Coming To One’s Senses
As I was putzing around this morning, it dawned on me that I’m seriously overdue for getting my eyes checked. Glaucoma runs in our family on my maternal grandfather’s side, and I’ve been told that I need to make sure to keep up with regular vision exams because of it.
J'aime mes yeux!
That acknowledged, it got me to thinking about something else as well—if you had to give up one of your five senses, which would it be?
In case you need a biology refresher they are:
- Taste
- Smell
- Sight
- Sound
- Touch
Answering that question was almost a little too easy for me, and I don’t know if I like that. But, this is how I came to my answer: Given that I am a jeweler and I absolutely MUST do what I do (because I’d die if I couldn’t), it bothers me most to think about losing either my senses of sight or touch. I must see to design, and I must be able to physically feel what I am doing. A lot of times you can feel burs on metal (ouch) better than you can see them. Not to mention, there is too much of the world left for me to see before I feel like I want to surrender my eyesight. Heck, if I weren’t a jeweler, I’d definitely be a geologist–so, no, I need mes yeux.
Taste? I love food waaaay too much. In fact, I just discovered Whole Food’s Black Forest bacon, and because of this there is NO way I will EVER give up my sense of taste. EVER. Coffee? Um, no. I’ll give up a rib before I give up my ability to taste coffee (and I’m a hard-core taster too–coffee is to me what wine is to wine connoisseurs).
Sound? Coming from a life as a former classical pianist, no way. Sure, I sold my piano to make room for my jewelry bench, but rest assured, I WILL be getting a replacement Steinway at some point. And, I don’t think The Universe granted me perfect pitch for naught. Though I never figured out of what use it really was before taking a hiatus, I’m not convinced that I will *never* use it–so, we’ll see. I’d love to get rid of my tinnitus though…
Also, I’m convinced that I could learn and would love to communicate in sign language, but to NOT hear the voices of the people I love, or to NOT be able to listen to mood music as I’m working? To NOT be able to hear lakes, streams and oceans? No thank you.
Smell? Well, there you have it. I would miss the smell of coffee brewing in the mornings, and I would certainly miss my favorite perfumes (Fracas and Lolita Lempika), but if I *HAD* to, I think I could go without my sense of smell. Maybe I’d be less inclined to eat that scone if I didn’t smell it baking??? I would not like NOT being able to smell smoke if I were ever exposed to a possible fire, but hopefully I’d be in a place that had a good, working smoke detector that would smell it for me–and from there I could hear the warning.
What sense would you give up if you had to?
[Methinks I'm going to make that appointment with an opthalmologist...]
My Name Is…
Tamra Gentry, and I am a mokume gane purist.
I heart my friends who make jewelry and items using polymer clay and glass; however, I am not a fan of any references to it in those areas, as the very specific *metal* diffusion-bonding process that gives us mokume gane was created by Japanese metal craftsmen hundreds of years ago, and often for a very specific purpose.
Sterling, copper and nickel sheets prepped for layering
This whole issue of semantics bothers me because *I* think the clay/glass/mokume gane link is confusing for anyone who wants to learn about real mokume gane. It’s history was hard enough to come by per two of the main people who did a TON of research and put mokume gane on the map here in the West–Eugene and Hiroko Pijanowski.
In searching for more examples of mokume items on Flickr, I came across an overwhelming and unsettling number of polymer clay and glass items.
Not. Happy.
Those items certainly are not representative of what mokume gane is in the traditional sense, and I find that problematic (though I really do appreciate one of the groups actually calling itself Faux-Mokume Gane vs. just all-out mokume gane).
So, I took matters into my own hands and created a Flickr group for mokume gane called, well, *Mokume Gane*.
If you make or use mokume gane in your work, I would love it if you would join this group and post photos (start/participate in discussions, etc.) so that we can further educate the public about mokume gane, its rich tradition/history, how it is made, etc.
Here’s the link: http://www.flickr.com/groups/mokumegane/ Of course I have some process shots posted from the time I spent apprenticing with Mokume Mentor last year.
I’ll be posting additional photos as I have time.
And He Shall Slay them ALLLLL! Wheeeee!!!
The Gentry Comedy Crew
Ok, that was exceptionally silly, but hey—behind the scenes in the Gentry household? Oh boy. And it was worse when we had Kay-Dawg because she was part of the circus too. [Contributive senses of humor are an essential part of the success of our almost 16-year-married bliss.]
