Sometime in the 1970s, I bought a set of Rapidographs pens, cartridge pens with calibrated tips that give perfectly even lines in a range of widths. One day (and probably night with NoDoz), I drew a couple of plants in the room, plus a couple out of my imagination. A few years later, I gave it to my brother, who had it framed and hung it on his wall. Now the glass is cracked and it's no longer on the wall, but fun to see again.

Also instructive. Clearly, I hadn't studied soil science: my idea of stratigraphy was oddly skewed. Could I ever have been so dumb? Or maybe I knew it was wrong but just wanted to play around with drawing different textures? I prefer to think the latter.

I couldn't get rid of the reflections (still learning the camera).

I remember the plant on the right, because it was the first time I'd noticed the teeny seedlets that hang from the edge of each leaf. Thus, proof that drawing nature forces close observation and a level of learning, if not complete learning, as I doubt my term "seedlets" is correct and I couldn't tell you the name of the plant or anything about it if my life depended on it. The one on the left was probably imaginary.

This one was real. Other information, nil.

I don't know what this is: