Hawaii

A while ago I got an email from a fellow named Paul. The title of the email was 'Aloha'. In the note he told me he was a surgeon-turned-ukulele-builder in Hawaii and had recently heard a story in NPR about me and my dad. He said the reason the story struck his attention is because he has distant relatives from the Rugby area and thought it interesting a guitar builder lives there in that tiny place. He decided to email after checking out my ukuleles and enjoying the inlay work I do. The thing I remember most about that first email is that he told me that he had recently retired from being the sole surgeon in his hospital so he took up ukulele building now that it is economically acceptable to lose a finger.

After chatting for many months, trading sets of koa for Red spruce, and learning about each others build process, he asked if I would be interested in coming to Hawaii to teach him and several other small builders my inlay techniques. At first I was thinking that has to be some sort of trick question, right? I get to go to Hawaii. To show people how to do my favorite thing. In February, arguably the worst month of the year. (Sorry Valentine's day and Nick's birthday, you don't redeem that dreary cold month in my book.) After it was confirmed he was not joking, we set up the dates and I booked a flight for myself and for Nick. (Because of the birthday.)

I love airports. To me they signify a gateway to possibility, adventure, and unknown. Everyone is going somewhere, has a purpose, and a reason for being there. I have spent countless hours in these expansive bustling buildings, usually alone, but never feeling lonely. My favorite pastime is observing the folks whizzing around me, wondering where they live, where they are going and who they are going to meet at the opposite gate. I will often make up backstories based on clues gleaned from their luggage, attire, and demeanor. Once I saw a woman carrying a shiny gold trophy through the terminal. It stood several feet high when she sat it on the floor. She didn't look particularly athletic, wearing dress pants with footwear inappropriate for comfortable travel and that was the only thing she had with her-no other luggage or sports bags so I didn't suspect she won an athletic event. I like to imagine it was awarded for an adult spelling bee and she won for an awesome word, perhaps something along the likes of 'callipygian'. (Feel free to look that one up.)

The flights, Asheville to Lihue, Kauai, via Atlanta and Los Angeles, weren't bad. Not too long, no excessive turbulence, and only one obnoxious seat mate who was overly excited about the cruise he was going on to Mexico with his Corvette club. Nick took the brunt of that one as I busied myself with being super interested in watching Jack Black drive his Waggoneer away from monsters of his own creating in Goosebumps. It was amazing. (It had to be.)

Orange juice from the yard!! 

Paul greeted us at the airport with leis and a hugs. He and his wife Syd were two of the most thoughtful hosts I have ever encountered. They planned meals for each day of our visit, along with fresh squeezed orange juice from trees in their yard, provided ideas for things to do during the days I wasn't teaching, and sent us off each morning in their silver Tacoma with a hand drawn map to points of interest and a huge bag of snacks. My main takeaway from that is that I know they are excellent parents and that they miss their daughter who now lives in Wisconsin. (I know, what!?) The first day we went on a hike, Paul insisted on providing our lunch and stopped into a market at the foot of the hill from his house. "What is that?" I asked, as he handed us little bundles wrapped in saranwrap, noting it was a mound of rice wrapped in nori with a meat-ish looking slab in the middle. I love sushi rolls, but I had never seen any as big as a sandwich. He told me it was called musubi and he would tell me what it was after I had eaten it. Hm. Something tells me he and my dad would be best friends...

View at Paul's house

Orange tree!!

Breakfast-pineapple, Portuguese sausage, french toast, and tiny but super sweet bananas

Sunset dinner on the beach.

After a sunny hike along sea cliffs ending at Shipwreck beach, that musubi tasted amazing. Kind of like a salty pork sandwich sushi roll. When we got back to his house that night I told Paul I really liked the musubi and asked what it was. "It's Spam!!" Then he cackled, like literally cackled, for a full minute. Nick got musubi every day after that stating it is perfect hiking food.

