Shop Blest

First, yes I know "blest" is not the standard spelling of the word blessed, I just thought it looked better. Or at least more fun. One of the things I've done each fall and spring for several years now is attend an educational series that the Woodsmith Store sponsors. They are on Thursday evenings and typically last for about an hour. They cover a great many topics, and even when it's something I know about, I always learn something. A couple of weeks ago, the biggest thing I learned was how incredibly fortunate I am to have the shop space I have.

There was a conversation going on about table saws  It is clear to almost everyone that this piece of equipment is the center of most shops.  Admittedly, if you are a scroll sawyer, or a turner, this is not the case, but for the rest of us, it is. The actual conversation was around what you have to move to be able to work in your shop.  I remembered working on an armoire for Sara while living in Lees Summit. In order to get anything done, I had to pull two cars out of the shop, and then get out equipment and material before I even started to work. It seriously took me an hour to get started and an hour to tear down at the end. That was with good weather. If the weather was bad, it was more of a challenge as I had to get the place warmed up as well.

Now, I come to the shop and am ready to work the minute I walk in the door. Heat is automatic in the winter thanks to a setback thermostat and I am considering air conditioning. My equipment is dialed in so measurements are accurate since I don't have to move things. I have the space needed to work on a teardrop trailer for my sister. Even with a trailer sitting in the shop, I still have plenty of room to work. Listening to these other woodworkers describe the things they had to do to be able to work made me realize how truly fortunate I am.

Then, while I was thinking about woodworking, my mind floated to a bigger place. I know we all face challenges each and every day, but it struck me how blessed I really am. Even though as a family, we really didn't have much when I was growing up, my sister and I really did not know it. The community we were born into and the family we were part of overcame the lack of tangible wealth. The community, and our family made up for it all. We did a lot with a little.

Jaye and I had college educations, because my mother truly believed that if someone was willing to fill out enough paperwork there was a way to go to college. We both had student debt when we came out but we dug in and took care of that as soon as we could. I went into the workplace and thought I would work at my first job until I retired. This wasn't the case, but I have been lucky as I have been able to be a "broken field runner" in the workplace. I have been able to learn things and pivot into a new job/career using all that I learned.

I guess all of these things came pouring in around me while I was thinking about my shop because of the world we find ourselves in today.  In large part, the Sigourneys of the past are gone.Places where people are extended family. Places that take care of each other. They are much less common today than they used to be. One of the places I have the opportunity to work in right now is Neola, Iowa. I think Neola is much like what I am talking about. That community has been able to raise money and get projects done unlike many other communities their size. If you have never stopped in there, you should visit.They have some amazing things going. And their HooDoo Days is a celebration to be experienced.

Anyway, I got a long way off track there, but I know much of what would help this country right now is if we were more like Neola or Sigourney. If we knew our neighbors and those around us. If we took the time to try to understand. If we walked a mile in their shoes.  I didn't grow up in a perfect place, but when I cross the Keokuk County line and start waving at people, just because I might know them, I know I was blessed to learn all of that. So, tomorrow on the way to work rather than yelling or honking at someone, I am going to wave and start my own little movement.

 Why don't you join me?

Gatherings

Whether it is just the time of year, or the holidays, I have been thinking about something lately.  What are the reasons families and friends gather? Groups come together for the absolute best of times: birthdays, anniversaries, commencements, weddings - you know the list. Lately however, I have watched a few gatherings which are a more difficult, and they have made me think.

For all of us, there have been times when family members are sick or dying. If not yet, there will be these times. They are simply unavoidable - as inevitable as taxes.

Throughout the last three or four weeks I've watched the house across the street. We knew one of the members of the household was fighting an end of life disease. We just weren't sure when it would happen. Then the increase in traffic alerted us to the fact that the time had come. Sara did a good job of staying connected during this time. I did not. Anyway, cars of family and friends have been across the street for the last several days, and I wonder about all of the conversations. When we meet, one of the standards things said is, "We shouldn't wait for a time like this to get together. We should get together more often."

This is what I have really been thinking about. Is this the right approach? Is this the attitude we should take at these times? I think it is not, and I will give you a couple of examples of another way to handle this. Several years ago, I went to a family gathering in What Cheer - a celebration of life for a member of my family that had passed - and we were out at the cemetery to bury the ashes. After a bit of conversation and a prayer or two, the time came to actually handle the burial.  Well, nobody brought a shovel. Now while there are families and circumstances where this would have caused an absolute meltdown, not my family. A member of my family just went to his truck, pulled out the long-handled shovel and we continued the ceremony. We all laughed, because it was funny and touching.

