This post is about the other handmade gift I made this past Christmas. Too large to fit in Santa’s sleigh, and definitely in excess of the maximum weight limits for loads pulled by reindeer, it was completed just prior to December 25th so the Jolly Old Elf wouldn’t have to subcontract its delivery to a freight hauling company.
Crafted for my son and designed with his help, what resulted was a desk / workstation for the studio in which he creates his music. Made of oak plywood with solid oak trim, it spans eight feet across, with a desktop depth of almost four feet. The only non-oak portions were the desk work surface, keyboard shelf, and monitor/speaker shelf. These were made of laminated particle board. The only non-wood components used were the rack rails that hold the electronic gear, and the computer keyboard slides.
Because of its large size, it was build as six separate components which, when assembled, combine to make up what you see in the pictures. The whole project took about a month at a reasonable cost of under $900.00. That’s a minimum of two thousand dollars less than would have been needed to buy one of similar size and quality.
Unlike the Dr. Who jewelry box in the last post, this Christmas project made it abundantly clear that it’s not only my hands that are failing. It’s obvious that my body strength is on the way out, as well. Back-in-the-day I used to run 4X8 sheets of plywood through the table saw completely by myself. Building THIS project, I couldn’t even have gotten them to the saw, let alone cut them without help. Ah, what a difference a decade or so makes.
Like a faithful old car, we keep “driving” our aging bodies as long as they are still able to start when we turn the key. And though we chug along life’s highway far below the maximum speed limit, and must stop on the shoulder more frequently for emergency services, we continue our labored journey with optimism… hoping that others will at least acknowledge our earned presence in the slow lane.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
As a guy ages, there’s one uncontested bit of evidence that he’s on the downhill side of life. I guess it really hit me when one day I happened to take a VERY close look at my hands for the first time. “Who in the hell do these scarred and wrinkled claws belong to?” I wondered. “And how and when did they get transplanted onto MY wrists without me knowing?”
I should have been paying closer attention. After all, I’d been waking up with pain and stiffness in my fingers for a long time. And when I played my keyboard it was more difficult to navigate the keys and span an octave with one hand. And mechanical “clicking” sounds had begun emanating from the joints as if I needed to grab some WD40 and give each one a spritz.
Any older male who has seriously worked with his hands over the years, knows exactly what I mean. As he senses his two fingered friends are becoming physically limited, it is as mentally devastating as a diagnosis of something lethal. That’s because as men we derive much of our sense of worth from what we create with our hands. No matter how insignificant, it is not only proof of our continued relevance, but our masculine way of trying to insure we’ll exist somewhere in the pages of life’s scrapbook long after we expire.
Anyway, it was with a pair of very sad hands that I decided to make two presents this past Christmas. I figured that while each would take a number of painful weeks to construct, both would be a unique expression of my love for the two recipients. They would also become a mental link to me, long after the hands that built them were still.
The gift I’m sharing in this post, then, was for my youngest daughter. A rabid fan of the “Dr. Who” television program, I thought I’d make her a jewelry box shaped like his Tardis Time Machine. Here’s a picture of it from the show. As you can see, it exists in the shape of a police call box.
The project took almost a month to complete. The miniature Tardis was about 14” wide, 10” deep, and 18” high. Everything was handmade, including the light on the roof and the entrance door pulls. All I purchased was the wood, the hinges, and the blue paint.
In a future post I’ll share the second of my Christmas creations. Meanwhile, best wishes to each of you for a healthy and productive New Year ! Peace.
Paisano
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
