Practical stuff

I need to do quite a lot of work at Kerverbel in order for it to become a working proposition. I actually enjoy physical work and exercise. I enjoy the rush of serotonin along with the next person, but cannot for the life of me see the raison d'etre behind the need to drive to a gym, spend several hundred pounds a year on membership (and yards of Lycra etc), run on the spot on some machine and then drive home. Probably stopping on the way for a couple of beers now that you are feeling so good.

Our forebears would have laughed their socks off at such insane behaviour. They got quite fit before Gyms were invented, and for free, it was called 'work'. (sorry, I know that many people cannot stand the four letter word ending in 'K') . They worked hard physically and ate heartily. C'est la vie.

I however, really enjoy physical work. Shovelling sand, mixing concrete and heaving bricks really tones the muscles, no expensive gym and an end product to be proud of , a beautiful body and a lovely edifice. There is something about the act of creating that fulfils a real need in mankind. I have always made, created or even grown things and it feels so complete when one succeeds. At one with the world and one's humanity. And the real beauty of creating for oneself is that there is no need to hurry. When one is making, really making, creating, something, time enters a new phase of being, it becomes meaningless. The first time that I understood that others felt this way was when I first read Robert Pirsig's " Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance". It was a revelation to me that others felt this way. I then read "The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists" by Robert Tressel and realised that creating and making were interwoven with our needs and reason to be. I also understand that they both had other axes to grind but that is not an imperative here.

If you have seen the film "Kill Bill" you will have seen the Japanese swordmaster. He took a month to create his ultimate sword. It was an expression of his Being, his Will, His Craft and his Art. He forged his weapon of death with love and care. He forged it in heat, shaped it with tools and polished it with love. Although it was a thing of death, he created life. For himself. Why is it that we can see the mysticism in the making of a thing of death but cannot, in ourselves understand this same mysticism in the everyday crafting and making that is carried on in our own workshops and factories. Why have we reduced it, in our minds to a mechanical meaningless task? We see beautiful artefacts, every day, all around us but we take them for granted. Not understanding the love and care that has created them. Perhaps we believe that somehow these things are created by nameless machines in some faceless factory. But this is not the case. These thigs of beauty are conceived, borne and created by a human being. Putting their all into the act of creation.

Many of us have lost the capability or ability to undertake the beautiful act of creation and fulfillment that follows. We have reduced daily life to a drudgery, one day after another, looking for excitement and sesationalism to fill the gaps. Is this why our young people reject what we offer? Perhaps they need to regain the power that one feel.

Recently I bought or rather was given an old concrete mixer. In itself it is not a thing of beauty, Far from it. But with it I may create things of beauty. So does that make it beautiful? I don't know the answer. The machine was made in the early 1970s and it no longer works, there is a fault with the engine. I need to do some research and discover the problem and how to rectify it. There is no handbook or manual, but I hope to understand it's inner workings and somehow make it work. Bring it back to life - I hope so. Is that not an achievement if I manage it? That would be a moment of creation perhaps. A small thing perhaps, but a success nonetheless.

On this mixer was a small fuel tank from another engine (a J.A.P.) which would be a stranger to it. A replacement. On this fuel tank is a small fuel tap, it controls the fuel flow and has a simple but sophisticated method of allowing a reserve of fuel to be ready for emergencies. A simple thing, but a thing of beauty. Made from brass castings, machined, polished and heavily chromium plated it is lovely to use. A really well made product.

It was made at a West Midlands factory on the Tipton / Dudley border by a company called Ewarts. I used to pass this factory regularly, it was one of countless others that made simple but beautiful products and sold them to the world. A source of wealth to the workers and of fullfilment also. To be able to create such things. Rare talent. It is now the site of a Tesco supermarket. Progress?

In the late 60's My first real love was a factory girl. She was called Muriel. Silly name but I did quite like her. We were to be married (Shades of 'Muriels Wedding') but we decided that it was the wrong thing to do, just four weeks before the fatal day. So we had to cancel everything. She came from an interesting family, her dad was one of thirteen surviving brothers. One of her cousins was Vic Eastwood, a famous Motocross sporting hero of the '60's and '70's. An Uncle of hers known as the 'Tipton Slasher' for his boxing prowess changed his first name to Clint and was last reported by the Sunday Times as living in Loughborough, but that's another story. She fell for a young Mormon missionary from Salt Lake City. I heard that she went to visit him over there but came back without her Prince. I saw her once more, when I had a temporary job during a University vacation. I was selling carpets in what is now called a 'shed' warehouse. She was with whom I assume was her husband. She avoided me. I never saw her again.

Muriel worked at the same Ewarts factory when I met her, she was a capstan lathe operator working on such items as the fuel tap I now have lying here on my desk. I wonder if her hands handled this thing I now hold, all those years ago. The timing would have been right. How small is this world of ours? Perhaps that particular circle is now completed.