Tuesday morning I attended a rehearsal for Paul's ukulele club. It was pretty much like the ones I have attended in North Carolina, except they all strummed traditional Hawaiian tunes instead of The Beatles and Over the Rainbow. Trying to follow along was difficult because to me all the Hawaiian words sounded the same, just slightly different variations of a vowel. The woman sitting next to me sang the songs as we all strummed our ukuleles. Perhaps in her sixties, she looked wise and thoughtful and kind. She wore a smart boater hat with a black ribbon perched on her head. Paul told me she is never without a hat. Her voice was rich and low and commanded attention. Those vowels sounded so beautiful coming from her. During several songs, Rose, one of the club members, did a hula dance. That was mesmerizing as well. Her relaxed flowing movements matched the music so well that they and the notes didn't seem like two separate things but a perfectly wrapped package presented with a long satin ribbon tied to it, each element just a bit lacking without the other.

Paul didn't seem phased that I had never taught an inlay class before. But standing before nine adults, all older than me and all having experience in woodworking and instrument building, I wondered if I could actually teach them anything. I thought back to my dad's advice, "Just go tell them what you do and how you do it. That's all you can do. You don't have to tell them about anything you don't know." He said that to me on the phone as I was hyperventilating outside the hotel before my talk at the Fretboard Summit in San Diego. Like now, I was going to go speak to a group of people who all had more experience than I did and were all older than I am. But I did what he said and it went just fine. (More on that trip later) The situation I was facing now seemed somehow different than that experience though. I have such a strong passion for inlay and know that I can do it well that I felt much more comfortable in this little cramped shop on Kauai than I did sitting in that chilly room in San Diego. I know that the inlay I do is sound and that I have gleaned enough experiences along the way to be able to show people my process.

Don't get me wrong, I have taught people things before. I have a minor in Outdoor Leadership from my undergraduate alma mater, which essentially means if you want to go do something outside, I can show you how to not die. Through that program and some amazing teachers I learned outdoor skills, and then learned how to teach other people to set safe anchors for rock climbing, how to belay, how to guide a canoe, how to kayak, how to tie useful knots, how to read tides and how to dress appropriately for an outdoor activity. I remember once when I was the Teacher's Assistant for one of the outdoor PE classes and was questioning my ability, my favorite teacher and mentor Tommy Holden asked me, "Ok, so if I weren't here or something happened to me, could you get everyone back to the van safely? How would you do that?" I thought about it, formed a plan in my mind and knew that I could. It might not be pretty, but I knew it was a possible task for my skill set. I kept that thought with me for all of my TA and trip leading duties, as I guided tourists in kayaks across Fritz Cove in Juneau, AK, and when I taught elementary school kids environmental education in Vermont.

Teaching the inlay class I thought how would Tommy show these people this skill? I thought back to one of the very first lessons he taught my freshman year climbing class. Sitting in a circle on the blue spongy floor of the gymnastics gym (which happened to be in the same room as the climbing wall) he showed us how to tie a bowline knot with a little narrative about a bunny and a tree. The bunny (aka the rope end) comes out of his hole (a loop in the rope), looks all around his tree the rope) and then dives back in his hole. And you have a bowline. To teach my students how to make a turn with the saw blade, I told them the saw had to march in place. I know the task is different, but the goal is the same and visual narratives seem to help drive home concepts. I thought of Tommy's bowline lesson and all the ones following that one, and thought, 'Alright, I can teach this like Tommy does." I knew he would make sure everyone felt like they were successful, praise their effort before offering a helpful critique, and always be clear and positive when presenting information. So I did that. And everyone had fun and everyone cut out an amazing design, all slightly different from the inlay I showed them. They all brought their own ideas and personality to the project which made me feel successful too. I had the best time those two days, and feel as though I made lasting friendships as well as showing people a skill and making them feel as though they can do something they couldn't before. I doubt I made as strong an impression on my students as my teacher Tommy did on my life, but if they get a tenth of the confidence and knowledge he bestowed upon me, I am grateful.

My class!  

Two of my awesome students brought me a lei! 

