3/12/2001

I had to come up stairs and write this down before I forgot.

There’s a very special moment in wood working. When you’ve turned of the screaming power tools, when you hip deep in shavings and you’ve lost all track of what time it is. There’s that moment were the blood and sweat you put into sharpening your tools, melds with the hours you spent learning your technique. That instant where you reach for the right tool and with complete oneness, shave off a layer of wood so fine that you could read through it. At that moment, you can literally hear, no feel the blade cut through each fiber of the wood. You are truly at one with your task! That’s the special moment that makes it all worth while.

You can’t acknowledge the moment, while it’s happening. To think about it, moves you to a different space. You stay in the moment, until you slip out and then you realize what just happened. You look at the clock and know the time has passed. You know that at those moments you were at one with your work.

I know this doesn’t just happen to woodworkers. It’s that moment that make golfers willing to sell their children to get that special club that will put them back in that moment. Skiers know the moment when they pull up and stop after a run. They know if they’ve given their all and everything worked at once. Martial artists slip into the movement and time stands still. Competitive shooters know it when they fire their last shot and the range officer says "Wow".

I’ve seen Deb in that moment when she accidentally healed 40 people in two hours at a Tony seminar. The staff room became a chiro healing center, and that moment was real.

Just a though before it went away.

I have to get back to the shop and finish building shelves.