Playing Fair and Being Kind

A CRAFTSMAN

The broken figure steps up into the abandoned workshop and stops to adjust to the neglect and silence. An atmosphere of resentment reeks. The forgotten tools, boards, fasteners, and machines lie hulking and motionless. Not a sound. Still there is the din of rejection and estrangement. His eyes stare at the decrepitude. No place in the old shack reflects anything but sadness disguised as disapproval and suspicion. He feels the tiredness that always comes with this event. He feels beaten before he is even two steps into the shack. He shakes his gray head and looks for a safe place to park his feet in order to move forward. Several boards and a partially disassembled chainsaw block his path. A moment or two to relocate these impediments and he is able to thread his way among the discarded objects he wants to inspect. He carefully places his large, gnarled hands; gingerly letting his knuckled fingers slide over the machinery as he passes along through the narrow passageways left for him.
There’s no electricity in the shack. That was disconnected years ago. He hasn’t been inside the place for well over ten years. He spies the nail apron and lifts it from the tote box of galvanized ten pennies, roofing nails, and box nails. The apron shows the old print advertising of a long-gone lumber yard. This place contains a major portion of his life. The extrusion of his existence passes through this place. His body contains the dust and splinters of hours spent here. His hands tingle with old scars and imbedded wedges of wood and fiberglass. He carries parts of this place in his body and parts of his body are dust in this place. DNA mixed together like kin.
The tools and machinery here have been idle for so long that nothing less than major reconditioning will make them right again. It will take a patient and tender hand to attend to all the bruising and disfigurement existent. Every tool was sharpened and wiped clean before this neglect. Someone paid attention daily and kept the place orderly, cleaned, stowed. Before, there was activity and interest. The songs of steel slicing wood, tunes of burnishing and scraping of steel against steel in sharpening. Voices in poetic utterance calling out measurements and species of old growth trees. Flames, fires in forges heating metal for the anvil and hammer. The smells of industry, the air filled with the aroma of rough-sawn planks, and shavings on the floor.
He stops and stares at the cold iron, the thickened film of oil coating the legs and stands that support the heavy planer and table saw. The drill press with cobwebs, chuck key dangling from the stiffened cord. Mice have built nests of shavings and bits of rag and insulation throughout. The ancient eyes find mouse dirt along the surfaces of the work bench and on the shelves hanging from the walls. He spies the jointer and one of his fingers suffers a freshly clipped knuckle again. The bump and then the sting of blood vessels erupting all over the bed of the machine. His missing fingers tingle. No more.
The silent misery of this place still rattles him. With the doors closed and the lights on he could stay involved for hours. He would spend all day and parts of nights cutting, shaping, and fitting pieces of wood species together for lasting gifts. His skills would spread joy to family members. He wasn’t able to give of himself over the years but when he could he would produce a piece of art in wood for one of his children. Something that would last and that would offer silent caring for years beyond his own. He was a generous man. All he had to give came from his hands and heart and he hurt to see this present condition of the machinery and tools that helped his generosity.
Today, he came home from the state prison where he worked as a volunteer. His skills as a group facilitator fed a need for the men who were locked up in an air-tight building with windows that were always shut and men were always moving to maintain a level of cleanliness and sterility that was not truly clean and sterile. There was a layer of disrespect on everything. The people were forced into idleness and many fell into disrepair out of sheer boredom. He often visited the place knowing that his presence was a gift to those who knew him. He delivered the cleansing attention that sharpened the minds and wits of the men who welcomed him. He carried with him a quieting wit and empathic mind. He could sit with a group and suggest they be a small gang in their meeting room. They could conspire and plot to be the best and most respectful of each other. He called them warriors. They loved it! He said they were like the warriors of ancient times in the northern parts of Ireland and Scotland. The Fianna, who would go out in the Spring of the year to guard the boundaries. They would not cross the boundaries, but would stay to guard the land where they lived. He loved that myth and enjoyed employing the story to illustrate the true nature of men. To be men meant to not interfere with others but to only protect your own. He wanted the men to know they could be men and be gentle and could protect the helpless and vulnerable of their own tribes.
When he arrives at the facility, he suffers the anxiety of putting on his own armor and cinching the leather straps that hold his weapon to his body. His old mind holds memories of past efforts to fend off the injustices of his life. His weapon is his clarity of mind, of truth, of love and caring for those who have no one to love or care for them.
He enters the prison and stands for a moment to let the place wash over him and fill his pores and body cavities with the neglect and silence of apathy. He feels the hostility of years of inferior and inadequate treatment of the residents of this place. Regardless of the location; whether in one town or the other this culture of false penitence pushed into the mugs of the unfortunate souls who were judged to be less human and less worthy. He enters the place that hold these false truths; that host an atmosphere of reeking resentment.
The forgotten men; thugs, thieves, rapists, and pedophiles lie hulking and motionless in their cells. Not a sound. Still there is the din of rejection and estrangement. His soul stares at the decrepitude of feeling, economic investment in humanitarianism. No place in the old prison reflects anything but sadness disguised as disapproval and suspicion. He feels the tiredness that always comes with this event. He feels beaten before he is even two steps into the place. He shakes his gray head and looks for a safe place to park his feet in order to move forward. Several visitors and a partially disassembled group of relatives block his path. A moment or two to patiently skirt these loved ones and he is able to thread his way among the discarded objects he wants to meet with. He carefully places his large, gnarled hands; gingerly letting his knuckled mental fingers slide over the images as he passes along through the narrow passageways left for him.
He imagines he is carrying fresh air and sweet dreams to his peaceful warriors. He imagines that they are waiting for him with the same love with which he moves forward into their space. He is a visitor and he is on guard and his weapon at the ready.
G. M. Goodwin
29 July 2019