Perspective
Two things happened this week that helped me regain a sense of balance in the way I look at things.
Two things happened this week that helped me regain a sense of balance in the way I look at things.
The first is that I cut my thumb in the kitchen. Not a terrible cut, but enough to make things difficult. Everything from buttoning a shirt to feeding stuff through my table saw is suddenly complicated. And, naturally, I’ve been whining about it ever since.
The other thing that happened was procrastinating getting to work going through some old magazine articles I’d written and edited. I came across one about a blind woodworker that made me reconsider my whining about working – only temporarily! – with one hand.
Curious, I Googled it and was amazed at the number of one-handed woodworkers out there, not to mention woodworkers with other handicaps. I easily found dozens on the first try. The thread that ran through all the articles I turned up was that none of these guys let their handicaps slow them down, either in their shops or their lives.
Sure, my thumb hurts. But it will heal soon and I’ll be good as new. None of the guys I read about will ever be good as new, and yet they keep on going. Time to stop whining.
A.J. Hamler is the former editor of Woodshop News and Woodcraft Magazine. He's currently a freelance woodworking writer/editor, which is another way of stating self-employed. When he's not writing or in the shop, he enjoys science fiction, gourmet cooking and Civil War reenacting, but not at the same time.