Fast forward to last fall - same general part of the world. We were in Thornburg for my cousin John's funeral. The crowd was enormous as John was one of those people everyone knew. They had the family visitation in the Tri-County High school in the common space at the front of the building. When I got to Berdette, John's wife, the first thing I did was make her laugh. I told her that John Ogden was the only person in my life who could get me to voluntarily walk into the Tri-County High School. For those of you not from our part of Iowa, Sigourney and Tri-County were not what you would call the best of friends, in fact, the tension and rivalry between the schools was palpable when students or graduates from the schools were in the same place.

I tell all of these stories about family gatherings for the same reason. There are good reasons to get people together and there are other times people have historically thought of as "bad" times to get people together. When I walked out of John's gathering, the second thought touched me. Yes, I will miss John, no question, but I had the opportunity to see some of the people in my life I rarely see.  Why is this considered a bad moment? Why not just see it for what it is, time to spend with family and friends. We make promises to schedule something, but the truth is, the minute we leave, our life pours in on us and another year passes before we know it.

Okay, I've wandered all over the place with this, and feel like I may have not made the point I wanted to make. The next time my family gets together, for whatever reason, I will be completely respectful of the situation, but will also take the time to hug my cousins, talk to my aunts, and do those things that makes us family. I will enjoy the opportunity to see and be with family. These people can drive me the craziest, but they have always been in my life. I need to take advantage of the fact they still are.

That's what I am thinking about today. I hope it gives you something to contemplate. Next up, I have a great thought about the size of your shop, and what this means to others. I look forward to writing it and I hope you look forward to reading it.

New Additions

Late last year, one of the greatest things that could ever happen to a person happened to me. I became a grandfather.  And like a new grandfather I did exactly what many before me had done. I went to ToysRUs, found the biggest teddy bear that they had in the place, strapped it in the seat of the truck and drove to Kansas City to meet this new Martin. Now he came into the world a little bit early, and there were some early concerns about his health, but I am happy to say that he is doing great now. It seemed to me that he was doing so great that I got him a backhoe for the sandbox for Christmas this year. Some told me that I might be early with this gift, but I want to make sure that the minute that he can take advantage of it, he is able to do just that.


After I saw Lucas in the hospital, what struck me was that I had no idea how to be a grandfather. Do I spoil this person at every turn? Do I feed him all of the foods he isn't allowed to eat at home? Do I take him to the shop at age 3 and teach him how to drive nails and use the scroll saw? Well, I am sure that all of these are things that as a grandpa I am supposed to do, but how can I tell? Is there a book? Oh so many questions. Of course, there is no instruction manual and it is all things that we will just have to learn, just like we learned how to be parents. Just like Andrew and Lyndsey are learning right now. I remember that like it was yesterday. We brought Andrew home and I had never held a baby before. Now we had one. Even though I was quite sure that Andrew was trying to communicate with us from his first day at home, we had no idea what he was asking for. It took time, and as you learned and thought you were moving forward, you soon found out that you really didn't know that much. 

Then over time, slowly at first, and then with more and more speed, what you knew and what you could interpret grew at an alarming rate and it all made sense. Until, of course, the late teenage years, but that is another story all on its own. By the time we had mastered the "kid" language we had discovered that much of it is universal. Now I can sit in a restaurant, hear a child crying and know if they are mad, hungry, or need their diaper changed. It really is just another language, but there is no class that you take, or book that you read that helps you to understand. You just have to jump in and figure it out. That is what we did with Andrew and that is what he and Lyndsey are doing with Lucas, and it will get easier with time. Hang in there, new parents. Nobody told you it would be this hard because it may have chased you off. Just hang in there. Having a new baby is pretty wonderful when you have a chance to get used to it.

Okay, speaking of a new addition that will make you happy, I added a piece of equipment to the Toybox last month.

