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Pen Jen's Inkwell Podcast

Pen Jen's Inkwell Podcast

By: Jen Waters
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About this listen

 Welcome to the Jen Waters' Pen Jen’s Inkwell Podcast! Jen wrote and performed all the original stories in the podcast. This podcast is produced by Eric Baines, who scored all the stories and poems in the series to public domain and original music. The podcast is associated with the blog of the same name, Pen Jen’s Inkwell, www.penjensinkwell.blogspot.com, which can be found on her website: www.jenwaters.com. It features the children's music and spoken word stories from her Apple Music releases, including WONDERLAND, WINTER WONDERLAND, IMPOSSIBLE THINGS, CURIOUSER AND CURIOUSER, ENTIRELY BONKERS, HANDWRITTEN, HOOPS TIME, THE GREAT PUZZLE, and more.
During the summer of 1994, Jen attended Berklee College of Music in Boston, Mass. In 1999, Jen graduated as an S.I. Newhouse Scholar from the School of Public Communications at Syracuse University with a major in magazine journalism and minors in music and in English and textual studies. She took the TV, radio, and film classes in sound production. She also took classes at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs of Syracuse University. During her junior year, she studied abroad for a semester in London, England. Upon graduation, Dean Rosanna Grassi awarded her with the Henry J. Wolff Prize for the graduating senior deemed most proficient in journalism.
She has written for such Pennsylvania publications as HARRISBURG Magazine, THE PATRIOT NEWS, and THE TIMES LEADER. She also wrote for seven years in the Washington, D.C., media, mostly human-interest stories.
"Yellow Roses," a song Jen co-wrote, became the grand-prize winner in the country category of the 2005 Session-I John Lennon Songwriting Contest. She has performed at various places such as the ASCAP Writer's Showcase at the Kennedy Center with host Stephen Schwartz, Genghis Cohen, Hallenbeck's, Hotel Cafe, the Koffeehouse Sundance Film Festival Chateau, and the Durango Songwriters Expos. Music-industry veteran Judy Stakee has mentored her.
In August 2014, Jen released a 33-song collection through Pen Jen Songs called WHIMSY. In April and May 2016, she re-released the WHIMSY songs as WHIMSY FOR ONE and WHIMSY FOR TWO, each with an original Christmas song. In March 2017, she released PURITY, a 12-song collection with a pop-classical influence. In April 2019, she released SIMPLICITY, a 20-song pop collection. In March 2022, she launched FATE, 17 original pop songs.
Combining her love for music and children, she founded Pen Jen Productions and created a children's novel and musical series, THE WHIRLWIND CHRONICLES: THE MAGIC MUSIC BOX, THE HORSE GATE, and DREAMS OR DUST. She also wrote KISSES, a musical based on the life of chocolatier Milton S. Hershey.
She is an ASCAP member and a nominee for the ASCAP Joe Raposo Children's Music Award. She has hundreds of stories and pop tunes yet to be written.Copyright Jen Waters Art Literary History & Criticism
Episodes
  • The Dilemmas of Daisy Dimple

    The Dilemmas of Daisy Dimple
    May 3 2023
    A smile and a flower can change lives.
    Daisy Dimple can't smile enough. At age 10, she plants flowers everywhere she goes, even in parking lots and sidewalks. She loves their scent and the beauty they bring to the world. Her 13-year-old brother Billy is a bully who’s jealous of her daisies and magic “hypnotizing” dimple. He calls her “Crazy Daisy,” and she nicknames him “Lil’ Boy Buster.” Daisy wishes she had enough courage to stand up to him once and for all—but she’s just too nice. Grandpa Blum hires Daisy and is confident she can build a garden for his Fourth of July party.
    Daisy branches out with many different flowers, and she finishes the garden two days before the party. The money will go to her class field trip—a day at the beach without her brother. Lil’ Boy Buster angrily floods the flowers and lets out a cage of rodents in the garden. Determined to rebuild the garden, Daisy sets traps for the rodents, levels the ground, and brings in new flowers. She stays up all night guarding the garden. The next day she plants even more flowers right up until the four o’clock party, but still isn’t done. So, when neighbors arrive, Daisy asks them each to plant a flower and contribute to finishing the garden. Of course, her magic dimple makes them say: “Yes.” The neighbors each want Daisy to build them a garden of their own.
    Lil’ Boy Buster sneaks through the back fence with a large water gun and the garden hose. He tries to flood the garden again, but Daisy wrestles him to the ground and plants a flower on his head. It takes root, and he can’t pull it out of his head. He yells and screams in embarrassment. When Daisy’s parents see the wonderful garden in Grandpa Blum’s backyard, they are upset at Lil’ Boy Buster and ask Daisy to transform their backyard into a beautiful paradise as well. Lil’ Boy Buster can no longer call Daisy “crazy.” She suggests that he replant the flower from his head in Grandpa Blum’s garden. If he decides to replant it, instead of destroying it, Daisy is sure it will come out of his head without a problem. So, Lil’ Boy Buster plants the awkward flower from his head in Grandpa Blum’s garden, and he slumps off in defeat, swearing to return in victory.
    The garden party is a huge success. Daisy will have more than enough money for her class field trip and decides to donate the rest of her money to planting a garden at the local Community Center.
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    19 mins
  • Mandy Dandie's Pink Lemonade

