A Positive Future
Working on a new project this past week made the week pass all too quickly. Chopping mortise holes and cutting tenons, ploughing out grooves in oak and then surface planing the stuff from bandsawn cuts left me well exercised yesterday with no complaints fitness wise. If I was at all tired it was trying out the gymnastics to work out the outcome of the general election by staying up to late for the election results. Looking back it was an unnecessary stopover rarely taken for me that did me little good. But it is important to see the developments as everything affects everything in one way or another. The ‘other worldliness’ of politics always influences my positive sense of expectation but sometimes leaves me feeling deflated. This one has left me wondering but thankfully I have plenty of wood in, a garage, a workbench and my hand tools. Sanity reigns!
Whereas my woodworking always warms me in so many ways, taking my expectations of myself and others ever higher makes me ever reflective. I reflect on a decade or so ago when I entered a political realm I never thought I would ever enter. In January 2009 I was walking the corridors of the West Wing and being greeted by the First Lady’s assistant who walked me into the West Wing.
There I would place my two designs along the wall between the door leading to the Oval Office. This I felt well equipped to handle. A decade ago, then, there I was at 60 working through the nights for over a month to finish two credenzas I’d designed for Cabinet Room. There was nothing dark about it. The logs were burning in the wood stove and snow falling outside made me aware of the time of year. I could rely on this. The US would soon have it’s new President Obama in office and everything felt new and positive.
We have a new videographer working with me, Will, he’s not a woodworker so he must learn about my moves on the job as it were, — in the saddle — and very quickly. He’s doing really well and he fits in with everyone on the team. When I switch from one end of the wood and he’s on the close it is hard on him to get there in time and often I am in the zone where I have been and gone and moved on. What to do? One piece of wood, one cut done and chips already on the floor???
The tenseness between muscle and joints grows as the hours pass. I am a high self-demand woodworker relying constantly on movement and efficiency. Thankfully my bench height is perfected and the tools close to hand. Nothing’s wasted and especially my energy. I made a mistake on the project but it wasn’t the working and the work that exhausted me but the emotion. Even though I could fix the mistake and retrieve some of what I lost, the emotional drain goes deeper sometimes. It’s the disappointment emotionally that can sap your strength and the benefit of prototyping means the mistakes can be filled with a slither or a chunk and you can carry on; it also keeps record of what went wrong so that you don’t go there again. In my case and this time I had lost the plot. Thankfully all things can be reconciled in a prototype before you get to the real deal and make a film of it!
The joints I am making seem to fit nicely and the shoulder lines are tight pretty much straight off. As the corners meet I realise that I am removing contention with chisel strokes to the wood or then the plane too. I realise that the human body is the most remarkable machine of all. After fifty-five years performing the same tasks I still have not needed any replacement bits. How amazing is it that that I have cut hundreds of thousands if hand cut joints without changing a thing and I have a good back, good legs, hips, neck, arms and hands too. Yes, they get tired, but only through natural working and never through pain. Should I leave my hands and arms to science? Funny thing is, when I was a machinist for a period of a few short years, my back went out regularly and so too my neck, legs and hips. Of course I have done things unrelated to work that have caused pain elsewhere. That’s different.
I encourage everyone where they can to exercise through steady and careful hand working at the workbench. It stretches the mind and then other parts too. Start out gently. Your hands and arms are not used to chopping. Take your time and listen to your body. Keep sharpening your tools and don’t underestimate the importance of sharp edges. This alone can reduce the energy expended by fifty percent and it always results in a good outcome.
It’s always a pleasure to read your blog. Thank goodness the election is over and the radio can discuss something else.
I’d love to hear the story how an Englishman in the USA came to be chosen to design two cadenzas for the White House. What an incredible honour and recognition that is. Although your back home, something of you remains in the USA, which judging by your previous tales was a new beginning for you.
I was surprised ( on the other side of the pond) to hear the outcome of Brexit.
I can’t say I’m not pleased by the decision even though it has no discernible effect on me. It’s just that I don’t think we are ready for a “new world order” just yet. I think that people are smart when it comes to these things, “will of the people and all that but I’m just an American who doesn’t know any better.
Work is certainly therapeutic, I knew a guy who was almost beaten to death in a prison riot ( he was a guard). He quit that job after getting disability to become a machine scraper, a now almost ….obsolete trade. Anyway he looked like a muscle man, the doctors were amazed he was in such good shape and credited his job to his well being. They originally said he would be a cripple the rest of his life.
If you don’t know what scraping is you might appreciate that it involves removing metal by tenths of a thousands of an inch….., by hand. It’s very strenuous and it takes years of training to be good at it.
Anyway Paul you struck another chord, and there is a lot of truth in it.
Thanks Paul. I too find politics to be unrewarding to watch. I should ditch tv and only subscribe to a once weekly newspaper. I would probably be happier for it.
I want to be an apprentice
Be careful what you wish for. It takes an exceptional crafting artisan to apprentice someone and these days they are harder and harder to find.
I could come.
If I can’t as reality informs me,,,
I will have to act as if I am doing one.
So far my efforts have been stymied by setbacks and my thoughts.
I may be a dreamer but I always have to think their is something good in me and I can change.
“And if the whole wide world stops singing
And all the stars go dark
I’ll keep a light on in my soul
Keep a bluebird in my heart”
Thanks for sharing that little nugget “It’s the disappointment emotionally that can sap your strength…”. But it never even occurred to me that others may feel that way, so it’s good to know it’s not just me.
A quote;
“Psychologists say that of all occupations carpentry is the most perfectly balanced between the aesthetic, mental and physical faculties.”
The Village Carpenter
by Walter Rose. 1937
my life led me into the service industry by chance, where everything is intangible. after years of managing large hotels and working what seemed like every moment i was awake, often 7 days a week, i took leave to learn the art of furniture making, as i had always been drawn to it. the simple pleasure of seeing something i created take shape is immense, and the satisfaction of knowing it will still be there in many years to come is one of the greatest pleasures available to man. i also understand the self disappointment when the idea you had is foiled by a silly mistake lol. but as they say, a true master is one because he knows how to fix it.
Pretty eagle!
I’m finishing a cabinet that needed to be done quickly, so no time for a prototype, just a drawing. Luckily, it’s simple. Nevertheless, the cabinet doors have eight little hidden compartments where I forgot to account for the haunch when laying out the mortises. They are all invisible and inaccessible. There’s a ninth little hidden compartment where I mis-cut one haunch. It’s at the top of the upper door, facing the ceiling. I may make a tiny scroll that says, “From the maker: Oops! 2019,” and then smile thinking about when someone might actually find that little note-in-a-mortise.
Merry Happy-Christmas.