Craft

Anyone who has known me for awhile knows that I love craft.

craft

O.E. cræft "power, strength, might," from P.Gmc. *krab-/*kraf-. Sense shifted to "skill, art" (via a notion of "mental power"), which led to the n. meaning of "trade."

I have always loved craft. One of the hallmarks of my childhood was my inability to sit in one place for very long unless I was making something. This was not very different from most children in kind but by degree it was magnitudes greater. So I went through a succession of activities, braiding, a hand loom, wood working, carving, origami, and God only knows what else. All of these were supported by my family because my parents loved craft as well. My father could assemble anything from parts imaginable and made etchings and sand carvings in glass of ridiculously dorky things like the the Enterprise. My mother crocheted and painted ceramics and was fairly good at both.

There is something wonderfully universal about craftsmanship. It is the exercise of knowledge over a situation. Not just any application will do. The craftsman is aware of all the pieces he is working with, she knows where all the pieces can fit, and if blessed with some artistry how they "should" fit. How wood grains meet, how fibers wear, what people think, whether two words flow seamlessly, all of these are knowledge of a thing applied with subtlety or in the old use of the word they are crafty.

All the people I most admire and the men I have loved have been mighty in their respective crafts. I find power extraordinarily sexy and I adore the immediate. A well placed word, touch, or note have each at some point in my life been the closest to paradise I've ever been. There is an art to love and there is a craft to it; I have been loved by men who are both artist and craftsman. I doubt that I could love a man who wasn't both.

For me craft is an ordering of passion. Whether that passion is for man, or God , or objects makes little difference. Craft is stepping back and observing a situation and then applying the sum of your knowledge to the observation and acting in a way that creates greater beauty. Craft frames what is inherently beautiful in any given thing and adores it in the process.

I love craft.