at his beloved pencil and realized that he had been using it for so long and drawn so many wonderful illustrations with it, that the tip had worn down to a tiny little nub.  Dispirited at the sad sight of his inspiration, the monk cried tears of regret.  While the monk cherished his pencil and the luminescent drawings it produced, he abhorred the thought of placing blade to wood for fear of permanently damaging the sweet little pencil and forever destroying the exquisiteness it exuded.  In a fit of teary-eyed frustration he cast the pencil aside where it rolled across the room into a crack in the floorboards beneath the organist's seat.
And there the little pencil sat pondering the stories it had helped to write.  While it was still a very young pencil, it knew that it was very lucky to have been chosen to copy the words of such an important text.  And if it never got the chance to write another word, then it would consider itself to have lived a long and fruitful life.

Years passed and still the little pencil sat happily wedged between the floorboards of the old church. Until one day a young musician was sitting in front of a piano where the church's old pipe organ used to rest.  He was desperately trying to complete one of his compositions, but couldn't get the ending quite right and needed to make additional notes.  He searched through all of his pockets, books, papers, and other belongings but had completely forgotten to pack a pencil.  While scrounging around he happened to spy the little pencil wedged between the floorboards just under his seat.
Delighted at his luck, the musician snatched the pencil from its age old hiding spot and quickly resharpened it.  As he listened to the creaking of the razor against the grain of the pencil's wood, the composer was struck by the natural melody emanating from the slender beauty.  Enraptured by his discovery, the composer continued to sharpen his newfound prize until the once dull nub of a tip was restored once again to a razor sharp point.
The composer quickly began making notes on his sheet music.  Line after line was worked and reworked as the composer furiously rewrote his entire concerto, inspired by the simple pleasure of sharpening his new pencil.  The pencil, meanwhile, was overjoyed at finding a new friend.  Moreover, the pencil was enchanted by this new type of writing it was asked to complete: a fantastic array of dots and dashes that scaled up and down a regimented set of parallel lines.  Finally the composer sat down to play the piece that he and his new friend had worked to complete.  Both the composer and the pencil were enchanted by the melodious tune that the sharpened pencil inspired.
The composer was ecstatic with the results and quickly snatched up his books and notes as well as his new pencil which he jubilantly kissed before tucking into his satchel.  The musician then rushed from the old church, inspiring pencil in tow, to share his brilliant composition with the world.
Together they traveled from town to town, then city to city, playing the opus which the pencil had stirred. Having spent most of its life stuck in the stuffy old church, the pencil was enthralled by the wonders of the world it witnessed.  There were fine concert halls stuffed with people and ornate candelabras hanging from the ceiling; small intimate homes with ages of family portraits hanging from the walls; once there was even a small orphanage with grubby faced children skittering about.
Feeling lucky have explored so many exotic new places, the pencil didn't mind when the musician kept it up all night scribbling new notes to scores of new symphonies.  It didn't mind that the musician's fervor got him so aroused that his hands seemed to burn the pencil's wood with the heat of his passion.  It didn't mind that the musician's grip was so tight that the grains in the pencil's wood begin to warp and skew under the pressure.
Then one early spring evening the composer pulled out his trusty pencil to sharpen it again and draw inspiration anew from its charming call.  But after so many years of being held in the fiery vise of the musician's hand, the lovely pencil was no longer straight and tall as in its youth.  So this time when the composer set razor to tip, the pencil released an off key crunch instead of its usual melodic croon.  The musician was shocked and dismayed by the discordant peal emanating from his once beloved pencil.  Saddened by the loss of his old compatriot, the musician walked to his favorite park where the chirping birds reminded him of the melodies his pencil once drew.  There he reverently left the pencil beneath a park bench, hoping for his pencil's sake that one of the birds might pity it enough to weave it into their nest so it could always listen to the chirping tunes of the birds.
The pencil sat for many years beneath the park bench listening to the chirping of the birds and marveling at their calls.  Each spring they would gather to serenade the little pencil before fluttering off to find a mate for the season.  Then summer would rush in with a wave of heat as the birds scurried and fluttered about to feed their young chicks.  Until fall arrived and one by one the nests emptied as each flock headed south for the winter.  Winters were the loneliest times for the pencil, covered by a muffling blanket of snow and abandoned by his bird friends.  The pencil sat and waited for spring to return along with his bird friends, pondering the meanings behind the beautiful music it once helped to create.  It knew that it was a very lucky pencil to have been chosen to create such moving arias.  And if it never got a chance to write another note, then it would consider itself to have lived a long and fruitful life.  Year after year passed and still the little pencil sat happily hidden beneath the park bench.

