More than once I’ve observed that if I get another shot at this thing called life, I think I’d like to be a carpenter. Would I hammer in the morning? Yes. And would I hammer in the evening? Probably then, too. If I had a hammer, I mean.
Specifically, I’d like to be a chairmaker. A chairwright, if you will. Because everyone likes chairs. Everyone needs chairs. And I imagine it would be rather rewarding to craft something that everyone would appreciate and enjoy.
Unfortunately, in this life I’m not very good at woodworking, despite being a Jewish man with a beard (at the moment). I’d love to blame my tools—as any poor craftsman might—but as it happens, I have some pretty nifty tools. I just don’t know how to use most of them properly. In fact, notwithstanding my keen interest in building things out of wood, I lack several key skills.
I know almost nothing about wood.
I know that there are different kinds of wood—generally, that there are hard woods, soft woods, and tiger woods—but I don’t know when or why someone would choose one or the other and vice versa, although I suppose a tiger wood might be best for building a wedge or a tee box.
I can’t cut straight.
Most woodworking projects—even the very simple kind that I attempt—call for straight edges. For reasons unclear, even with some sophisticated/expensive devices that run on actual electricity, I can not seem to make straight cuts in pieces of wood. The conscientious craftsperson will “measure twice, cut once,” but I typically have to cut three or four times to get the edge of my wood near straight, and by that time it’s too short.
All of my stains look the same.
Over the years, I’ve purchased dozens of cans of wood stain in myriad shades, tints, and hues for a variety of carpentry projects. At some point in each project, usually toward the end, I have to choose a stain. Despite sometimes spending up to and including ninety seconds deliberating, however, whichever stain I choose invariably turns out to be Brown. Honey Maple? Brown. English Chestnut? Brown. Black? Brown.
I swallow too many nails.
I know that it’s not a good idea to use my lips to hold the next nail I’m going to hammer, but it’s just a very convenient place—until I inevitably swallow that nail and have to find a replacement, which I will more likely than not also swallow, in turn. It’s gotten so bad that I now swallow nails even when I’m using only screws. Or glue.
I don’t know when—or how—to quit.
A smarter man—or woman, child, or nonhuman primate—would almost certainly stop trying to build the things I try to build as soon as they see how the project is going, somewhere between cutting the first board on an unholy angle and swallowing the third nail. Not me, though. I soldier on every time. Or is that solder on? I have a soldering iron, but I have yet to figure out how to use it to join two pieces of wood. I might be using too much flux.