What we mad

Paul sent me home with a tan (ok a sunburn), a fascination for feral roosters, a taste for Spam, a 100 year old plank of a kona coffee tree, and most importantly confidence that I am proficient enough at what I do that I can show other people how to do it. Nick asked if he could help make the kona coffee ukulele. I was surprised he wanted to learn, but am so excited that I get to teach him how to make a ukulele. We have been working on it each weekend I am home and he is doing an excellent job. We successfully made it through a week of canoeing in Florida together, which Tommy calls divorce boats, so I bet we can make it through building a ukulele together too.

A shop in Kalaheo that only uses koa...

Shave ice is serious in Hawaii. That wasn't the large.

Hiking to a waterfall! 

My rooster friend Monty. On top of an 800ft waterfall. He left once he saw I didn't have food for him.

Setting Up Shop

The past few months for me have consisted of a whirlwind of travel, building a house, making instruments in order to purchase said house, moving, and setting up a shop of my own in the basement. Turns out executing such tasks leaves little time for writing you stories, but I have so many saved up and I can't wait to tell you so get excited. I will begin with building a house and a shop because that has usurped the majority of my time and energy since August. 

Watching the progress of the house was somewhat surreal. I couldn't believe it was my space, or perhaps just didn't want to believe it until it was actually ours. Actively searching since last March, finding a house with shop space in Asheville was proving difficult, and having to obtain the permits to build one into an older house even more frustrating. The more I learned about the process and what would have to be done, the more I felt like one of those dogs running through an agility course, though not a lithe Border Collie, but perhaps a pudgy, aging dachshund that can't quite jump high enough to make it through the hoop or all the way up the see-saw. When it seemed just about hopeless, my dad called one muggy June evening and told me he had spoken with a guy who came into the shop who just happened to be building houses in one of my favorite neighborhoods in Asheville. He has been after my dad for a guitar for a while so in exchange for one, he said he would happily work with me to build a house that had everything I needed, without having to beat out a myriad of other people making higher and higher offers as we had previously been doing. (Sitting in my lovely, finished house now, I am still wondering if I am dreaming.)

After several months of picking paint colors, floors, tiles and countertops the house was about ready to move into. Each time I visited the house, I would walk down to the basement to see the shop space. Unlike the rest of the house, which would have a new element each time, the shop was always the same. Just a cement room with double doors out the back and two big bright windows on the adjacent walls. It didn't matter, it was my space and unlike any of the other options I had looked at, I would be starting out with a suitable number of electrical outlets (36!) and almost excessive lighting. 

On my birthday, the day before we closed on the house, I took my usual tour, walking upstairs, admiring the backsplash I chose in the kitchen, then walking down to the shop. When I opened the door, instead of an empty cement room, I found beautiful sturdy cabinets and a built in counter, a work bench and several machines standing at attention against the walls. While always wishing for one, I have never gotten a surprise gift on my birthday and I was a bit overwhelmed with how excited seeing a bunch of shop tools made me. My dad's friend Chris and his builder Chuck had spent the previous day building it out for me totally unbeknownst to me.

Standing in my new shop on my birthday.

 It turns out setting up a shop isn't the easiest thing to do. The small number of tools I do have, I placed in the same drawers my dad has his in so I can feel a little more at home. Every time I reach for a tool, I have to think, oh wait, I don't have those clamps, or I don't have enough of those clamps. They are three hours away in their drawer at my dad's shop. Then I have to go take a trip Home Depot and see if I can find something similar enough to my dad's to work. Now I know I am pretty dang lucky to have my dad, his friend Don, Chuck and Chris, and everyone else who wants me to succeed standing behind me in my corner helping me get everything set up. My dad didn't have that when he first started building his guitars.

The building that served as my dad's first shop sits on a little flat spot across the drive from my Granny's house. During my summers staying at her house, other than picking raspberries from the prickly briars that climbed along the outside walls of the shop, I have no memories that prominently feature that building. By that time my dad had moved production of his guitars to what I refer to as the 'old shop', the building next to the Rugby Rescue Squad that he rented from Vivian Osborne for $25/month. Since I didn't know much about that first building at Granny's, I called my dad and asked. 

My favorite conversations with Wayne Henderson are ones where he tells me a story. I feel like most other conversations are a notch less comfortable for him, but when he is telling me about our family, his experiences building instruments, or that time he pulled a prank on his substitute, Jimmy, he happily chatters on until I remind him that brace he glued down earlier is probably dry by now.

