Pull Up a Chair

 

I bumped into these chairs more than a year ago on Ana White's blog.  I bought plywood and two by twos about nine months ago.  I finished them last week.  I think part of why they took so long to build is that some of the joins were difficult to clamp and glue takes a long time to dry.  There was a lot of waiting and not a lot of momentum.

 

 

I get that building ten chairs is a big project, and I think I've mentioned that I have five children...whom I homeschool.  I'm a little busy.  But nine months is a lot of time to have a pile of wood sitting around.  I think if I were honest, I would say I sometimes avoided working on them because I was afraid.

 

 

 I really wasn't afraid of failing.  There was a lot of failing and it wasn't a big deal.  I cut things too short, drilled pilot holes too close to the edge, forgot to square until after the glue dried, set the compound mitre saw to the wrong angle, broke bits, lost bits, left half a bucket of wood filler out to dry, dropped a clamp on my toe, again.  I was afraid of rejection.

 

 

Most of the people in my life think I'm neat.  This project wasn't going to change that.  The only person whose opinion of me was on the line was me.  Now that I see that, I've decided to try something different.  I really enjoy these chairs.  They're beautiful.  I'm proud of the work, and perseverance I put into them.  But I'm not going to accept myself more because of this success.  Nor am I going to accept myself less because I anxiously dodged.  I'm just right.  I'm building bookshelves this week.  I don't feel scared at all.