Black waves and power tools.

Black Waves - 1

Listening to Rick Rubin
Talk about his taste,
Denying the ego,
Sending his awards
To his parents’ house,
Tyler Cowen leans in,
They’re a decent match.

We’re driving together
Towards the workshop,
About an hour
From downtown,
Into the country,
But really a million
Miles away from
The left-brained buzz.

Out to the acreage,
To the workshop,
The prairie skies,
Blue as a bluebird,
Cloudless for what felt
Like the first time weeks.

But time is dilating
In strange ways now,
So it might’ve only
Been a few days.
Our schedules aren’t
Exactly “regular,”
Our routines more astray,
Than Fed guidance.
Since just before Christmas,
Still doing our best.

Black Waves - 5

These days I’m her chauffeur,
And primary companion
During business hours,
Father to our two boys,
In the evenings.
We’re still one,
Two parts of a whole,
A structure otherwise,
Divided and apart.i

Healing her brain,
Isn’t healing
A broken bone.
It’s not set it
And forget it,
It’s healing together.
Through hope,
Through humour,
Through medication,
And meditation.
We’re on the mend now,
Maybe 30% there,
Which is so reassuring,
After the cold dark abyss
Of New Years Day.

It’s a mid-morning drive,
When her energy
Is at its most reliable,
Before she needs
To lie down and rest.
So we plan a big adventure,
To the workshop,
To see our new millwork,
Black waves and all,
In process of becoming,
For our new Studio.
Maybe I’ll even,
Pick up a power tool
And co-create,
Just a bit.

Black Waves - 2

The highways are open,
But lumpy and bumpy,
The car communicating
With each crack and heave.
Should’ve taken her Lincoln,
At least the sun visors
Would’ve extended.
But would’ve could’ve should’ve,
At least that’s what
We teach our kids.

She closes her eyes,
Not seeing the farms,
And old telephone poles,
Quelling her nausea
As best she can.
We keep driving,
No Google Maps,
Barely cell reception,
Just a hand-drawn
Map to guide us,
On these remote Range Roads.
What other freedoms
Will we discover?
On our way to the workshop.

The map’s job is done,
We arrive just before noon.
Inside the barn,
Rock music blares,
We ask our friends,
Our contractors,
To quiet ‘er down.
Her tinnitus is painful
At the best of times,
Zeppelin doesn’t help.
They gladly oblige,
Appreciating her state.

Black Waves - 6

The cabinet casings are built,
Assemblage of cedar,
Solid as steel.
Now comes the carving,
Molding and shaping,
Belting and sanding,
Water into wine,
Alchemy,
Turning fallen trees
Into fine furniture,
Après Caleb Woodard.ii

They hand me a mask
And goggles,
The goggles fog up,
But I keep the mask.
They hand me a grinder,
Said it’d “pull”
As I make contact,
The girl dons ear plugs
And films,
No power tools for her,
Not in this state.

I lean over the cedar,
And make the gentlest contact,
More curious than hesitant,
The blade yanks on its leash,
Grabbing every which way,
Control is left wanting,
Finesse not forthcoming,
Like a dreidel spinning
On an old concrete driveway,
Skipping and hopping,
This way and that.

I drop to my knees,
Control 5x’d that fast,
Good, I thought.
For 10 minutes
I ride black waves,
Without destroying anything,
That’s how long
My hand muscles last.
Gripping the bronco,
I thought my hands
Were decently strong too,
Yes and no
Is the reality.
Either/or is
Left-brainedism,
Again and again.

Black Waves - 4

The right hemisphere
Is where reality
Lives integrated,
Infinite like waves,
Exactly like waves,
Not particles at all,
There are no particles,
Just waves,
Black waves,
Like the cabinet.

Black waves,
Of energy,
Of time,
Of attention,
Of consciousness,
We are not obligated
To complete the work,
But neither are we free
To desist from it.iii

Black Waves - 7

  1. Per Ari Lamm (archived):

    How did God create Eve? He made her from Adam’s rib, right?

    …Wrong!

    Here’s the verse: “The Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man…He took one of his ribs…And the rib (tzela) that the Lord God had taken from the man He made (va’yiven) into a woman” (2:21-22).

    Wait, but doesn’t that say God made Eve from Adam’s rib?

    Well, no…

    The Hebrew word being translated as “rib” here is “tzela”. But it only means that in much later Hebrew (like *way* after the Bible).

    In the Bible itself, however, it never takes that meaning.

    In the Bible, the word “tzela” is actually always an architectural term. It means “side”.

    The next time we meet this word in the Bible, it’s in constructing the Ark of the Covenant: “two rings on one side (tzela) of it and two rings on the other side (tzela)” (Exodus 25:12).

    So “tzela” refers to one part of a building that, when you fit it together with the other part, forms a whole.

    And that’s clearly the meaning in Genesis! How do I know? Well, remember the Hebrew word the Bible uses for “made” (as in “made into a woman”)?

    It’s “va’yiven”.

    That root (b-n-h) quite literally means “to build” in the architectural sense!

    So God didn’t make Eve from one of Adam’s ribs. Rather, He split the first human in half—He built one side into Man and the other into Woman. They are two halves of the same structure.

    One being—one flesh—longing to be united.

    Literarily, this explains the Bible’s very next line: “Therefore (‘al kein) a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh” (2:24).

    How does Woman’s creation lead to this “therefore”?

    Genesis’s answer is that once you understand Man and Woman as two halves of the same being, you can then understand the attraction of marriage.

    After all, man comes from the flesh of his parents…and so only leaves them for another being of whose flesh he is a part.

  2. IG has its uses! Thanks Caleb!
  3. Pirkei Avot 2:21 in Mishnah (Oral Torah), per Iain McGilchrist, who isn’t even Jewish! How great is that?

4 thoughts on “Black waves and power tools.

  1. […] deep through the veins of the crypto-space, and through tech more broadly at present. My old–new-best-friend Dr. Iain McGilchrist would certainly seem to agree, so let’s bring him in to […]

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