A Thought About Christmas

I think it is often a difficult time of year for many, especially is this so at the close of long periods of uncertainty, isolation and diversely different pockets of unrest. Current unpredictabilities of unrest defies much of what we have known in our individual cultures. It seems we have all developed a more international recognition of words we never knew to include in our languages, words such as Pandemic, COVID, jab and many, many more. Of course, the pandemic has also exposed the deeper need in many of us for the cohesiveness of community, inclusivity, non-judgementalism and such. Keep well is now replaced by the word well-being, judgementalism by tolerance loneliness by neighborliness, and we do all of this by seriously thinking about other people we might not have thought so much about before this time and through the pandemic's ability to touch anyone and everyone everywhere.

With Christmas so near to those who acknowledge its sense of cultural significance in warmth and affection, even without its religious connotations, it often becomes reflective of a season or year's past in which we lived. We consider those we know and don't know at all, the circumstances of so many people, peoples and cultures alongside those now escaping oppression and those searching for a new future beyond the cultures they owned and lived in and now find themselves in search of new beginnings. This is where I found myself these past weeks as I searched to pick through news for a truthfulness I too could actually understand and believe to be a solid truth. As a crafting artisan, I have always found great meaning in and through the simplicity of making. I still do. When I cannot fathom the injustices of so many elements we call life, in the midst of bitter exchanges between elected leaders of the world, my hands begin to make and I make something that did not and could not exist without my handling the wood and the tools. Suddenly the world seems to make better sense of the senseless. I shape and carve the pieces until they interlock and wonder why the same reductive practice I use cannot work between cultures and societies as a mosaic composition that compliments all differences. Woodworking is indeed a total reductive process from beginning to end. A tree is felled and separated from its rootedness and the ever more reductions reduce the great mass of stem into the rails and stiles and tops and bottoms where panels bridge the great divides in between those parts span the great divides.

I am finishing up some gifts in my garage workshop. Many fewer this year than last. I have made so much this year that my creative juices feel just a tad depleted. One thing stands out to me though. I have a granddaughter who began coming into the workshop every other week or so. A year ago she could barely lift a spokeshave but now, with a little help, she can peel off shavings one after another. I cannot do my own work if she is in the workshop with me, but it is not an issue as I love seeing how her mind and hands and body works. As soon as she comes in she grabs her two-step platform to gain the height she needs to the benchtop and the vise area. Immediately her eyes search for her own red spokeshave and she lifts it to midair in anticipation that I might just 'magic' some wood into the vise for her to shape and shave. Her mind is a sponge and her concentration at the beginning of the year took all of my attention for direction.

But yesterday, in one continuous wave of concentration, she and I made a simple clock from a salvaged section of mesquite I had kept in my rack of offcuts. Together we drilled thirteen holes, made an ebony dowel of 6mm and made the punctuation dots of the dividing hours of a day. As she doggedly inserted the tiny-toothed Zona saw into the mitre box and started sawing, she reached for my hand to push too. It wasn't because she needed my hand to guide and give power so much as to include me in the process. My granddaughter never wants anyone to be left out, you see. The dots fell and rolled onto the benchtop and the floor and this became a game of catch and retrieve. I was so surprised when she lifted the cross pein hammer to drive them into the 6mm holes we had previously drilled in regular succession. She just loved the huge brace and bit and again reached for my hand to hold to the pad and placed it exactly where it was needed. She lifted and turned the braces in regular and measured pace until she had counted to five--the set depth she now knew would set the final depth of the holes. We changed the bit and drilled out the centre hole all the way through and inserted the movement ready for the clock hands. The spokeshave and sandpaper rounded the edges and smoothed out the snags. She again took my hands to feel "how soft" it was and we were ready for the finish. A safe finish and a forgiving one is vegetable oil. You can apply a coat with a rag of soft cloth and the colour pops beautifully. It can be repeated every few months to restore the deep colour.

In an age where there seems to be an 'ism' for everything, inclusivity is key to a better future. The able should never disable the already disabled but look into what can be done to equip, accept and enhance the wonderful results of support. I am glad my granddaughter is able to accept my age as a positive in her life. We not only feed the wild birds of our natural world we share together, we also enjoy our working together at the workbench. I watched artists working around me in my workshop over the recent weeks completing their work and was amazed at what inclusivity can bring to us to enrich our world. Makers at the bench, yes, but then makers in a digital world creating the most beautiful videos and editing them. People who enhance the work in so many ways that seem ever to hover almost silently in the background that suddenly burst into laughter at something seen or said or considered really funny.

I hope we can all see the fun side of life to include those in their dark and often unsee moments. A workbench and a vise, some wood and some shavings. We all have something to give from when we are makers. Shavings might be messy, but they are wonderful packing for the delicate things called life. And yes, that is more than just a metaphor!