In 1990, at a Woodworking Show, I had my first chance to look at this piece of equipment. I remember, leaning on the Powermatic table saw that had just come to market, with Chuck Wolfe from Wolfe Machinery, thinking how great it would be to own one of these. Now, twenty six years later, I finally bought one. It came in at a birth weight of 635 pounds and took a truck with a lift-gate to get it to the Toybox, but now it is in and functional and I know it will produce a lot of sawdust and parts to build things out of.  All of my excuses about starting on Sara's new kitchen cabinets had better come to an end now. There is just no excuse left to not get work done ... unless of course it is the overwhelming fact that I need a shaper. More to come there.

I hope that as 2016 ended, and we all looked at the extensive list of people that we lost this year, we also had good reasons to focus on all that was good for us in the year.  I am cautiously optimistic about 2017, both business and personal, looking for more good news in the year than bad.  I hope that this will be your case as well.

Shop Talk

A couple of weeks ago, I had an opportunity to meet with and talk to a gentleman I've known for a couple of years now. The relationship we've always had was a work relationship. He works for me, well, some of the time. And some of the time I work for him. Actually, I have no issue with working for him as I actually believe my responsibility is to support my people. Some call this the inverted management pyramid. Anyway, because of some circumstances, we decided we shouldn't talk in our place of business, but instead we'd meet at his home. This was a little unusual, but as I said, under the circumstances  it made sense. When I arrived, the first thing I noticed was the new garage/shop he'd built. As all of you would completely expect of me, I asked for a tour. Let no shop go unexplored.

Then an amazing thing happened that really caused me to reach back into the recesses of my memory. The next few minutes of conversation were the most open and the most honest we had ever had. In a few minutes I knew more about him than I learned in the years I've known him. I think the reverse may also be true as I found myself very much at ease, talking about things truly important to me with an openness we'd never shared before. It cause me to think back to the days with Payless Cashways when my closest group of friends managed stores and tried to put up better numbers than mine.  I remembered all of the merchants who helped us to be more than we should have been, and I remembered "bar talk."

Bar talk was a concept my Regional Vice President first suggested to me. I'm not sure if it was original or something he learned somewhere else, but it really didn't matter. The concept was that if you were in a meeting and asked a question, you were careful with your answer, thinking about all of the people in the room and how they would interpret your words. On the other hand, when the meeting ended and you all went out to dinner together, had a couple of adult libations, and the same question was asked, the answer was completely different. In this environment the same person who over-analyzed their response in the meeting would just tell you what they really thought. Bar talk. Open, honest communication at its finest. And now, I discovered another place this happens is in the shop.  Who knew ...

Throughout my life, there have been places I've always been more comfortable, and when I came to the end of this conversation, I figured out why.  They were the places where there was a lot less posturing and people had a greater tendency to be open and honest. The first of these was Sigourney Lumber on Saturday mornings when I went up with dad to see what had happened around town during the week. That was an incredibly honest venue, maybe a little too much for a boy my age. But I never had to wonder what someone was thinking, they just put it out there. The next was my mom's kitchen table. Although the players changed over time, the conversations were always the same: open, honest, and direct. This is where I learned to argue, with Jerry Miletich taking a position just to start an argument and then seeing how I did. It was a place to learn about truth and opinion, all in the same time and space.

The last place like this I think of is Midwest Top Shop in Fort Dodge, Iowa. When I arrived there, they were a vendor of mine, but soon, this place became a shelter from the world, and the people there became some of my closest friends.  Again, look at that, it was in a shop I felt the most comfortable and at ease, and was probably the most honest. Now, here I am again, in a different shop, in a different part of the world and the conversation is once again one to remember forever.

I guess I am a "shop guy" at heart, and will probably always be one.

One interesting note is that my company has bought several businesses in small towns in Iowa this last year. I find myself very comfortable in those locations. Maybe I need to modify my thoughts to say shops, or small towns in Iowa.

I don't know where you are the most comfortable, but I hope you can identify where it is so you can spend as much time as possible there. Have a great week.

Conflict

We all experience conflict and we see it around us, but rarely do we talk about it, or even think about it. The last few weeks seem to have contained a lot of it for me and it really made me think about the ways this happens and the results that often ride with conflict.  Although I'm sure much has been written about it, I can identify several different types of conflict.

First is conflict that has no real purpose. This is often around a topic that is really not very important, or with a person that is not worth the fight. Now admittedly, there are times that this type of conflict can be very entertaining, working to push the buttons of the person on the other side of the conflict, but in the end, rarely is anything affected, or are changes made. Many of the conflicts around political personalities, or political positions fall into this category. There will be a lot of rhetoric around a topic, but in the end, very few changes.  People tend to return to their original position, like fighters returning to their corners.

