Stumbling Toward God?

I fully intended to follow up my last post within a couple of days with some thoughts on graduating from college a whole nine months after I actually finished as well as some points on the nature of family and friendships, perhaps throwing in a little something about my trip to Las Vegas, but I am above all, profoundly lazy. That’s all old news now.

A couple weeks ago I was playing a game on a custom board made by the host of the evenings festivities. The board was very well done and received much praise from all parties. Of course, in my head, it begged comparison with a game I created myself a few years ago, being that they both are maps of real countries and concern actual cities and the routes connecting them. His board, of course, blows mine out of the water. I console myself by emphasizing the fact that I did not have the luxury of working for a company that actually designs mapping software, I had to create that whole thing myself. (Which was complicated given that the United States, as you may or may not know, is far from square.) Further, while he merely took an existing game and substituted a map of France for a map of Germany, I created my game out of nothing in three days. But I doubt that anyone really cares because the sole copy is not in my possession, nor would it be interesting to anyone who was not in 20 Somethings four years ago.

Whatever. These days, I do woodworking. Or at least, I tell people that I do woodworking. Or at least, I used to. I tend to drop a truly ridiculous amount of stuff on the floor when I’m my little shop. There do not happen to be too many things in a woodworking shop that can take a concrete landing with no ill effects. Say, didn’t you used to be a juggler? Like, in a circus and everything? Wow, you must have been HORRIBLE at it. How nice of you to bring that up.

Anyway, my most recent project was a present for a certain child. My initial idea was a toy car, because boys like cars, no? (And not just any car…) But I quickly realized that that was more complicated than I thought it was going to be, and I was on a pretty tight deadline. So I decided instead to go with a sign with our name on it, which was more personal, faster, and just all around better. Of course, I quickly found myself saying, “Man, I sure hope this kid isn’t a perfectionist.” Yeah. Come on, he’s one year old, he’s not even going to know what this is. Which only raises the point that if I did a really sweet job, he could have that thing for his whole life. Or he could toss it out as soon as he is old enough to decorate his own room. Whatever.

Interestingly enough, that means that the only projects that I have totally completed since becoming a “full-time” woodworker have been gifts for other people for specific occasions. Which proves that technically, I actually can get something done if I only have a proper deadline. However, last weekend, I was at a thing at some peoples’ house and THE STUFF IN THAT GUY’S GARAGE THAT HE HAD BUILT HIMSELF MADE ME NEVER WANT TO MENTION MY OWN (lack of) WOODWORKING SKILLS AGAIN.

Now, it seems like whenever I’m being “humble” (or as I prefer to think, “realistic”) about my woodworking there always seems to be someone who wants to point out that I have made guitars before. “Before” being the key word. Back when I was in a school for guitar making, with all the right tools, having my hand held the whole way. And I will admit, they are two of the best looking guitars that you are likely to lay eyes on. But the fact that neither one of them is actually playable is really a source of embarrassment for me so let’s all stop bringing it up, shall we?

In any case, on Tuesday of last week I finally hit “critical mass” of frustration with my current tools and decided to research and calculate out exactly how much it would cost to equip a shop with reasonable tools. In the meantime, a friend of mine had joined a band and started doing some recording, which reminded me, “Say! Wouldn’t this be a good time to actually mix and master that CD that I recorded two years ago?” So I spent some time on that, only to realize that I suu-huck at mixing. Which was not particularly a surprise to me, it is just kind of amusing because that is technically what my “real” job is. (No wonder Orange County is so upset.) It did not help any that my source material was sub-par. I wouldn’t buy this… why the heck should anyone else? Of course, considering that I have purchased a – count them: “a” – song(s) in the past four years, perhaps what I would buy is not an effective measure of quality music. Regardless, I really just wanted to use this project to get the wheels moving musically to allow for some more interesting stuff that I have planned, but no, those drums are freaking killin’ me and I’m really going to have to work something else out. Someday.

But however hard I want
I know deep down inside
I’ll never really get more hope
Or any more time
— The Cure