Stanstead QC | 9 Feb 2012
“I’m 36 years old, I love my family, I love baseball, and I’m about to become a farmer. But until I heard the voice I had never done a crazy thing in my whole life.” – Field of Dreams
It’s funny how life happens while you’re busy making other plans – and making plans for other people. As you know, my whole professional career has been connected in some way to emergency health services, emergency preparedness, or emergency management.
In lieu of a midlife career crisis, the crash of the American economy overtook almost all of the opportunities I had to express myself as an emergency services leader or mentor. The grants sundowned, the budgets dried up, and a lack of catastrophes shifted thought patterns to a happier time prior to 9/11 or Katrina.
Which leads me to telling you about my apprenticeship in a wood-working shop.
Recently, I’ve been learning the custom cabinetry & furniture design biz from the ground-up with Gerry Goodsell and Bruce Buzzell of GBH Custom Cabinetry of Stanstead QC. It’s unrelentingly tough, old-world, passionate work that requires a mix of wisdom and skills that can’t be jam-packed into a smartphone app and dispensed on-demand.
My hair (not much left after the latest buzz cut) and clothes that have gone through repeated wash cycles still reek of stain. I’ve come to the conclusion that somehow the smell has nestled into a corner of my nose and just won’t come out no matter what I attempt in terms of remediation. When I shake my clothes off on the porch there’s an indelicate shower of sawdust and splinters that tumble to the ground. And while my fingers are still all attached to my hands, many of them have the marks left behind by splinters or nicks or both. My friend Matt Fortin says that given enough time my skin will toughen up. Oh good.
Not long after we first moved out here I was out scouting for land my friend/neighbour Howard Peterson could lease to plant soybeans and I had a memorable conversation about how relatively unblemished my hands were with one old-school farmer up the road. “You’re not a farmer are you?”
“No, sir. Is it that obvious?” I’d worn my best farmer gear so I wouldn’t stand out as a recently transplanted city guy. “Well, your hands are soft, those jeans sure are pretty, and no self-respecting farmer would drive up a dirt road in a little rice-burning vroom-vroom car like that one.”
Hmmmm. A few more weeks with Gerry & Bruce and I’ll be able to head back up the road and present a wood-torn handshake, some seriously distressed jeans, and a – still need to borrow a pickup truck – to complete the proper portrait picture.
Back to the cabinet shop. Gerry and Bruce specialize in custom one-of-a-kind antique reproduction pieces. They use wood prepared for them by another ‘old-school’ guy with his own sawmill who lives up in Ways Mills – a tiny town disguised as a picturesque backwoods crossroads complete with beautiful old churches standing mirror-like on opposite sides of the road.
Some of the wood is relatively new while other pieces are built from wood that has been recycled after a previous lifetime as a barn, a farmhouse, or a shed. They’ve amassed a great collection of vintage square nails and other bits and pieces of hardware – and have introduced me to the joys of leafing slowly, very slowly, through catalogues from companies specializing in antique reproduction hardware.
Earlier this week, we ‘cooked’ a newly-delivered latch in the wood furnace for a full day to achieve just the right combination of rust, ash and wear so that it would match the one-hundred-and-something-year-old hinges destined for an armoire in the process of coming together in the shop.
Gerry and I sat down over cappuccino and examined a box of antique reproduction hardware which he had ordered. The attention to detail was incredible and as Gerry demonstrated how each could be used – holding them up against pantry cupboard doors and kitchen cabinetry – it was clear just how personally invested he is in the design and build process. “Just look at these rat tail hinges, they’re a work of art. Look at them up here on this door. That’s a great look and feel.”
Today is ‘reveal day’ for the latest armoire nearing the end of the build phase and headed over here for the finishing phase. Finishing will include the application of butcher’s wax, the wiring for the lighting and the UPS system, and the integration of the locked secret cabinet that will contain, according to the client’s specs, a bottle of Don Cuco Sotol Suave and two glasses. I learn something new every day and sometimes it doesn’t have anything to do with the art of working with wood. Trust me when I tell you that Sotol is not an easy thing to find far North of the Mexican-Texan line. And don’t even think of suggesting Tequila as a replacement to someone who specifies Sotol as their secret-compartment stress-relieving drink of choice.
Bruce & Gerry are perfectionists. The armoire was supposed to arrive yesterday. Gerry showed up at our place with a coffee in hand but no cabinet in the pickup truck. He explained that he just wasn’t satisfied with the overall look and was going to lay on another thin coat of stain. Each piece of furniture goes out with their heart and soul added for good measure. They have been building things out of wood for a long time and have built their name and reputation on the beauty and functionality of each piece of cabinetry or furniture that comes out of their shop.
My old friend Jim Stephens is a serious craftsman – pottery, blacksmithing, scientific glassblowing, and carpentry. When I told him about my apprenticeship in the BGH work shop, he told me, “A shop is a great place for the mind to rest, for the internal dialogue to rest,for the ego to take a rest. When you do good work and make a nice thing of quality and beauty, it speaks for itself as it speaks for you, it is a little part of yourself that goes out into the world. The shop is a place of action, and few words... The best strong emotions in a work shop are awe, joy, serenity, peacefulness and focus.”
Indeed.
Be well. Practice big medicine.
Hal
BGH Custom Cabinetry & Furniture | T: 819-704-0662 | E: hnewman@tems.ca
