Item #31: Robyn Mug

In a holiday tidy-up of my desk, I repatriated some mugs from their roles as pen-holders to their proper place in the kitchen cupboard. This one I call the Robyn Mug for obvious reasons.

The mug comes from one of those paint-your-own-pottery places called Crankpots (the Vancouver location is no longer operating). As a team activity for work in 2009-2010ish, we booked an evening at the shop for the 12+ of us, with aim of everyone painting their own mugs to reduce using disposable coffee cups. A team-building-slash-environmental exercise. There was the added benefit of personalizing your mug sufficiently to prevent (or at least reduce) the likelihood of others using it.

I don’t recall why I went with green, but it works well with the rest of the colours and design. Around my name are musical notes to reflect the singer in me. I always like sun-and-moon-and-stars decorations, so they’re there, too.

Of course, I had to include my nickname – Beans – for those who know me primarily as that. On the bottom, we were instructed to paint a little apple, so that the shop would know which mugs belonged to our group. I added the little doggy footprints as homage to beloved pooches.

As it did at home, the mug was relegated to pen holding duty at the office, and moved with me from space to space during my time there. I noticed that the same was true for several others in the team, with mugs and cups used for pens and paper clips (one person used it for a plant). For me, it was out of fear of losing or breaking it that led to me not using it for its intended purpose. Not that it is a thing of beauty, but it was nonetheless precious by being unique and from a fondly remembered time.

The mug is now back in the cupboard and gets regular use for coffee and tea. When it’s on my desk while I’m working, I can look at those blue lines and be calmed by thinking of the waves.