Anyway, I usually give my “slay them” orders and bow to Hubster as he heads out of the door to Kendo practice on a weekly basis. Of course he looks at me, rolls his eyes, calls me a “goof,” and then proceeds to go slay dragons.
That established, I am in love with the cuff links I made for him to wear to a meeting with a few fellow IT execs/colleagues. I’ve wanted to make this special pair for him for a while now, just because—but I’d been procrastinating because I couldn’t decide on a design for them.
Making a.m. coffee in cufflinks...
Well, this past Sunday, Hubster comes to me and mentions that he’s meeting with a colleague who LOVES cuff links, and that this colleague really dug the Fordite ones I made.
“Do you have a pair I can show off?” he asks.
Fordite & Sterling Silver
Well, my first Fordite pair is long sold and gone. And generally speaking, my Fordite pieces take time anyway (because the designs have to “speak” to me). So I went with what I already had in mind–Kendo.
Hubster is a kendōka (practitioner of Kendo aka Japanese fencing), and has been one for almost 10 years now. Knowing how passionate he is about the study and practice of Kendo, I’d always had it in my head to make him a pair of cuff links featuring a tsuba–or hand guard for a traditional Japanese sword. And given my love for mokume gane, I was really excited about coming up with something. Granted, they practice using bamboo sticks (aka, shenai), but hey…
I think I did them justice.
I’ve always been fascinated with swords and tsuba (to the point of fantasizing about becoming a nihonto), so luckily Hubs has me in his back pocket because I can make him a pair of new tsuba cuff links any time I want. ;-] In fact, I already have some additional designs floating around in my head as I was inspired by these. I mean, this pair is SO gorgeous—the photo does them NO justice. I kept the design simple, which *I* think makes them REALLY pretty, and they look SO elegant on his cuffs. He wore a double-cuffed shirt yesterday, and a single-cuffed shirt today. All beautiful. –He must have thought I was crazy because I followed him around the house in a hypnotic daze staring at his cuffs as he was prepping to leave.
I may just have to make me a pair too (I’m a Thomas Pink shirt-junkie (despite what I might look like in the studio on any given day)…cuff links often required. 
)
Cufflinks = Done (Well, almost…)
But only by the hairs of my chinnie-chin-chin.
That’s because, knowing better, I did something really stupid that almost cost me one of them. As a result, it took me a little longer to fix what I messed up because these bad boys are too pretty and I was NOT giving them up.
No way, Jose.
In progress
In the photo, they’re fresh out of the pickle, so all I have to do now is clean them up (get rid of solder remnants, do a little more sanding, polish them) and they’re ready to go.
I am in love with them, and there’s something of a story behind my choice that I’ll blog when I post the photos of the final product.
Oh–I forgot that I didn’t post my status about the cufflinks here the other day. This post is derived from:
Tamra Gentry Design Studio : Gotta go make a pair of (marketing) cuff links for Hubby to wear to dinner Wednesday with a group of fellow execs/colleagues. Potential! ;-] (Must work faster than my usual meticulous artisan self from conception to finished product–wish me luck
My Space
I hate a mess, and THIS makes me absolutely crazy.
So does THIS.
Most of the white cake-y stuff is my flux—boric acid and denatured alcohol. Given everything else I’ve tried over time (you name it, I’ve tried it–even that Firescoff stuff), it works likes a dream for me. However, one of the drawbacks is that it is messy as hell, and I HATE it for that.
Heck, even my office is a mess right about now, and, of course, I absofrigginlutely HATE it. I didn’t even bother to photograph the other side of the futon.
Before I get started in the morning, I’ll probably end up spending half the day cleaning all of this crap up, because I just can’t function like this. I usually (ritualistically) clean up my studio in the evening because I hate being presented with a Morning Mess. But, I’m not going to even try that–I’m too tired, and there’s too much else to do. ;-p
In the meantime, for some reason I’ve had The Little Purple Man’s “Melody Cool” in my head (from “Graffiti Bridge”)–I was hoping to post the video to close out the day, but sorry, couldn’t find anything… [Today was one of those days that I prefer to work in silence, but I think tomorrow will indeed be a Prince on full-blast day. ;-]
