Wednesday, November 03, 2010:
Workshop
Time is not kind. I won't bother trying to summarize everything that's happened in the past five update-free years; I know all my readers are gone, with perhaps one exception. Hi Alfred! So let's just get to what has prompted me to write again:
My father has a carpentry job, the first in months. He needs someone to help him, and yesterday I agreed to do it. It will probably take around a week. I was very hesitant about it; being in close quarters with my father can be a hell worth no amount of money. I'm not sure why I said yes, exactly. We started today, and before I was even officially "on the clock", dad was demonstrating his masterful talent for bullshit.
To my surprised relief, though, he mellowed out pretty fast once we got in the shop and started working. I've been starting to develop a sense in the past month, probably a decade overdue, that he needs art in some form to be happy, and through that happiness somewhat mentally healthy, and that form for him is usually carpentry. Which is something he's been doing less and less of for the past five years or so.
I started this post too late. Let's see if I can power through.
Several years ago my father tried to start a business making rocking horses. Many people pointed out to him over and over that his business plan wasn't so much full of holes as entirely composed of a single giant one, but despite this he persisted in pouring roughly thirty thousand dollars into that hole over the course of two years. He never really appeared to come to terms with the fact that it wasn't working; instead, he just eventually ran completely out of money. At present count, there are twenty-six completed rocking horses still in his workshop, hanging from ceiling hooks; this does not include the shelves of parts for horses that were never assembled. These are the leftovers, the ones dad couldn't give away as gifts, or convince friends to buy and give away as gifts themselves.
I haven't spent much time in his workshop since the router accident.
(Nope, looks like I can't power through. Crap. This is getting fixed in the morning, when this message will be removed.)
Time is not kind. I won't bother trying to summarize everything that's happened in the past five update-free years; I know all my readers are gone, with perhaps one exception. Hi Alfred! So let's just get to what has prompted me to write again:
My father has a carpentry job, the first in months. He needs someone to help him, and yesterday I agreed to do it. It will probably take around a week. I was very hesitant about it; being in close quarters with my father can be a hell worth no amount of money. I'm not sure why I said yes, exactly. We started today, and before I was even officially "on the clock", dad was demonstrating his masterful talent for bullshit.
To my surprised relief, though, he mellowed out pretty fast once we got in the shop and started working. I've been starting to develop a sense in the past month, probably a decade overdue, that he needs art in some form to be happy, and through that happiness somewhat mentally healthy, and that form for him is usually carpentry. Which is something he's been doing less and less of for the past five years or so.
I started this post too late. Let's see if I can power through.
Several years ago my father tried to start a business making rocking horses. Many people pointed out to him over and over that his business plan wasn't so much full of holes as entirely composed of a single giant one, but despite this he persisted in pouring roughly thirty thousand dollars into that hole over the course of two years. He never really appeared to come to terms with the fact that it wasn't working; instead, he just eventually ran completely out of money. At present count, there are twenty-six completed rocking horses still in his workshop, hanging from ceiling hooks; this does not include the shelves of parts for horses that were never assembled. These are the leftovers, the ones dad couldn't give away as gifts, or convince friends to buy and give away as gifts themselves.
I haven't spent much time in his workshop since the router accident.
(Nope, looks like I can't power through. Crap. This is getting fixed in the morning, when this message will be removed.)
