entry for August 22, 2010

The pictures above were taken by my colleague, Reiner, with his Nikon D300 and a macro lens. 

I learned how to tie the small Turks Head knot in 1982 during my shipyard apprenticeship. The handle wrap is a Moku whipping which is used to bind the ends of rope to prevent fraying. Ornamental knot tying has always fascinated me. The Turks Head design gives the appearance of never ending. It was developed to repair splits in a sail vessel's mast or the oars of a boat. Today you can find it on the main deck of most any Navy vessel. 

I completed the work on the walking stick June 1, 2002 during an unemployment period. You only see a small portion of the stick. The rest is just as spectacular from top to bottom. The story behind it's second life is amazing to me. During that particular jobless period, I spent time replacing shingles on my storage building, then clearing the overgrown bushes and tree saplings. The brush clear became such a monumental task that I created a brush pile that could fill a dump truck. I rented a chipper and proceeded to transform the waste to something useful. This walking stick was a long branch of a Red Maple tree that was covered and wrapped with vines. I had my hands on it  for the toss into the chipper and then looked at a little differently. I wondered what was behind all the tangled mess of vines. So I tossed aside.

I spent a few weeks of peeling bark, sanding knots and cleaning out the grooves. During the cleaning process, more and more beauty was revealed. From there the walking stick idea was created and the idea to search for more. There were 80+ more that followed, but none as beautiful as this one. 

I spent this weekend in Chattanooga. My turn to cover the weekend work for the project. It is the necessary evil of the job and this weekend wasn't a good time for it. I feel my duties at home have been compromised due to my short time on the weekends I am home. I failed to check the coolant in both vehicles last weekend. Gin's truck overheated Thursday afternoon. The funny thing is, she said she saw and waved at our mechanic just as she left Inman for Lyman/Welford. We think he jinxed the truck. She managed to get it to the repair shop that evening. Good thing for AAA. My car flashed the low coolant light for Gin on Saturday. She managed to get some fluids in it. I guess I've got some making up to do next weekend. 

Come on Friday!!!

Enjoy your work week or vacation or whatever you have to do this week. 

P@