He told me he built that building himself, with his dad serving as his only knowledgeable reference and helper. "I bought some lumber from a saw mill up on White Top. It cost me $75. I believe that was the first time I had ever written a check," he told me. He said at that time there weren't any building codes or anything so he just built a 16x20" room in the same manner as one would construct a barn, a task which everyone in the area had experience, and installed a bunch of shelves along the walls. He told me he had a few tools gathered, and his dad had given him some spool clamps which he set on the shelves. "Even with those shelves I soon found out that a 16x20" room was not quite big enough." 

When the moonshiner paid him for his seventh guitar, the D-45 that now sports a bullet hole, my dad  took the $500 and bought a Shopsmith, a Black & Decker trimmer that we now refer to as 'the router', a bunch of clamps, and some other small tools.  That router is still in production, though I worry perhaps it shouldn't be as the cord has been repeatedly mended with electrical tape, but still occasionally shoots sparks across the shop floor as it scoots along the edge of a guitar back. I understand his reluctance to retire it though as I have repeatedly tried and failed to find a suitable replacement from the selection of new and fancy power tools currently offered at hardware stores. I also know the clamps to which he is referring, as I use them often, even rifling through the drawer to be sure I use those specific ones. I prefer them immensely to the newer ones intermixed in that drawer and missed them very much as I was gluing braces to a ukulele top in my own shop. I had to take my daily trip to the Home Depot for some similar ones, but again, they don't quite measure up. Most of the tasks the Shopsmith was responsible for have been replaced with other tools, but it still sits retiring proudly in the corner enjoying a bit less use in its old age.

I haven't had many visitors to my shop yet, but I look forward to getting some as, while it can be a bit irksome having people standing in the way, it is equally fun to have people stop by and show interest in what you're doing. My dad told me about some of his first loafers. A typical fixture was his Uncle Cone. I was very young when Uncle Cone died, but I have a vague recollection of an extremely wrinkled man who would sit statue-like by the wood stove at Osborne's store when we stopped in to get the occasional scratch-off lottery ticket. My dad would always say in a voice loud enough for Cone to hear, so I knew he didn't mean it, "Now stay away from him, he's crazy." My dad said Uncle Cone would come to his shop periodically trying to convince my dad to drive him to the hospital because he would "take drinking spells that would almost kill him" so he had to go detox at the hospital. He would quit drinking for a couple of weeks then retox again. Apparently his drinking habits had upset the rest of his family members and my dad was the only one who would agree to drive him down to Independence. 

One day though Uncle Cone was out of luck. A man named John, whom my dad had met while working at George Gruhn's shop in Nashville came walking up the driveway. He had been in the market for a D-45 and my dad had told John that he knew Red Smiley's D-45 was for sale for $4000 in Roanoke. "I think he was scared to drive across the creek or something, because I didn't hear him drive up or see a car, he just came walking up the driveway holding that guitar," my dad said. "Uncle Cone was sitting by the door still drunk. He looked right at that guy like he knew him and said, 'Lord I wouldn'ta thoughta you for $5.' I don't know what John thought of that but he probably thought we were all crazy. I told Uncle Cone I couldn't drive him to the hospital that day, I had to look at Red Smiley's D-45." 

I asked if there were any other exciting stories to come out of that first shop and he told me one more. He said I couldn't print it, but I am going to tell you about it anyway because I laughed until my eyes were streaming tears. Here is what he said: "Well, Uncle Cone's son, my cousin Dick, was over with my good friend Ronnie Testerman. Ronnie was sitting cocked back in a chair and had a cigarette lighter out playing with it. Next thing I know there was a blue flame come up higher than his head and almost set the place on fire. I think what he was trying to do was cover up a fart by using that lighter like a match, but instead it plain blew up. I have heard of people doing that, but had never seen it with my own eyes. I swear that's what happened. I honestly thought it was going to burn my shop down." If you know my dad, fart jokes are just about his favorite thing, only second to seeing a prewar D-45 in person. 

