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I began this blog in order to share my experiences learning instrument building from my dad, but along with those stories I look forward to sharing my memories of growing up with two busy, musically inclined parents as well as my current experiences stepping out on my own as a female luthier promoting environmental sustainability in her instruments while working to alter gender stereotypes in a male dominated field. If you'd like to use quotes from this blog for interviews or in your own work, please contact me first! (email is henderson.elizabethj@gmail.com)

Tuesday, July 21, 2020

Uncharted Territory

Things have changed, and they have changed rapidly. I assume you have also noticed these changes. In the midst of a virus that could either kill you or show no symptoms, allowing you to spread it to people you love who could perhaps die from it or show no symptoms, my husband and I are expecting a new little apprentice next month. Both of these big events, globally and personally, have altered our travel plans, the way we interact with each other as a community, and how I am working on guitars these days.

First, if you are up to date on my past blogs, you already know that I had a miscarriage about a year and a half ago. I am not shy about sharing that information because I don't want anyone else who might have dealt with a loss like that to feel how I did then; as though my body had failed me, that I should hide it away like a deep dark secret because it is inherently wrong to kill a being and that's what my body did. I wanted to talk about it then and am feeling encouraged to do so now. I feel that talking about it regularly, as though it was just a thing that happens sometimes, like rain at a picnic even though you checked the weather forecast and all was supposed to be clear, will help quell the guilt I shouldn't have to feel, as simply sometimes pregnancies aren't viable. I also mention it now because it is common enough that we, as women working to start a family, need to know it is ok for that to happen sometimes. It's not the end of our journey if we don't want it to be. We shouldn't sweep those experiences under the rug and dismiss them as a blip; they are part of our history, just like scars carved into our skin, or scratches dinged into the finish of a guitar. I am proud of every mark I may have accidentally left from loving on an instrument I play, why not acknowledge and appreciate everything we see as a flaw in life and see it for what it really is? A life we lucky enough to have lived in, loved on, experienced. My loss feels like a jagged scar set firmly within my soul that won't be erased by a healthy pregnancy, but I wouldn't want it to. I am extremely thankful for that experience because now I know I am ready, I am able, and after seeing so many friends get the babies and family they want, I also know we have just been waiting for it to be our turn.


Eight months in and I still have no plans to stop building things for you. I love what I do so much, and she has allowed me to keep working as usual, albeit sometimes a bit later in the day and new maneuvers to fit around the table saw. Having her there during each task also bring a lot more thought to how I protect myself, and her, from ingesting dust and running the louder more vibrate-y machines. My dad has been kind enough to do my finish work for me though I wish he didn't have to as he has enough on his plate. As usual, he seems ok to help us out as he does without a thought for everything else I might need.

I am trying to do what I can to help him as well while we feel our way through this uncertain time of Coronavirus. About a month and a half ago restrictions in South Carolina relaxed enough for him to be able to have his prostate removed. I drove him down, was allowed to go as far as the surgery waiting room and say goodbye, but was shooed out immediately. I then proceeded to wait for updates in my car for the next seven hours. It seems worse than it sounds, I felt safer waiting in the parking lot than a hospital waiting room, just being a pregnant person without access to a bathroom wasn't ideal. But like spraying my finish, I know he would do it for me without thinking twice.

Following a successful surgery where no cancer was found to have spread outside the prostate, my dad then recovered for a week at my house because it was closer to his doctor than his house in Virginia. I don't know about him, but Nick and I really enjoyed his stay. We played Tonk together most evenings, gambling with the same pile of ones each night until someone ran out, and waited all day to watch Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy.

Since the pandemic began in March, my dad seems to have picked up a habit of coming to the house to watch shows he likes because less folks have been visiting the shop. I know he enjoys the company, and it isn't ideal for all the people who love to come hang out all night in Wayne's shop, but for me it is literally the first time in my 35 years that I can make dinner and expect my dad to come eat it with me or play a game of Tonk during the commercials of The Naked Gun and not have to worry about each car that drives by is coming to take his attention from what ever we are doing. Also he can plan to go fishing with Nick and then actually go because he doesn't have to visit with someone else who shows up unexpectedly. Another small silver lining was the other day, as we all rocked in the chairs on his porch, he said, "You know, I've never really spent a summer here. I am always out traveling or there is the festival, and Galax and going out to play every weekend. It is really pretty here in the summer."



For the past few months we have been doing what we can to be careful and keep each of us safe while we wait for my dad to recover fully from surgery and for me to have a baby. I appreciate the folks who have called the shop to keep Daddy company instead of visiting for now, and the ones who do still come by unexpectedly, wearing a mask just in case and visiting from the driveway. I know some people, especially around our area, don't believe this virus is as scary as it feels like to me, but it matters greatly that my dad stay safe, it should to all those people who think so much of him, so wearing a little mask or just calling instead of visiting shouldn't require a second thought. I know my safety matters less to most of my dad's visitors, but please consider that I am carrying someone else in my body who didn't ask for any of this nonsense but I go keep my dad company while I have the chance to work with him. If you are one of those folks calling and wearing masks, know it is much appreciated that you understand my concerns and are accommodating for now.

When I head up to work in my dad's shop, I'd like to say that I am helping him with some of his work as well, but it isn't quite true. While we were all hanging out at my house after his surgery, someone emailed me to ask my dad what his plans were for his #800 guitar as they knew it was getting close in the serial number queue and were vying for a slot. I dutifully asked Daddy what he thought he'd do with it since he happened to be sitting on my couch watching a baseball game. He said he thought he would make #800 for his granddaughter so she would have a birth year guitar for when she was old enough to play it. My heart melted, as I had no idea he would even have thought to make her a guitar at all, especially before she arrived.

#800 is now underway. I have left all of the details of that guitar to him and what he wants to make for her, but I insisted on having hearts on the fingerboard, like the fret markers on my style 5 he made for my eighth birthday. "I wish there was some of that Truman Capote's yacht wood still around, like what mine was made from," I said one day while we were in the shop. He turned and pulled down a dusty, oxidized, and cracked side and said, this is all that's left of it. I bet I could flatten it back out and use it for the peg head. He did. My other request was that the inlay not be farmed out to a CNC machine, either he could cut hearts or I would be glad to do it. He said he would like something fancy and for me to design it, so I worked the hearts, same size and shape of his, into a little vine design. It was an odd feeling, wanting to do something so well because it wasn't just for any client (whom I always want to do my best to make them as happy as I can) but for my daughter, whom I have never met. It felt even more important that I do a good job for her.



Brazilian rosewood from the bar of Truman Capote's yacht.


Now, how will it work to fit caring for this new tiny person into my building schedule, you ask? To tell you the truth, I don't know. When I attended the Woodstock Invitational guitar show I asked several of the women builders and while a few had children, none had been building instruments while pregnant or raising babies. I have recently met a couple of women in my lady luthier group who have had kids while working as luthiers, but they live in countries where six months of maternity leave is provided by their government. Aside from feeling jealous, albeit happy for them, that they have such a great safety net in their healthcare system where ours is sorely lacking, I suppose I will just have to figure it out on my own here. Hopefully I will be able to find a balance between doing the job I absolutely love and caring for my growing family. Stay tuned, it is sure to be a fun, but perhaps bumpy, ride.



Some of us do better on the Covid diet than others...