Every Friday, I include a personal note in our Newsletter where I discuss some random event or concept. I never really know what I am going to write until I am sitting at the keyboard on Friday morning. Today’s newsletter note turned into more of a blog post and its something that I would like to hear people’s thoughts on. So I am re-posting it here. Enjoy!
I have a question for you. Have you ever taken the more difficult path on purpose? You could do something the easy way, with results that were just as good, but there was something about the more difficult path that drew you in. I confronted this as I was preparing for this month’s Guild project: a wall-hanging tool chest. I wasn’t sure whether to opt for a new joinery gizmo I am reviewing, or go the more challenging route with traditional dadoes (made even more complicated because of excessively undersized plywood and the fact that the dados are stopped). So as tempting as it was to try the new gizmo on this project, as it surely would have made life easier, I decided to opt for the dadoes. And while I’d like to claim some herioc noble reason, the truth is that the simple path just wouldn’t have done much justice to our viewers. The fact is, if you haven’t dealt with undersized plywood and stopped dadoes yet, you will. So you need to know how to deal with it, with or without a gizmo. And there is plenty of time to show how the gizmo works on future shows. So I wonder how many of you own something like a Domino, an FMT or a DowelMax, yet you still occasionally make your joints the old-fashioned way. Maybe you own a planer but you still break out your #7 and the smoother just for fun. Or perhaps you have a nice dovetail jig on the shelf collecting dust, because you really enjoy cutting them by hand. I know I could say yes to at least one of those scenarios, and I know I’m not alone. If you really think about it, we all share this common trait. Aren’t we all intentionally taking the more difficult path just by being woodworkers? In today’s day and age, do we really need to make our own furniture by hand?!?! Of course not, but we do it anyway. No matter how many splinters, cuts, and backaches we get, we would still rather be in the shop than just about anywhere else. So here’s to the difficult path! I shudder to think of a world without it!
You are just so freakin’ zen, Marc.
Nice post…
(repeating myself from Facebook)
haha… the hardest part for me is resisting the urge to cut corners and do it the easy way, just to get it done… woodworking is about slowing down and embracing the process, but that doesn’t come easy to me at ALL… getting there though…
…..said as he looks longingly at his beloved DeWalt router… lol Love that picture man!
The summit of a mountain is where all of us want to be, but its the journey that has the real beauty.
I can get to the top by flying a helicopter and take it all in or I can climb it myself and enjoy things along the way that I could not have appreciated any other way. In the end the result is the same, I see the view from the top, but the path less traveled (not taken) makes all the difference.
I do woodworking for the nostalgia, for the therapy it does to my sanity. Doing it by hand or the hard way is why we do this.
Thanks for the mental thought, I enjoyed it very much.
(first time poster)
I bought a dovetail jig a while back – it is in the scrap bin under a pile of wood.
I agree completely, we already spend too much time on the interstate and not enough on the country roads.
Same here dovetail jig getting dust.
Here is my take on it : amost 100 year ago my grandmother did everything she had to do by foot or on a horse. Now I take a plane, if our travel speed have increase by a factor 1000, I need to slow down some aspects of my live as much as possible and WW is the key : you can do double mortise and tenon join when a plain biscuit or dowel would have suffice, sand and wipe 10 coats when really 3 or 4 should be enough.
Want to find a new home for that poor, neglected dovetail jig?
Wow. I frequently choose the more difficult path. The one that stands most in my mind was the college I choose. I could have gone to a good but easy local suburban business college or a hard (son of b** hard) engineering college in a city. I chose the hard college and became an engineer.
In woodworking, I often chose the hard way, when I want to do it right. Sometimes that means many hours of extra work, but I feel justified when I know the result is better built, or not “hiding” something. However…have I ever cut corners?…yes I have…usually when I’m tired and want to get it done…so I try to stop work before I get tired…:)
al
Yes, I also do tend to take the difficult path. I do my woodworking almost exclusively with hand tools. I drive a manual transmission car instead of an automatic. I bowl with old “low tech” bowling balls in an old “low tech” bowling center instead of using the latest high-tech gear in modern centers (where I could undoubtedly have a much higher average). I live in an old house with its higher maintenance requirements rather than a new house. The list goes on.
Even though I could accomplish the same things with less effort, I don’t think I’d feel nearly as fulfilled as I do when I take the difficult path. Things you work hard for have a lot of value…maybe some people need more of it in their lives than others.
Shoot, just being a woodworker is choosing a difficult path. The majority of people just pick out some polished turd at the local, discount furniture store.
It would seem I like to take the difficult path when finishing. Sure, I could just spray on a nice, waterbased poly. And it would look great. But I actually enjoy the process of wiping on and knocking down multiple coats Arm-R-Seal by hand. I also like the results.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go whip up some beagle DNA in the shop. I really want another dog and insist on taking the difficult path.
