nrmorris9
Concentration
Look at this man, bent over his tools. He is a study in patient concentration. He is a shaper of things, a living example of a life spent laboring with his hands. As he goes about his business of shaping metal, he himself is shaped by his work.
It’s inescapable. When you work wood or metal, when you shape it to meet a particular need or to fit a specific form, you also shape yourself and the way you see the world. Each piece of metal, each block of wood has its own unique characteristics, its own strengths, its own weaknesses. As you work the material, you cannot help but discover your own unique strengths and weaknesses.
In the course of such work a relationship develops between the shaper and the thing being shaped. When you put something of yourself into the object, you necessarily accept something in exchange. From stubborn metal you learn patience and judgment, you learn to trust in the memory of your muscles and to put faith in the sensitivity of your fingers. You learn who and what you are.
Look at this man, bent over his tools. Though at the end of his days his back may be bent, it was never bent in submission or surrender. It was bent in homage to the lessons learned at the altar of honest labor. It was bent in respect.
Blog photograph copyrighted to the photographer and used with permission by utata.org. All photographs used on utata.org are stored on flickr.com and are obtained via the flickr API. Text is copyrighted to the author, greg fallis and is used with permission by utata.org. Please see Show and Share Your Work
