Franklin Funny Pen

Welcome to Part 1

Take me to Part 2, please.

Take me to Part 3, please.

Allow me to tell you the story of a pen.  His name, quite frankly, was Franklin.  Franklin Funny Pen.  There are many kinds of pens; some are thin, others fat.  Some have clips, and others are more naked; there are highlighters, permanent inkers, ball-point and flair.  I bet you did not know this, but they all have names.  All of them.  Yes; for instance, the one I am using to write this story goes by the name of Frederick Franklin Roosevelt Smithers Foolo-Graham.  (Now I am typing on a computer, but originally the story was written with different pens.) 

Franklin is a popular name for pens, for some reason.  I do not know why.  Nor do I know exactly where pens acquire their names; as you know, they do not procreate like humans; it would be absurd to assume that there are pen families.  There are, in fact, pig-pens; that is, those who are half-pig and half-pen, and these are known to have familial structures. 

But alas.  Franklin Funny Pen was skinny and semi-transparent.  His lightweight body carried black ink.  You know how most “black” pens aren’t really black, but dark purple?  Yes?  No?  Don’t believe me?  Try it.  Get a black piece of construction paper and scribble “black” pen lines onto it.  Step 2:  Hold the page in the light.  3:  See the purpleness.

There’s another way to test this, and it’s by going to the official Color Man.  He is blind, but sees and discerns all colors.  I do not know how exactly, but such is the nature of life.  Paradoxes exist everywhere, and yet there are no paradoxes.  Just kidding.  Not.  What I mean to say is, sometimes when you encounter something true, it is also paradoxical.  For instance, there is a saying that says, “The further you travel, the less you know.”  Good thing I have not traveled much in my lifetime!  Psyche.  I’m sure you understand the quote.  My point is, sometimes people who seem weak or who are going through struggles are actually stronger than someone whose life is easy and carefree.  Sometimes it’s the fools who understand the workings of life.  Sometimes it’s the blind who see.

F.P., as his friends called him, was unique because he wrote in black ink.  Even the official Color Man knew.  F.P. would write stories, letters, poems, and thoughts wherever there was a spare page.  In fact, the world to him was a piece of paper on which he could write his story.  Yes, he would inscribe words on walls and tables and windows and trees.  There was one palm tree nearby F.P.’s house, on which he wrote the words

      Grow tall, palm tree

      Grow tall!  The storms may fall

      Like violent seas;

      Grow tall; not high

      For winds will toss you 'round.

      Grow tall, palm tree:

      Grow your frozen roots

      Underground. 

Who was the first man to walk on the moon?  You should know this.  If not, ask your parents, because they should be able to tell you.  If not, maybe they could ask their parents; your grandparents, that is.  And if they don’t know, then I’m not sure what you can do.  I guess I can tell you now:  it was Neil Armstrong.  That name may be forever remembered.  A simple name, if you think about it.  It has a rhythm to it; we’re used to hearing it so much, at least my generation is.  I don’t know if your generation is aware of his name.

The first pen to fly to the moon was – yes – F.P.  Franklin Funny Pen.  I am not sure how he did it.  How could he have broken the earth’s gravitational pull?  Physically, it’s impossible.  There are some theories theorizing that he wrote his way to the moon.  That is, he turned air and the wind into thin sheets of paper and wrote thoughts and ideas, struggling against the forces of nature, until he broke the pull and floated all the way to the moon.  Once there, he wrote:

      O moon, O smiling face

      Do you weep?  When you look

      on this earth, so green, so gray

      Can you sleep?  Or are you forever chained

      to follow your path around this rock?

      O moon, looking down, looking up

      like a mirror shining light

      through your never-ending night

      O moon, come soon 

      and find us doing something right.

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