My dad in his first shop circa 1972. Photo credit: David Lewis

I haven't had too much excitement in my shop yet, aside from getting a guitar stuck on my arm for about twenty minutes and worrying I would have to go to the hospital with a guitar stuck on my arm, but that is a story for another time. Each day I have to figure out a new problem, or how to make a form, or clamp work without the help of my dad and all of the tools hanging at the ready in his shop. I am thankful I have so many folks who believe in my ability enough to be willing to help me make an awesome space to build my instruments. 

I noticed the other day that my dad had a new set of fret files hanging on the hook where the familiar red, yellow, and orange handled ones have been stored for years. These new ones all have the same colored handles, and I don't like the feel of them as much as the original ones. When I commented on that, he said, "Yeah, I don't much like them either, but I am trying to get used to them so you can take the old ones." Seeing as he still uses a router that spits sparks while perfectly cutting the groove for binding, I know that there is a greater honor in being gifted the fret files we know and love rather than just getting the new ones. While I am so thankful to have a space that is mine, new and unfamiliar now, it is that much more important to me that he will always be there in my fret files, clamps, patterns, and forms. 

Here's to new adventures.

Making Progress

First, I want to thank so many of you for commenting, supporting, lifting me up when I was feeling a bit down the last time I wrote. While it wasn't my intention to solicit such kind words, I appreciate them more than you can know. After hearing so many stories from lady friends who have had similar experiences, I know the bigger issue of inequality won't resolve overnight, but I felt I wanted to address that it happens, however unintentionally, in more places than we care to see.

The past few weeks have felt like the opposite of the weeks prior. I have had visitors stop by the shop specifically to see me and what I am working, received Facebook messages from folks asking me my opinion on how they should attack certain guitar projects of their own, a good friend played one of my guitars at an incredible show she did with another great friend. Oh, and there was a little story on that that national NPR show, All Things Considered...

Walnut sisters

For the past couple of weeks I have been working on a batch of three guitars, numbered 39-41, which I know is ambitious but I want so badly to make instruments for everyone who wants one that I hope to step up production a little bit. If you were wondering, the three guitars are a koa OM-42, a Claro walnut 000-41, and a Black walnut 0-41. The system of doing three at a time has been working just fine so far but I have yet to get to the finishing stage. The sanding, spraying, and then sanding some more gets pretty tiring with just one, so I'll let you know how this turns out when I try to work on three. Perhaps I should try to find some sanding interns or something...Write this up: Seeking determined, detail oriented person with literally nothing better to do to than hand sand between seven (or more if you mess up) coats of finish on a batch of homemade guitars. It's harder than it looks, so must be attentive and able to learn. No pay, probably no school credit either...but I'll let you play with the mongoose that lives in the shop which is, in my opinion, a priceless experience. Only for a few minutes though because there is all that finish to sand.

My favorite part about these three guitars is that their owners asked me to cut intricate inlays for the fingerboards of each one. It required more difficult work and time, but I always enjoy coming up with new designs that compliment each of my customers. The owner of the Black walnut 0-41 I am working on sent me pictures of her favorite ceramic pieces featuring art nouveau vines and decoration along their bodies. I used the pictures to draw inspiration for a vine climbing the fingerboard.

As far as media coverage goes, it is difficult for me to grasp the reach of NPR's show All Things Considered. I listen most days, but that's just me, sitting in my corner making instruments. Audie Cornish is just telling me stories, right? Who would listen to one about me if I weren't there to hear? It was especially unnerving when several minutes after our story aired my phone was beeping and buzzing with messages of friends all over the country saying they heard it. In all honesty. I didn't hear it until the next day because the Roanoke station chose that time slot to work on their fund raising efforts. It was pretty overwhelming to know so many of my friends and family, not to mention the strangers I had never met, heard it but I had no idea how crazy I sounded.

The thing is, most news stories that I am in are really about my dad, where I just happen to be standing nearby. I was completely surprised and amazed to hear that story and especially to hear Vince Gill say such kind things about me and my instruments. (What?!!) I want to thank my friend and fellow Roanoke Catholic alum Desiré Moses for her excellent job of reporting (and for her skilled editing to make me sound less like an idiot than I actually do in real life). I honestly can't thank her enough for coming down from Roanoke and spending the afternoon at the shop with us.

