I am sometimes the recipient of kudos for the beautiful work that I
have done.

Tommy Plamman gets the same treatment.

The interesting thing to me about this is that it is really about the
kind of work that we have been allowed to do.

The stretching of your skills comes at the behest of your customers.

For a man who makes his living at it, these stretching exercises come
more frequently, and with the added impetus of profit.

Mike Hide would never have learned to carve as well as he does, if he
were only responding to a request from his wife, to make a nice carved
piece.

For a hobbyist Wooddorker, they usually come at the behest of
yourself, or your wife.

Let's tell the truth here; you really can't save any money by
building it yourself.

The best thing about being a hobbies wooddorker is that you can build
any damned thing that you want, and you can damned well take as long
as you want to make it.

You can also buy the best wood that you can find.

I see a number of threads that involve envy of the professional
wooddorker.

Do not envy him, he is a slave to time and money.

I've had twenty months of freedom from the need to produce wooddorking
items for money.

These have been the most enjoyable months of my wooddorking life.

To me it's analogous to the Hale-Bopp phenomenon in Astronomy.






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