    Mandy Dandie's Pink Lemonade
    Mar 30 2023
    With a little pink lemonade and a little musical magic, one special little girl can save her endangered neighborhood.
    Mandy Dandie refuses to let Sherwood Neighborhood—which is going downhill fast—be turned into a major freeway. People are unemployed and don’t talk to each other except to fight. Ruben Gruff offers to buy their backyards, and they’re thrilled about the much-needed cash, but Mandy, 10, is upset about losing the old oak trees. She sets up a lemonade stand: she’ll give the money to her neighbors, so they’ll reject the disastrous project.
    Mandy’s first attempt with her “secret recipe” hardly sells so she uses all her coins to purchase an odd pink lemon tree. This new pink drink is a hit. And . . . everyone who drinks the magic lemonade sings about secret worries and dreams, and then forgets they did so. Mandy just listens. Gruff the developer downs a cup and sings his secret plan to run a four-lane highway through the neighborhood, making him a millionaire at the expense of all those homes.
    At the council meeting, Ruben hands out sales contracts. Mandy tries to warn everybody and tell them of his plan, but Ruben argues she’s not on the agenda, and Mandy is not allowed to speak. She walks home in tears. Mandy drags her pink lemon tree to the next meeting. People crowd around and are soon singing the truth. The neighbors all sympathize and encourage each other. Ruben then drinks and reveals his own devious secret. The neighbors band together and reject Gruff Construction’s plans. Mandy and her pink lemonade save Sherwood Neighborhood.
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    19 mins
  • The Potter's House

    The Potter's House
    Feb 4 2023
    Being a willing vessel in the hands of the Potter can bring never-ending miracles.
    As legend has it, anyone who is a pottery student of Sage Conrad, a renowned potter in Charleston, South Carolina, is sure to experience a miracle, not like a hokey, made-up one, but a deep, mystical encounter that caused the person to change from the inside out. She is known for her studio called The Wheel. Like most mornings, her longtime friend Alfred Odin sits in the back of the studio while Sage teaches a class. He reshapes the clay on his wheel, unable to get the clay to do what he wants. He gives Sage a hard time for always trying to teach her students life lessons.
    Sage kisses Alfie on the cheek and chides him for hiding his rosary in his pocket. For someone who loves to curse God, she thinks he has a funny way of always carrying a cross in his pocket just in case God might be watching. Alfie is angry that Sage tells everyone his secrets. As his rosary sticks out of his pocket, he uses his fingers to open the clay. Since his bowl is a bit lopsided, he starts over again, kneading the clay like dough.
    “O Lord, You are our Father, we are the clay, and You our potter; and all of us are the work of Your hand,” Sage reads from the hand-carved sign at the front of her class, quoting Isaiah 64:8. She asks her students what they will allow God’s hands to make of their lives. She also asks them what they will make with their own hands. Alfie mumbles that he has heard her speech so many times that he could give it himself. Sage talks about being a willing vessel for the purposes of the Lord. She asks her students to stand up and sing praise. She leads them in singing “Have Thine Own Way, Lord.” Alfie wearily conducts from the back of the room.
    Then, Sage proceeds to teach the basics of making pottery on a wheel. Sage looks at Alfie’s latest creation with a critical eye. Then, Alfie insists that Sage has been in love with him since they were teenagers, but she could never admit it. Sage smiles, sitting down in front of a treadle wheel to teach the class her techniques firsthand. On the contrary, Alfie is so stubborn and hard-headed that sometimes he misses the blessing as a “crackpot,” she jokes. Despite the spat between Sage and Alfie, the students craft their clay jars with care. By the end of the day, the pupils have each made some sort of earthen vessel, ready for the first firing of the kiln, and then the glazing, and then firing their handiwork for the second time. Sage hopes that every time her students look at their finished creations, they can remember that they are willing vessels. There is no greater honor than to be clay in the hands of the Potter.
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    12 mins
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