Hello there,
I often sit down to write these things with big ideas in mind. Lots of words about craft, automation, thinking machines and the anti-human forces at work in the world and how they'll always eventually lose, but maybe not in our lifetime. I start to write and then it just kind of turns to dust as I go. I could squeeze a little harder and press it back into shape, but I'm enjoying being at the workbench lately, and I'd rather save the squeeze for something heavier than words, at least for today.
I'll borrow some words instead. This is a poem I think about a lot lately, and it's about (or set in) the little town that I currently live in. It was a real shock to learn than an all-time favorite poet had spent time in this place.
First Snow, Kerhonkson
By Diane di Prima
for Alan
This, then, is the gift the world has given me
(you have given me)
softly the snow
cupped in hollows
lying on the surface of the pond
matching my long white candles
which stand at the window
which will burn at dusk while the snow
fills up our valley
this hollow
no friend will wander down
no one arriving brown from Mexico
from the sunfields of California, bearing pot
they are scattered now, dead or silent
or blasted to madness
by the howling brightness of our once common vision
and this gift of yours—
white silence filling the contours of my life.
---
It's looking like the snow might be gone soon. I made a few wallets, and I hope to make a few more. If you have suggestions for what styles to work on, or what leathers to work with for the next batch, I'm all ears. No promises though. For a second round of borrowed words, Tom Waits says about songwriting:
"Trying to capture them sometimes is trying to trap birds. Fortunately, other songs come easy, like digging potatoes out of the ground. Others are like gum found under an old table."
Making wallets feels a little like that. I can direct it a little bit, but mostly I sit down and see what happens.
This batch is a pair of Westbound Midlength wallets with Marbled Shell Cordovan outers and natural veg tan inners. These are a real favorite style but a lot of work to make, so I can't turn them out very often.
More soon hopefully.
-n