Have you ever noticed how the projects that get the most admiration from other woodworkers are not the ones that are the biggest and the baddest. They’re the ones that show the greatest amount of sweat equity. The ones that reveal the hand-caressed contours that can’t be duplicated on a machine. The hand-cut, versus machine cut dovetails. The inlays and overlays and little asymmetries that can only be done with a lot of hand labor. I think that’s one of the things that separates craft from carpentry.
DD
I am all about the more difficult path. Good on ya for following your inner compass.
Funny thing about the difficult path is that it’s almost always more rewarding. I’ve been working on a hope chest for my girlfriend for….well long enough, and I was originally just going to rabbet two wide boards and make a big box. But, after watching your series on making a steamer trunk, I changed the design to incorporate frame and panel sides. These are the first actual joints I’ve ever attempted, and, after TONS of test cuts, I finally figured out how to make them fit nicely. Sometimes the easy path is the only one we know. It’s guys like you, my friend, that show people like me that difficult paths do exist, and that they’re not necessarily as difficult as we believe.
Marc,
Great post. In woodworking I am just looking for a path. If I turn to my professional life however, I see myself taking the path that best teaches the people that work for and with me. So while some people may enjoy the journey, I think perhaps your context influences your choices. Considerg the blurb about you at the end of your most recent Popular woodworking you have three passions; 1. Woodworking, 2. Technology and 3. Teaching, I would say that the interplay between these three variables really have alot to do with your outcome. I am looking for any path as a woodworker because I am novice. I want to be successful and create things that are functional and pleasing. I can see myself at some point doing things the hard way down the road becasue you learn not from the end result but from the method. All lessons are both subjective and intersubjective. We all take different and the same things away…..>I doubt I am making any sense so I will stop blabbing!!!!!!
Mark
Since I’m starting out in woodworking, I have decided early on that I want to learn the traditional methods of working with wood. I feel it allows not only developing better skills, but it allows you to become more familiar with the nature of the wood by working more directly with it.
I can, however, see that for those that are doing woodworking as a business, there comes a time when you have to allow efficiencies in to the shop to meet deadlines and customer expectations.
I’m thankful I’m getting into woodworking as a hobby and pure enjoyment of the craft, but I also want to get good at the hand methods so that I become quick and efficient in whatever I do with wood. I may not get there but as Marc emphasizes, it’s the journey on “the difficult path” (the road less traveled) that can be the most rewarding.
Being new to woodworking myself, this idea is hitting home with me as we speak. I’m rebuilding a built in entertainment center, and faced with building two sets of doors for the cabinets. Having no experience with doors, I mulled this over for literally weeks but decided against the usual overlay, cope and stick construction. Instead, I’ve opted for inset doors with mortise and tenon joinery with a mitered quirk and bead inside profile. If I can pull it off, I think it will be worth it. If not, it’s only wood, right? So far so good, one prototype door built but the trick will be to make them inset nicely…… we shall see…..
Dave
In reply to Marc’s question, there ARE times that I take the more difficult path.
I own a Domino, and in my opinion, it is one of the greatest power tools ever invented. However, having said that, I DO go out of my way and make good old-fashioned mortise and tenon joints when I build a piece of historical reproduction furniture.
The reason I do this is because I, personally, find it hard to present a piece of historical furniture having known I used modern day technology to make it. In my personal opinion, if you present a piece of historical reproduction furniture, it should be just that. Historically reproduced using authentic joinery and finishing techniques at the very least.
Sometimes the hard road teaches you the most. I’m making a particular boardgame for sale, and it requires a rounded side. It would be easier to just use my friend’s bandsaw to cut the curved pieces. Instead, I am designing and making both a disk sander and a jig to round the pieces on. As a result, I’m learning a lot more than I would by using the band saw.
I think that this definately coincides with the thought that sometimes you gain more from the journey than arriving at the destination…
Great Photograph! Where is it?
You don’t see the tiny little people next to the big rocks unless you take time to click on the photo. There is probably a message there somewhere and oh yah. Double ditto to everything you said in the article.
BTW, does anyone know what the picture is of? It looks like somewhere I visited in the Middle East.
Don’t know. Google images to the rescue! :)
I have always done things the easy and simple way in the past but I am finding myself wanting a new challenge. I am thinking about making a blanket chest with all hand tools and see how it turns out. I think I’ll have more fun and the chest will mean more to me.
wether or not you use power tools to me is irrelevant. The difficult path is doing the job correctly without cutting corners. I chose woodworking as a hobby so my furniture would have stories to go with it. when im back in the dirt in fifty years my daughter will be telling my grandkids how i built there dresser and bed for her when she was a little girl. Knowing that the things i built will serve my family now and hopefully for years to come is, to me, more rewarding than anything else
It’s nice that someone put this into words. Thanks Marc.