On Thu, 02 Jun 2005 22:23:47 -0700, charlie b
wrote:

My woodworking goal is to be able to develop the knowledge,
skills and abilities necessary to design, build and finish
furniture I can't afford to buy.

(BTW - Tom Plamann's done it - so there's hope.)

What're you shooting for?

charlie b


"All I wanna do is have some fun

And I get the feeling

I'm not the only one..."

(apologies to Ms. Crow)


I want to take all of the elements of the furniture that I have seen
over the last many years and synthesize them into a few pieces that
reflect the history of those items that I respect the most - and give
these pieces away to the people that I love - in the hope that they
will keep them and treasure them forever.

I want to build the most perfect tall case clock, that has a
traditional look and feel but is unique in its design to a degree that
it can't be thought of as a copy - and I want the person I give it to
keep it forever.

I want to learn to carve as well and as sweetly as Mike Hide does.

I want to build a modified version of the classic knee hole Goddard
Townsend Desks, to be used as night tables in my bedroom.

I want to develop the pleasant personality of Norm, the phlegmatic
approach to the work of Dave Marks and the apparent insensitivity to
pain of Roy Underhill.

I want my son to get tall enough so that he can work at the tablesaw
without fear that a kickback would take his head off.

I want to make a cherry tall chest with a crotch figure for the doors
- that I am still searching for.

I hope that I don't die before I get to build my Herreshoff skiff.

I've recently come to want to build a new version of my old
carpenter's tote box, with nice wood and joinery, well above its
station, to give to my son as a twelfth birthday present (he's eight -
there is still time).

I want to live long enough to see the wooddorking magazines back off
of the 'how to do' stuff and allow a little room for the poetry of
wooddorking.

I want Tommy Plamman's new shop.

I want to learn how to turn wood so thin that you can damned near read
a newspaper through it.

I want to sell my Leigh and be able to see well enough to sharpen my
dovetail saws.

I want Keeter and O'Deen to come back to the Wreck.

I wish that I was twenty five again, so that I could do everything
over that I have already done.


As Momma used to say, "If wishes were horses - beggars would ride."


Still, it's the wishing and the wanting that keeps us moving forward
and, like our cartilaginous cousins, the sharks, if'n we stop moving
forward - we sink to the bottom and die.




Tom Watson - WoodDorker
tjwatson1ATcomcastDOTnet (email)
http://home.comcast.net/~tjwatson1/ (website)