Flow

Apologies for my recent silence. Busy, you know, with things and then the ball gets rolling and when you finally look up it’s what? May? July?? And I missed those opportunities so I’m finally back with more musings.

I’m building a new shop for myself now. Let me rephrase that. I’m paying folks to build me a new shop right now. They will make choices about lumber or nailing patterns or discarded chunks of good plywood that make me grit my teeth in dismay. And my response to them is always, “That is fantastic.”

My motto for carpentry is ‘Get ‘er done’. I’ll worry about the fixes later. This new shop build got held up by Covid and lumber prices and then finding people to work at all. Having a roof and walls up right now is a huge accomplishment. The final design details I have yet to make.

I suspect that I’ll hold some small classes out here come next Spring but for now I’m going to continue with my hate/ love relationship with the web and keep holding classes online. It is the most curious of situations for hands on work like furniture making to hold these classes via the internet. I can’t see a student’s grip or correct their stance or feel how a drawer works except in the most egregious examples.

Yet the flip side to this remove is my opportunity now to wax/ wane on about topics such as ‘good’ design vs. Modernism or what Lyricism can mean for our design work or concepts like Pattern and Flow. We all have the largest library anywhere at our disposal, the internet, so that calling up examples is amazing and so easy.

Now the concept of Flow is one that I have found of particular interest. My thanks to OMP student Mike Lecky for getting that book “Flow” in front of me a few years back. The basic idea of it is that when we are doing work for its own sake we can enter this realm where time disappears, the challenge in front of us takes up all our attention, and the rewards are personal, not external. The task is always a little bit beyond our reach so the struggle to manage it causes us to concentrate fiercely. It is a wonderful feeling and if you’ve carved wood, or rock climbed, or cooked for a party of 20 you know the focus it entails. Nothing else gets in the way. It’s called the Zone in athletics and it’s magic when you’re there.

This clarity is something I strive for in my work at the bench. Some days it’s there. Some days it’s not.

One thing I know that gets in the way of this feeling is a lack of flow in my shop space. [Hence the importance of a new shop space for my collection of tools and woods and woods and tools.] It’s hard to stay focused when I trip over things that are stacked too far out into the pathway. Or I have to move something again that has gotten in my way. Or the bench top is cluttered from the last batch of small jobs. Little stuff like that gets in the way of flow at the bench.

Now organization of our space is critical. It is the central theme of my video series this Fall called Setting Up Shop. I ran it with 20 folks last year and it turned out to be an illuminating experience for all. For the students they learned how simple things can change their space. For moi, I learned that the best teacher, again, is experience. I just finished up a job in the shop, making a drawer. It has been on my list for, well I won’t say for how long. Some few hours of joining, gluing, finishing and fitting this drawer to the cabinet and it was done. And there it is now. Holding things, removing clutter, another box of clutter disappears from the floor. It is huge the difference it makes in my tiny space!

But that’s what Flow is about in your work space. Learning how to organize your space for your own benefit.

Flow. Get rid of the clutter.

The biggest obstacle I face when making something is always one thing. It is always me. It is not the tools or the wood splitting or the router cut going absolutely haywire with blow-out. That wasn’t supposed to happen. Stuff does. How I handle it is always the key.

Remember that quote from Pirsig’s book, “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance”, “assembly of Japanese bicycle require great peace of mind.” So true. Just as true when working at the bench. Without it, Flow will not occur.

Look at your space. Eliminate the clutter. See how you move through the space and make this smoother, easier. It will help you find that other Flow more easily.

Please check out our website for more information on the Setting Up Shop series. Contact me with questions about it or the Online Mastery Program.

Stay cool.

The Finally Done Drawer

My rabbeted dovetail drawer box is made of Multi-ply plywood. Special drawer front of bird’s eye maple veneer I saved for this job for 25 years. Come on by and I’ll show you all the patches I had to make in this drawer cuz of the condition of that plywood. Gotta say, it feels great to see it in place.

To see some great student work, please check out the Online Mastery Program Gallery. The OMP starts again in October 2024.