So the guitar progress is on pause for a week because I am home working on a little ukulele, and then am headed to San Diego this weekend to attend the 2016 Fretboard Journal Summit. I am going to tell some stories of working with my dad and learning how to build guitars. I am also excited to visit with fellow builders, hopefully learn a thing or two, and most importantly, meet new friends. Come hang out and be my friend!

Girl in the Guitar Shop

So if I am being honest with you, the past couple of weeks haven't been the easiest. While I am so proud of my accomplishments and feel empowered in my job most days. every now and again, like the tendrils of gauzy green chemical vapor that seeps through the forest floor of Fern Gully, waves of doubt sometimes creep into my day. Typically it isn't terribly difficult to push aside and simply ignore my feelings when the Tuesday loafers treat me as though I don't matter. I cling to the knowledge that my dad does value my work and opinion and he has come to rely on me to help him out in the shop whether they see that or not. Every so often though, especially when the Tuesday crowd of old men rolls in, I don't really feel as though belong in my dad's shop. Not as an equal or a useful piece of the puzzle anyway. I am sure they don't mean it how it comes across, perhaps it is a generational thing or something, but a lot of times the shop visitors treat me as though I am either not there or just something to placate; "Aw how cute, the poor little girl want's to try to use a table saw."

Now, even though I am on a roll of frustration, I am going to pause for a moment to make one constant exception. Even though he comes in crotchety every Tuesday, upset that his table is cluttered with junk, even though it always is, Herb Key is always kind to me. He comes in before everyone else to find me trying to get my work done before the crowd descends. He always takes extra time every week to share with me what guitar he is working on and how he plans to fix it. All he really needs to do it say, "I am doing a neck set on this old Gibson," when I ask what project he has for the day but he doesn't. He shows me the handmade tools he has finagled to make the job simpler for himself, explains in detail how he plans to execute his job, and shows me how to turn on the water steamer without burning myself. He always takes time from his job to share tidbits of Gibson trivia, neck reset tips, and little ideas to make repair work exciting. I appreciate very much that he always treats me with respect and kindness. That being said, not many other folks are in his same boat.

In case you were curious, here are a few of the things that have recently knocked me down: First, someone accidentally (I hope) burned the $200 worth of buffing pads I had just brought to the shop from Asheville. The guitar I was in the middle of fitting a top on was unceremoniously moved from its table and dumped in several locations with absolutely no care. (With the explanation when I returned from breakfast from my dad, "I moved the stuff with your name on it because I needed to sharpen my tools." I suppose if the guitar was stamped with Wayne Henderson's name he woudln't consider touching it) He also walked up when my dad was checking out a guitar that very clearly had my name inlaid on the headstock and said condescendingly, "Oh, Jayne, did you make that?" Next, a group of local luthiers and their friends visiting on a not so distant Tuesday treated me with as much regard and respect as they would a hangnail they had just removed and flicked away. Finally, a man stopped by the shop selling guitar sets and jacked up his prices to double their worth. I can only assume the reason is because he thought he could hoodwink a stupid little girl who doesn't know the going price for a warped set of slab-cut cherry wood.

After all that and a little bit more in a couple week span I had simply had enough. I felt deflated, like one of the tired wrinkled balloons we stuff into the sound holes of our guitars to block the inside bodies after seven coats of finish. I thought perhaps I should quit and find something else to do more suited to my educational background and gender. This story gets better though, I promise. I am finished complaining. Luckily I have an awesome cousin (more like sister) named Leah and she pulled into the shop parking lot just in time. She didn't have to try terribly hard to convince me to play hooky for the rest of the afternoon.