The second type of conflict is often encountered in our professional lives. I'm in the middle of this type right now. For the last year, I've been managing a rather large project at work. This project cost is in excess of a quarter of a million dollars. It is one of the larger projects I've ever been associated with and I have worked diligently to communicate with all of the parties exactly what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do it. As we approach the end, I find that one of the biggest targets that I had: an increase in speed in the way we do our business was not clearly understood by the company I'd hired. Needless to say, conflict arises. I understand that some of the people on the other side don't feel that I am being reasonable, and quite honestly, I feel the same way about them. We all know that the project needs to be completed and it needs to be done right. We will work through it. The interesting thing in this kind of conflict is that when it is all done, you can choose to go your separate ways, think poorly of the opposite party and never associate with them again. While that is a possibility, it probably isn't the best. We live on a small little planet and sooner or later, the relationship will need to be renewed. Interestingly enough, I am reminded of a conflict that I had in High School with a girl named Jane. At the end of it I told her that she would need me again. Hmm...well, not so far at least. Guess that I was wrong on that one.

The final conflict that comes to mind today is one that you have with those people you really love. These can actually be the most intense as we know exactly what to say and how to say it to make the conflict personal. When you get in the middle of one of these, everything that happens hurts you and hurts the person on the other side. In some cases of conflict, you can identify a winner. In this situation, there is never a winner. At the end of the conflict all you can really hope is that apologies will be accepted and that it will be possible to move forward and be okay. The wonderful thing is that since these are the people we care the most about, conflicts can be set aside with love and caring, apologies and acceptance. We may have to be stubborn and wait a while. but it will work out.

If you are dealing with unresolved conflicts, take a little time in the next few days to see if you can put one of them behind you. Just one. Take the steps to make things better with a person that you wronged, or may have wronged you. You will both feel better.  I am going to try to take care of the work one this next week. And Jane, if you are reading this, give me a holler. We probably need to get that fixed as well.

Okay, a couple of other notes.  I am working on a Quartered White Oak bed frame for the guest room, and I have to say that it is coming out absolutely beautifully.  I can hardly wait to show you pictures when it is done.

And finally, if you have missed the series titled "Highway Through Hell," you have missed a good one.  Check it out on Netflix.  Now, have a great day.

Doldrums

As we come to the end of the month, I look back, not only at the last 29 days, but back through the years. It has always seemed to me as if February is one of the hardest months to get through.  I think back to school days and I remember it seemed as if February would never end. Too many tests and Spring Break still seemed out of sight  - far off in the future. In the days I ran residence halls for Drake, as Hall Directors, we always knew this was the month with the most craziness. This was the month roomates would decide they had enough of each other and this was the month people would walk out into the hallway and just start fighting with each other. February was always hard work.

So, of course the question is why? I think there are a lot of reasons.  Part of the issue is that by this point, winter has been around too long. I think the days are too short and the nights are too long. We have a lot of the nasty weather in February, and even more important, February is generally without sunlight. Gray days most of the time.  I think part of it is because we come off such a high time, with Christmas, New Year, Super Bowl, you pick the thing which is most important, but in February there isn't much after Valentine's Day has come and gone.  And finally, it's the shortest month of the year, so all of your regular payments come way too close to each other. Had you thought of that one?  

But guess what? The other end of the spectrum is coming. Spring is just around the corner and before we know it, farmers will be planting fields and trees will be sprouting their little buds which lead to them leafing out. We will have reached the Spring Break period for families and students, and all will seem better. We will see the last snow storm of the season come and go and we will know it will get warm and stay warm.

So, as we reach this time of change and the promises of Spring, I guess the question for me is what will I do with it?  Every year I look forward to this: waiting for the end of winter, waiting for the time I can put the coat away for good. And every year, I think of the items I have left over from the year before which haven't been completed. I am on year three for a patio project. It needs a little more rock and I need to move the grill upstairs where it's easier to use. I need to put a second coat of paint on the garage door. This has been waiting since the year Megan graduated from High school.  I should probably get that done, don't you think?

