80 grit

Yesterday had felt like a first day of spring, sunny, warm, snow rumbling off the roofs, and I looked at a pile of tree sections that I had organized within the disorgannized chaos of a space on my porch, and I thought to take up one of them.  The were in all different phases of exploration, some with just the bark taken away, some sawed towards a maximum minimum, some with honed edges.  My thoughts went from the pieces of wood to another pile close-by, of knives and axes, chisels and sandpaper.  Just as each piece of wood has its story, each tool and piece of sandpaper also has its sense of purpose, its essence of personality, and its moment of becoming meaningful within the process that I call searching for spoons.

Take for instance a piece of 80 grit sandpaper.  It can be flattened, curved, bent ripped, folded but ultimately it is just plain rough enough to bite into most woods with an attitude of not so much caring for some distantly imagined smooth sheened surface as setting into a mood of journeying into solidity to bring out some first sense of shape. 

80 grit is the framer who pounds at two-by-eights, fastening them to the open air.  80 grit is the plow-blade that forms a ribboned cleavage of field upon the muddy earth.  80 grit is the mood of the many nights of missed throws at the basketball hoop as a young boy dreams of that first slam-dunk on the big court.  80 grit is the patient silence of a father who shows his child how to use a carving knife for the first time, hands the knofe over and then watches as the child makes that first cut into wood.