Photo Essay: My Most Recent Project

As many of you know, I have a hard time relaxing. My (admittedly unhealthy) idea of relaxing is taking on another project (or a fifth or sixth side-hustle). This habit ain’t great during a lockdown.

Back in January, I read about the outbreak of COVID in China, and I thought to myself, “Self, this could spread here, and we might end up quarantined in our homes, too.” So I ordered some masks and a woodworking kit. Before you make the mistake of thinking I am smart, I did not think about selling any stock. THAT would have been smart.

A couple years ago, when my Uncle Dave passed, I inherited some of his pipes because he and I both smoked tobacco from pipes just like my Grandpa Don. I also got this kit to carve a pipe.

The pipe starts out looking like this:

I had a model I decided to use. It’s not the most appropriate for the memory of a lost loved one; that’s not why I chose it. This is a representation from a character in my next novel, the sequel to Don’t Read This Book. She (eventually) looks like this:

So I got to work carving the pipe. And the effect on my psyche was surprising. I felt so calm while I was carving. I would lose all teack of time, sometimes stitting still and carving for six or seven hours before feeling a stiffness in my back and realizing I hadn’t moved. I’d organize my schedule to try to get things done so I could get back to carving. And this was one of the coolest effects: At night, instead of my COVID anxiety dreams, I had this incredibly boring and pleasant dreams about carving!

In the end, the carved pipe looked like this:

Next, I colored the tentacles.

Then I used watercolor paint to fill it in.

Then began the process of sealing it. To do this, you bake it and heat up some beeswax, and you keep pulling it out of the over and applying layers of melted beeswax to the hot clay until it can’t absorb any more (or until you run out of wax, as I did). Then you let it cool, and it looks shiny.

But that’s not the coolest part. Check this out!

Yeah, that’s right: When used, smoke comes out of her eyes.

Next I’m either going to start a brand new project, a large fountain for my backyard, or a more modest project, maybe a long stem for the pipe that has matching tentacles curling around it. I can’t decide which will come first. I have a lot of other work to do (teaching my high school students, teaching a class to teachers, getting four or five more books ready for publication this year, finishing my own novel), but this was a great way to relax, and I’ll come back to projects like this to fill the time.