She drove us, along with two kayaks, some crinkly bags Doritos, and two chilled tallboys of Corona out to the bank of the Little River and shoved me, sitting in her yellow boat, out into the meandering water. (She let me have her comfy, easily maneuverable, creek boat similar to the ocean kayaks to which I am accustomed and she took her uncle's sit-on-top that she wasn't used to paddling. Side note: If you don't paddle, I feel the need to let you know that such an act is similar to offering me a Porsche while leaving her happily behind the wheel of a Yugo.) We floated down the river enjoying our snacks and laughing as we periodically spun, paddling helplessly, when our boats snagged over hidden rocks and branches rising a bit too high beneath the water's surface.

At one point Leah decided she wanted to get out and skip rocks. She slowly moved through the knee deep water searching the riverbed for flat round rocks ideal for skipping. After a few attempts she deemed 'bad' (they only skipped three or four times over the water...she is an expert, you see, expecting more like 15 skips per throw) she set out to catch minnows instead. "Look! There's one! Ooh there's a bunch! A whole school! Maybe they will just swim into my hands!" she squealed. "Yeah maybe," I halfheartedly answered, more interested in finding a shaded spot to park my kayak without having to submerge my clunky 12 year old Chacos into the dark river water. I looked over and watched her standing silently hunched waiting for an innocent minnow to swim unknowingly into her waiting trap. I managed to hook my boat to a bit of rock slightly less dappled with bird feces than the rest of its mass, dipped my toes into the crisp flowing water and watched her play. Floating in my spot that day I felt immensely more relaxed than I had the several weeks prior. While Leah patiently waited for her minnow, I thought about how lucky I was to have such a strong, smart, capable 'sister' to emulate. Sitting there on that river I reminisced of all the times she demonstrated to me that I can do whatever I want. She dressed as the pirate instead of the princess in dress-up when she was five, she played basketball and ran cross country instead of cheering for the boys who did. She plays guitar in the jam circles with the old men instead of sitting quietly alongside their wives.

You see, Leah would never let those guys in the shop belittle her. She would never stand for that. I wish I were as strong as she. But I realize now that I am. I know how to do something not a ton of women can do; I know how to safely use a table saw; I know how to sharpen my pocket knife (and use it to pick the stain from beneath my fingernails); I know how to do a neckset; I know how to make a guitar. Now please read that last sentence again. Don't think I am saying I can do those things because my dad knows how to do those things. He taught me, yes, but I now know how to do them in my own right. Please treat me as though I do.

I made this guitar for my good friend Mac. 

Playing with my good buddy Mac and my hero, Leah.

Sparklers

Gah! How does time move so quickly?! I honestly thought perhaps I had missed a few weeks to write to you, but not this long...again. I feel like I have a pretty legitimate excuse this time though as I was finishing a 45 style guitar by myself while my dad was away teaching at a music camp. He was around long enough to show me some important steps, but the final steps were on my own. Let me just tell you, if inlaying all of that pearl sounded difficult, then you probably don't even want to know about the rest. But, I'm going to tell you anyway.

So the sparkly part is only a small aspect of what is needed to make a guitar adorned along all the edges of all surfaces of the body with thin strips of abalone shell. Since I went into it in detail in an earlier post I will only remind you that I used real, flat pieces of abalone that I painstakingly ran through a tiny table saw to make little strips and installed them with my tender fingers into the channels left by the removal of Teflon strips. Until now I hadn't fully grasped the difficulty of installing the Teflon.

On each side of the Teflon are three strips of wood veneer of varying thickness. I also wrote about attaching binding in a previous post so if you want to know more about that process, you can read about when I made a 42 style guitar here. The 45 process is a bit more involved since it requires adding the same pattern, well almost, to the edges of the sides and back, not just the top. The new pattern on the back and sides goes, from the edge facing in toward the body to the binding, white-black-Teflon-barely thicker black-white-black-binding. Getting that thicker black line set up is the worst part because it is such a small difference that I put it in absolutely positive that it is correct, then come time to scrape it down and it is flipped. Those are just the worst days.

