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.