I'm coming to the end of February and the beginning of March and am going back to one of the things I learned while working at Drake. This is a planning season, the time you think about the things coming up and see if you can make sure these go better next time around. We have a lot of things coming up this year - I should try to be ready for them. And I've learned a very valuable lesson in the shop lately. I discovered that if I really set my mind to something, and really work on it, a project moves forward at a nice clip. I believe I will have photos of a new bedstead I've been working on to show you in the next couple of weeks.  

A great deal of my life I thought I was pretty organized and got a lot done. Thinking through the doldrums of February have put me in a different place. I do get a lot done at work nearly every day, but when I come home it's really easy for me to turn into a slug and time passes and gets away from me. I have, like many people, lost years to sitting on the couch and watching television. Now, I'm not for a minute saying I will eliminate it all, but I am saying I will work diligently to curtail time-wasting activity. Also, I have to start thinking about building kitchen cabinets. We have been working toward a kitchen remodel for quite some time and it needs to start now.

Finally, I have an order for a teardrop trailer to make for my sister by her birthday. Fortunately, it is not for this birthday, but for one coming up which ends in a "0", but will be here before you know it (sorry for saying so Jaye).  I guess I had better get busy there as well.  Okay, out of the doldrums of February and into the frenetic activity of Spring.  Anyone care to go with me?

Voting

For those of you in Iowa, you either looked forward to or are thankful that we just finished the Caucus season. For those of you living somewhere besides Iowa, the state's "First in the Nation" status regarding the Presidential contest does in fact come with some baggage. We've had more access and exposure to reporters from around the nation than is ever required. In the last two weeks, at least half the time my commute included a news crew doing a story about the conflict....oops, I mean contest.  But now that is all over for a while. The candidates have packed up all of their slogans and promises and moved on to New Hampshire, and I am sure I speak for many when I tell them to travel carefully. Even though we worried a blizzard might keep people here another day or so, it looks as though they are gone.

So, let's talk about the real power of voting. I am not talking about the caucuses, although all of that was important, I am talking about voting economically. We've all thought about this at one time or another, and have probably executed this at one time, but if you are like me, I always wonder if it really matters.  Well, I am here to tell you for me, it does.

You know me - a story has to come with this. I have been with the same bank for over 26 years. I moved to this bank in 1990 because I discovered a very interesting thing. At the time, if you were with a bank in one state, and at an ATM in another state, you could not make a deposit.  At the time I was with a local Des Moines bank and working in Kansas City - in the days before direct deposit. In order to deposit a paycheck, I had to drive to Iowa and find an ATM in the middle of the night. Yes, if there is any doubt, the deposit needed to get into the account and HOW. So when the smoke cleared, we moved to a bank with a national footprint so this wouldn't happen again. And I have been with them for 26 years. Until a week ago.

Over the time, this bank has added more and more fees, as so many have, and I just accepted it, but a week or so ago, they charged me $37.00 for something which was incorrect, at least in my opinion (by the way, remember, I am the customer here). When I called to speak with someone, I was pleased to be talking to a call center immediately identified as being in Rhode Island. Okay, good first step. Then after I explained what my issue was, to my amazement and disappointment, the person on the other end of the phone tried to explain to me why I was wrong, and in what seemed to me to be a very demeaning tone. This after they identified me at the beginning of the call as a "Preferred" customer. By the end of the call I had to resort to telling them in the event they did not want to fix this, I  would just leave. They fixed it and I came off the phone angry enough I decided to leave anyway.

In steps JP at a local bank. I've used this institution to finance the Toybox for several years now, and even though JP on occasion asked me about other opportunities, he never pushed or treated me like any less of a customer because he only carried the paper on the Toybox. When I called him to make an appointment, he told me he was working on Saturday and typically after the rush first thing in the morning there was a very quiet period of time. I went in during that window and found things to be just as JP had said. We sat and talked about all of the things he could do, and I set up accounts with him on the spot. I also believe if there is ever an issue with anything, JP will take the time to listen to me and come up with a solution appropriate for the circumstances.

Now, in looking at the total current assets of the bank I am leaving, they show 2.144 trillion dollars. I feel highly confident nobody in that organization woke up this morning and said, "Crap, I think Jim Martin left us."  From the point of view of voting economically, this did not affect the company I left even one bit. But it mattered to me.

I feel as though I will be taken better care of in a more local situation. I know the name of the person I am dealing with, and I believe that getting my business matters to him. And that is good enough for me. Thank you, JP, for caring enough to treat me as not just a customer, but also as a person. I look forward to doing business with you.