Sorry to hear about your family tribulations. I sold our camper/trailer as there were too many sad memories involved in using that and my health is not up to camping these days. Your approach is similar to mine except I'm somewhat hobbled at standing and walking. I go to the gym and lift weights 3 times a week and feel good afterwards even if I'm a bit sore the following day. I use my shop 3-4 times a day in about 1/2 hour blocks but have to rest in between. While seated I can using my 3D printer - currently printing out disposable brass instrument mouthpieces for my elementary school music teacher daughter in law who uses the mouthpieces for her annual student auditions for the following years tuition program. The students are tested to see if they can make a mouthpiece "buzz" - some can't do this till they're older. Regular mouth pieces have to be disinfected in between use whereas the students can keep the 3D printed ones to practice.
Hi Bob,
Please accept my sympathies for your loss. There is nothing written or spoken that can compensate for this agonizing change. I'm rather agnostic, but have a close friend for more than half my life that is a pastor, and another who is a music minister at her church. I'm not sure where you fit in the spectrum of beliefs, but wherever it is, that is fine. In times like this, after wading through grief and finally finding a bit of light somewhere, even I try to picture the missing person looking down at me and telling (maybe yelling at) me to notice that while things are not going to return to the previous normal, s/he has just moved out of the way to let you see through a new window to your next adventures... propelled by the memories of the missing to push you forward, rather than hold you back.
I have not opened AS for at least a decade but happened to just want to look today, and I the first posting under milling was a good old BobL posting. I miss your friendly banter / suggestions / problem solving / explanations / sharing of your milling adventures / even talk about D2 plane blade steel from some time ago. Seeing your creativity and ambition, I was thrilled to see you working on brass mouthpieces. Though my BS in Mathematics / Computer science didn't lead to a career, my Masters of Architecture gave me a dozen years working on Hospitals up to US$500m. After being the 80th and final person laid off in 2010 (weeks before my wedding) in a firm of 160, I picked up musical instrument repair - band and orchestral (I refused to work on guitars and percussion as that would have kept me from working on oboes). I had to choose between that and returning to 50+hrs/week architecture, but I had my only child on the way. I choose to work part time with things that kids spit in (Trumpets get really gross when not cleaned) so I could be home and be a dad, rather than be a missing dad. It was awesome. I taught my son to play his first note on a trumpet at 16 months. Everybody said he couldn't do it but kids this age are blowing "Zerberts / raspberries" all the time... they are playing brass instruments without the instrument in front of them. Before he was 2 years old, he played (I had to do the fingering because I couldn't even reach) a full scale on a clarinet, oboe, and saxophone. He played Sol-Do'-Do on a full sized tuba, french horn, trumpet, alto horn and trombone by himself. I have videos to prove it. His doctor said he got over his pneumonia so quickly because of his deep breathing for instruments.
All this was from a kid who's lactation specialist (Helps with breast feeding) said he wouldn't be able to nurse because he has Trisomy-21 (Down Syndrome which can cause all muscle tissue in the boy to be weak or low tone). When we weened him, she admitted that she really thought he wouldn't be able do nurse because she has never had a kid with Down syndrome be able to do that. She said that He changed her mind, and should would try harder with other kids with DS.
So many folks would not accept a child with DS, much as we fight the loss of a loved one. (I cannot accept life that way!) We of course did, and we wouldn't change a thing. After the crap at the hospital where medical professionals were arguing Yes/No on a diagnosis of DS for over a week, we began to see life WITH Henry, not life where something is missing. As every parent will tell you, their kid is amazing, and this goes for Henry, of course. In addition to his ability to play instruments (He is now 8), he can hear the music in his head, and sing it out when the lyrics are supposed to be sung... he is an empath... he knows your emotions before you do ... one day when he was about 1, I walked in the house and he signed (American Sign language was his first communication method) "Daddy sad". I stopped, and sure enough, my morning shift at work left me sad. Now he talks well, runs up and down stairs (My wife had a high school student with DS who could not navigate stairs), is learning to ride a bike, participate well in class, and is just a darned cute kid. Yes, he has a 100% chance of getting brain plaques that come with dementia at an older age, but only a 50% chance of displaying any dementia. He is far more likely to get leukemia, but 4x as likely to survive it vs. one of his typically developing peers. There are certain hard tumor cancers that he will NEVER get, but you and I may. He "Won't go to Harvard Medical School" as his pediatrician said in the first 60 seconds after we met her, but hey, that sounds expensive anyway.
I guess I ramble on, hoping that I catch you at the right time where you have periods where the memories are happy, and energy giving, rather than perpetually sad and debilitating as they are in the beginning. As I noted, an opening (A window is only functional because of what is not there... take your interpretation through eastern philosophy as you wish) comes when something moves out of the way. If we move out of the way, we don't want those surrounding us to lament the new opportunities, even though the one missing is THE ONE. We take great joy that we got to spend much time with THE ONE, but one of us was going to leave first... what do we want the other to do if we leave first? What are we going to do?
