Penmaking program is a good outlet for seniors
December 26th 2009 10:30
Signature Tune
By Erik Lacitis
Seattle Times staff reporter
Charlotte Vincent uses a handle built by Ron Schroder to hold her piece of wood as she rolls and rubs it over a sandpaper block to shape the pen piece.
Maybe you're in your 20s or 30s or 40s, and oh so busy in a hyperkinetic TwitterFacebookiPhone world. You start twitching if you haven't checked messages in the past minute.
So it's hard to fathom a time, decades from now, when the highlight of your day will be ... making a handcrafted wood pen.
That's because you're not 89, like Charlotte Vincent.
Vincent didn't think she'd be making wood pens back when she was younger, either.
"Never even thought about it," she says.
You get old, you'd be surprised in what you find fulfillment.
Vincent remembers her busy younger days, before blood vessels lost elasticity, bones shrank, and the number of neurons in the brain decreased.
She raised six children, bouncing around the country as the family followed her late Navy husband, Warren.
"Each child was born in a different state," says Vincent.
Vincent says she wishes that her grandmother had been a little more talkative about what it's like getting old. Kind of prepared her, you know?
"All those aches and pains and bad days, and how it's harder to concentrate," says Vincent.
That's why Vincent feels pretty good after spending six hours to make one pen using only hand tools — no lathes, nothing that needs to be plugged into an electrical outlet. At 89, you needn't be using power tools.
She's part of a group of half-a-dozen women at the Aegis at Totem Lake assisted-living facility in Kirkland who, for the past two years, have met twice a week to make the pens.
Grandma made this
The women have made some 300 of the smooth, shellacked pieces (which include some letter openers) that show off the intricate grain and color of marblewood, pink ivory, ironwood and other fine woods.
Usually, the pens are gifted to family and friends, for whom the pens mean a lot: Grandma made this for you.
"I accomplished something," says Vincent about the pens. "So much of what we do here is busywork just to keep you occupied."
She means all those activities at Aegis, a nice place for those lucky enough to have a good nest egg. The all-inclusive rates start at $3,000 a month for a studio, and go up to $7,000.
The facility looks like a lodge and the staff is friendly. There is an indoor aviary with waterfalls and a koi pond. There are movies after dinner, and outings to casinos.
Still, as nice as the facility is, in the giving-meaning-to-one's-life category, for Vincent, handcrafting a wood pen beats playing a bingo game.
The project here is the brainchild of Ron Schroder, of Kirkland, whose father-in-law lives at the facility.
Schroder is no spring chicken himself. He's 62 and retired two years ago as a communications designer. He took up woodcrafting, having always been fascinated with that art.
Soon enough, he says, he bought a lathe and "my garage was a mess."
Moment of inspiration
Schroder happened to read an article in Woodcraft Magazine titled, "From the hands of Alzheimer's."
It told of the Penwright program started in 2005 by volunteer and woodcraftsman Larry Beckwith at an assisted-living center in Granger, Ind.
Handcrafting pens had helped residents who had mild to moderate dementia and become depressed over their memory loss and confusion, said Beckwith. The story told how the simple act of making a wood pen helped patients, and adults in general, when participating in an activity with a motor component.
Beckwith had designed simple hand tools with which users could "turn" pens without power tools.
And so Schroder decided to try Beckwith's program at Aegis, hoping his father-in-law would participate.
That first introductory session in May 2007 left Schroder a bit disillusioned. Male residents at Aegis were asked to the session, Schroder figuring woodcrafting would appeal more to men.
About five men said they were interested. Then they saw what was involved. Then they told Schroder, thanks, but no thanks.
"They're lazy," says Nadine Nystrom, 68, one of the women in woodworking group, about why the guys wouldn't craft wood pens.
Says another woman, Jary Ward, 71, "Well, I think the men felt they had worked all their life and didn't need to do anything that strenuous anymore."
The women happened to be in the lobby when they saw Schroder's disappointment after that introductory session to the men went bust.
"We said, 'We want to do it,' " says Ward.
The pen-making group has been together ever since. Schroder now has expanded it to four other locations.
It's not a big-cost venture. Schroder donates his time. The women (and some men, in the other locations) buy the wood and pen parts, which comes to maybe $4 per pen. Some of the women have sold their pens, one selling pens at $45 each.
Schroder says he's shown the pens done by the women to fellow woodcrafting hobbyists, and that they're amazed at the quality, and more amazed that they were all done with hand tools.
At age 62, Schroder has plenty of time before he reaches 89.
Right now, he's running around, picking up supplies, running the workshops.
You know, that busy life.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, between 2000 and 2050, there will be a 147 percent increase in people older than 65. That's three times more than the general population will increase.
"This is getting me ready," says Schroder about making the pens at Aegis, "so I can have something to do when I wind up here."
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