So my dad showed me how to glue the wood veneer strips to the telfon before adding it to the guitar, since, as he well knows, doing each one separately is extremely difficult and time consuming. The teflon sheet with a small groove cut along its length sure doesn't look very intimidating and as my dad showed me I thought, well this is easy, go away so I can do it, I don't need help with this! Boy was I wrong. "You got your lines flipped." "There isn't enough glue-the lines aren't fully stuck together, that is going to give you a world of hurt when you're putting it on the guitar." "Watch out, that joint needs to be perfect or it is all you'll ever see." The warnings came in alarmingly quick succession after I took over the helm. After a while I wanted to throw that benign looking piece of plastic on the floor with moderate force and walk away. After quite a bit longer than I feel appropriate, I finished installing the Teflon around the lines. Then I had to glue those to the strip of ivoroid binding. Then I had to route a space in the side and, along with the purfling I made for the top and back, glue it to the edges.


Before all of that though, I had to figure out how to mire the joints around the end piece of ivoroid because on my dad's old Martin 0-45 that I was using as a template had angled joints on each side of the piece. How did they do that? I had to inlay the piece with the attached lines and Teflon before I cut the groove for the binding the binding so I couldn't do it all together, which would have made the task easier. After maybe 3 more hours than it typically takes to install an end piece, I finally got the joints mitred how I wanted, and fit the edge of my binding/purfling combo snuggly into them.  Now I fully understand why my dad has a ton of orders for a 45 and they go untouched or, if the customer is pushy, the bodies sit on the highest shelf where they go forgotten, or probably more like ignored.

1922 Martin 0-45. "Make yours look like that."

Joints are the worst

To take a break from the ridiculously tedious work I had been doing we hosted a Fourth of July party at my dad's house. Our friends Marci and Andy, who have stood as pillars of the community of Rugby for several years now, were the instigators of the shindig, and they invited everyone they knew to come watch a fireworks display shot off on the top of the hill across from the house. They surmised that the folks who couldn't get out of their house to attend the party could still see the show from their porch or window. They were probably right as I watched them open their trunk to $1300 worth of Tennessee fireworks. Next to the low riding car our friend Mac was firing up his patented Jimmy Buffet Margarita Machine....

There are a lot of parties at my dad's house, but this one was really special to me. There weren't droves of people I didn't know giving me 'why are you here' looks when I am walking by without an instrument in my hand. The attendees were friends I see separately all the time when I am out running or down at the store. I wave to Sarah as she passes by to carry the mail, and Howard as he mows Evelyn's lawn across the street. I greet my great Uncle Rex as I go pick raspberries at my Granny's house. I haven't seen everyone collectively in years though. It seemed like all of Rugby came out to celebrate with us. It was heartwarming and so exciting to me to see so many folks from my childhood and to see that their lives had progressed happily, so many introducing me to their growing families and grandchildren.

A gaggle of kids ran past me playing a game I didn't recognize. "Do you remember when that was us?" my cousin Lauren asked me. Boy do I. I remember we would gather a big group of kids, seeking out the ones standing bored by their parents sides, and play hide and seek tag, do gymnastics in the grass, one-upping each other until we couldn't. We would sometimes sneak over to the big old barn next door after telling stories of it being haunted. Occasionally, depending on the season and which party, some friends and I would take a sheet out to the hayfield and smush some of the tall grass down so we felt secluded (even though we were still mere feet from people sitting in circles playing music) and just stare up at the stars. "Look! That star is moving!" my friend Taylor said. "Well it's an airplane," I countered. "No, it's a star and it is really moving!" "Oh yeah...hm." "I was just messing with you, we learned in psychology about conforming and because I told you that star is moving you legitimately think it is." "But it is!" I insisted. I am not sure why I remember that conversation so vividly, but many nights when the sky is Rugby so bright I can see the Milky Way I think of that time he said that. And I think I can see a moving star. Fine, psychology, you win. I miss the days of feeling like we were part of an exclusive club, nobody could touch us and we were just in our own bubble of friendship, having more fun than anyone at the real party.

It is interesting to think of time passing, considering everyone there at that party. I went from feeling too young to hang out with the cook kids, to being the cool kids, to being too cool for anything but hiding in my room, to joining the party and hanging out with the adults. Maybe someday I will be able to watch my kids progress the same way. I hope so.

Family

It wouldn't be a Wayne Henderson party without guitars...