Kimberly and the Carlsbad Caverns

When my parents were young, my Dad enlisted in the Air Force to avoid being drafted into Vietnam.  One of the places he was stationed was Holloman Air Force base, where Kimberly, my older sister, was born.  Being new parents while stationed half-way across the country from their own families was tough.  So to stave off the feelings of loneliness and isolation, they made a habit of taking frequent trips to various landmarks around the area.  They figured they may as well make the best of what they had.
The trouble is, it was New Mexico.  There's just not a whole lot to see out there besides windswept deserts and the occasional top secret spy plane flying over Roswell.  But there are a lot of National Parks with forests, mountains, and even some intricate cave systems.  Luckily, Carlsbad Caverns, one of the largest and most prolific cave systems in North America, was only a 3 hour drive away from the base.  So once their newborn baby daughter was old enough to make the trip, they packed up the car and headed out on a fine spring day.
Upon arrival they signed up for a ranger guided tour through the caves.  Now, since you can't roll a stroller through the rocky terrain of a cave, Dad had brought along a baby backpack to carry my sister down.  So before they set off into the caverns, Dad loaded up Kimberly onto his back while Mom wrapped her up in a little baby jacket and bonnet to keep her warm in the chilly cave system.  Fully prepared for the hike down to the cavern's Underground Lunchroom and visitor center, the tour group set off following the park ranger single file down the trail.  Dad descended into the caves first with Kimberly strapped safely to his back while Mom followed right behind him to keep an eye on her baby daughter.
The tour group was about halfway through their 750 foot descent into the cavern when Mom looked up from her exertions to see Kimberly happily cooing and giggling as she played with her bonnet.  It was a simple summer cap with a frilly laced brim and a single elastic cord that wrapped around Kimberly's chin to hold it in place.  She had managed somehow to slip her chubby little hand underneath that elastic band and was merrily tugging on it, giggling with delight to feel it tugging back against her.  Kimberly was evidently feeling quite macho that day because she then decided to stretch that poor elastic band as far as it could possibly go when suddenly...
SNAP!  ...mmmbbbwwwaaaAAAHHH!!!!
The band had slipped through her tiny fingers right when it was stretched to the brink and come flying back at the infant, popping her square in the mouth.  Never before has such a happy cooing baby switched so quickly to such ear-piercing irate screams.
As her squalling echoed off the cavern walls, the tour group began to notice that the high-pitched wails were not dying out as you might expect, but instead were growing louder, more urgent, and higher pitched.  Such screeching could not possibly be emanating from the voice of this young child.
Carlsbad caverns is home to over 17 different species of bats.  A recent survey counted over 700,000 individual bats resident in the caverns at once.  In her cries of fear and pain, Kimberly had somehow hit an octave that the bats recognized as a child in distress and all 700,000 of them came flying down from their roosts to rescue the young one.
As the bats began swooping down to attack the tour group, the ranger gave orders for everyone to immediately duck and cover to protect their eyes and faces from the claws of the assailing bats.  Dad, being the well trained military man that he was, quickly followed orders and hunched over to avoid the assault.  Unfortunately, he did so with Kimberly still strapped firmly to his back.  So as he bent down to escape the onslaught, Kimberly was hoisted up to face a rushing tide of screeching, fur-covered, claw-tipped leathery wings.  This did not improve her mood in the slightest and her now panicked cries only served to incite the bats further.
Seeing her child in distress and now exceptionally vulnerable to the attacking bats, Mom leapt into action.  She jumped from her own prone position onto Dad's back while wildly batting at the bats with both arms.  Dad, already unbalance by his own crouched position, was further upended by the flailing weight of Mom upon his thoroughly unprepared back.  In short order the trio went tumbling down the trail until their decline was finally halted by a pair of looming stalagmites.
Luckily, in the tumult Kimberly's cries were finally muffled by the weight of her parents' bodies; reassuring the bats that the alarm had been resolved so they could finally retreat back to their roosts.  Needless to say, after checking that everyone in the tour group had survived relatively unscathed, the park ranger immediately escorted my sheepish parents out of the caverns.
That is why, to this day, children under the age of 3 are not allowed into Carlsbad Caverns.

Uncle Alan and the Coat of Many Arms

My Uncle Alan was the shy introvert you would expect from the typical budding young artist.  Blessed with a soft spoken and easy going nature, Uncle Alan was hardly ever in trouble at school and usually managed to blend in well with his peers.  So it was with much shock and surprise when his mother received an irate phone call from his art teacher.
Not only was she surprised by the uncharacteristic nature of the call, but also because art was his favorite subject in school.  Uncle Alan struggled with the traditional academic classes due to a mild, yet undiagnosed case of dyslexia.  But art class was a place where he could harness his incredible creative talents and really shine like nowhere else in his life.  Every day when Uncle Alan came home from school and his mother would ask about what he had learned that day, he would literally gush about some new project they were working on or new technique they were studying in his art class.  His love for the class wasn't merely limited to the subject matter either.  For every amiable word he had for the class, Uncle Alan found two for the extraordinary mentor he found in his teacher.
"Mrs. Newsome, I need you to come to the school immediately!" the teacher fumed over the phone line, "You need to see what your son, Alan, has done and explain to him that I will not tolerate that level of insubordination in my class."
"Alan?" his mother replied, "I've never known him to harm a fly or speak out of turn to anyone.  Are you sure it's not Kevin?"  Uncle Kevin was his eldest brother and already had a notoriously infamous reputation for his stubborn defiance of any sort of authority.  That combined with his overdeveloped sense of responsibility to stand up to bullies who might pick on his timid baby brothers had led to more than a few fights at school and twice as many phone calls from the principal's office.  After reassuring her that it was indeed her son, Alan, who had committed this horrible offense, his mother relented and agreed to meet the art teacher in her office immediately.
All during the drive to the school, his mother tried to think of what horrible thing her demure littlest son could have done to illicit such a visceral reaction from his favorite teacher.  Did he throw some sort of tantrum?  But the boy never cried.  Did he call the teacher a bad name?  But he hardly spoke up in class at all much less talked back.  Did he vandalize someone else's work?  But he loved all forms of artwork and was well known as someone who regularly encouraged his peers.  Giving up on every scenario she could imagine, she finally arrived at the school and headed quickly to art teacher's office to finally gain an answer to this looming mystery.
"Thank you for coming on such short notice, Mrs. Newsome.  I couldn't show you this over the phone," the teacher explained, "You really have to see what your son has done."
His mother sat attentively awaiting the horrifying sight that had loomed in her imagination throughout the drive to school.  His art teacher reached into her files and produced a drawing created by Uncle Alan over the previous week.  It was a simple pencil drawing of a brown smoking jacket.  It was extraordinary because at the shoulders instead of two arms hanging down, there were instead many arms, each engaged in some different activity.  One held a tobacco pipe with tendrils of smoke wafting up. One was tucked neatly inside the coat's front pocket.  Another manly arm gently lifted the coat sleeve to expose a slender watch attached to its feminine wrist.  An old one waved goodbye to a longtime friend.  While a younger one reached out to shake the hand of a newly made acquaintance.  And yet another one helpfully pointed out directions to a total stranger.  Indeed, there were enough arms coming out of this coat to make a Hindu god feel inadequate.
Impressed with the quality of his work, Uncle Alan's mother sat admiring her son's fine drawing down to the intricate details of wrinkles and hair on the knuckles.  Awakening from her reverie, Mrs. Newsome looked quizzically at the art teacher.  "I'm sorry, I don't understand what's wrong with his drawing."
Frustrated and impatient the teacher huffed, "The assignment, Mrs. Newsome was to draw a coat of arms.  I know your son thinks he is being cute! But I want you to know that I do not tolerate this sort of insolence from my students when I give an assignment."
Mrs. Newsome blinked for a moment, then suddenly burst out into a fit of laughter so hard that tears began streaming down her face.  The consternation of the art teacher grew as she began to believe such insolence ran in the the Newsome family.  Heaving to catch her breath, Mrs. Newsome finally composed herself enough to address the teacher properly, "Did you show him what a coat of arms looks like before he began the assignment?"
"Well, no.  I assumed all the kids had seen one from their family," the art teacher replied uncertainly.
"Well our family doesn't have one.  And Alan, having the creative mind that he does, merely gave his best effort at providing what you asked for: A coat... of ARMS!  I promise you he wasn't being a smart alec.  He just took what you told him and interpreted it literally."
Mortified, the art teacher blanched with embarrassment.  Ever the stately lady, Uncle Alan's mother simply patted the teacher on the shoulder and reassured her, "If you ever have trouble explaining an assignment to him again, just call me and I'll make sure he gives you what you want."
And that was how I first learned that the people in my family just don't think, or see, or hear quite the same way everyone else in the world does.