Mr. Oatmeal's Oratories: 2020

So, I recently built a desk that will no doubt be my forever desk. Then I thought, at some point, someone else will own the thing. That got me to thinking about telling that person the story of how this desk came to be and why it is like it is. I decided to write a letter to the person who will someday have this desk, here is that letter.

I see you decided to see what was in that compartment. I made that compartment for no other reason than to hold this note, and occasionally hide cash from my Bride.

My name is Duane Smith and the idea for this desk got started after my first week of working at home during the COVID19 pandemic. I am unsure when someone may read this but right now is an unprecedented time in History.

I am the currently the Chief Technology Officer for OPB, Oregon Public Broadcasting, and on March 13, 2020 we shifted to about 200 of our staff to working remotely. This preceding Governor Kate Brown’s stay at home order, which came out about a week later. I was in the first test group for remote working. I was thankful that we had recently paid to have broadband internet brought up to our home. Before we had half of a DSL, 2.8mbs was a fast speed day for me and after, we had 1gig speeds, worth every penny of the $2,800 it cost to have them trench it up to our house.

After the first week of working from home I realized that the desk I had in my home office was WHOLLY inadequate for me to actually work from home. It was a 40-year-old Piece Of Shit that I bought from Goodwill probably 20 years ago. It is tiny and has very little space for my legs to fit under. I have a sit stand desk at work has a larger work surface and provides way more space underneath. I also learned that the chair I had was also a POS, so I went to the office at 7140 sw Macadam in Portland and grabbed my office chair.

That is when I started thinking about a new desk. I started looking around and did not see anything that I really liked that I could afford. I started thinking about a sit stand desk. Again, did not really find anything I liked. Then it dawned on me, I could build my own desk, but what kind. My mind for some reason immediately went to a big live edge slab sit stand desk. Something that had a crotch in it. I could almost see what it would look like from the moment the idea popped into my head.

But, I had never worked with a live edge, or a big slab of any kind. I had never used epoxy and I suspected I would need to use that. I have been impressed with some of the river tables and other projects I have seen where the use of colored epoxies was prominent. I did not want that level of contrast because that whole thing feels a little like a fad to me. I think those things are super cool looking, I just am not sure that will still be cool in 10-20 years.

So, I started studying how to work with large slabs, specifically Walnut, which is what I first saw in my mind, not sure what but that’s what I saw. I can only recall one project I have ever used Walnut and that was a pair of ashtrays that I ended up giving to my sister back in the late 70’s, not for smoking cigarettes.

The first big challenge, where the hell would I buy a giant chunk of walnut. I asked friends, searched on the hardware store bulletin board, Criagslist and Facebook Marketplace. I found a guy named Eric who had a ton of giant slabs for really good prices. All his slabs were green, within a year of felling. Back to the research, how do ya dry these giant slabs out. OK, all I have to find a place to kiln dry it for me, I live in the great PNW, I thought this won’t be a problem at all.

I found a company that charged by the board foot, AJ Kiln Drying. He indicated that a slab that big and 3 inches thick would need to be air dried for at least 3 years before it could go in the kiln, or it would warp and twist up to the point of ruining the slab. Great, I did not want to wait three years. I asked him if he knew of anyone who had slabs that were at least 3 years air dried.

A. J. pointed me in the direction of the Maverick Sawmill and the owner, a man named Nick Mooers located in Hubbard Oregon. I reached out to him and explained what I was looking for. He told me that he had thousands of slabs and was 100% sure he had something that fit my requirements. He said he would pull some out and line them up for me and I could come take a look. A few days later I traveled to see and while I wished I could have bought them all, I selected this one.

It was 3 inches thick and did not look entirely flat. I thought, no biggy, I could mill that down flat and then parallel it. I asked him if they did that sort of work, to which he said yes we have a big CNC machine that makes short work of it. I asked what that cost to have done, he told me that if we could agree on a price right then he would do it at no charge, we did, and he did. I picked it up about 4 days later, milled smoothly down to about 2 inches thick.

Since I do not have my shop built and have my 58 Ford Ranchero and 63 Galaxie 500 convertible in my garage I had to commandeer my Wife’s garage. I built a carpet covered fold up rack that allowed me to work on it and then fold it up with the slab and she could park her car in there. Bride was not happy about losing her side of the garage for a bit.

The first week I spent sitting in a chair staring at the slab, waiting for it to tell me what it wanted to be. I kept coming back to the broken edge, that was probably created when the tree was felled. I first spent time trying to figure out how to cut it out or minimize it best I could. I realized that I should not try to do that. Primarily because the broken piece, while not what I wanted, was what it was.

That got me to thinking, it has to stay. This is not a dimensioned lumber project where I was striving to make everything as close to perfect as I could. I decided I had to honor the slab for what it was, not what I wanted it to be. I suppose that is true for all work on larger slabs. That was a revelation that helped with the rest of the design and build.

So, I spent more time staring at it through that lens. As I thought about it, I began to realize that I needed to highlight the damage and figure out a way to use that to tell a story. I know, I am such a nerd given to sentimentality. I could have easily just whipped something together but for some reason I wanted to make this desk into something special. Special because I had never built myself and desk and will most likely never build another for myself.

I cannot recall which day it was, but it dawned on me, maybe this can be a story about my own life. Those areas from my youth that were broken, broken mostly because of my own dumbassedness. Then I realized I could incorporate pieces from my past, emotional ties to those who helped provide the guidance, direction and structure that has led me to who I am today. So that had to include a number of things, my parents, my Grandmother (Granny) and many of the influential folks along my life’s journey.

As a somewhat sentimental person, I have kept trinkets and items over the years from folks who were important to me. I have items from my parents, who both passed in 2009 and from Granny. I have items from friends and mentors spanning back over my most of my life that have meaning to me. The thought dawned on me, what if I could somehow incorporate some of these mementos into this desk, as a reminder about how I got to where I am today.

I thought, great, I have a direction! I started thinking about each area that had sustained some sort of damage, some may call them flaws but at this point I stopped thinking about them in that context. I started looking at each one as an opportunity to tell a piece of my story. How could I bring my past into this thing in a way that told my story, I had no idea at this early stage but knew that which each spot, the answer would eventually present itself to me.

Time to start thinking about what kind of actual desk this slab would sit on. I really like my sit/stand desk I had at work. I started researching the mechanisms. The old interwebs, as usual, gave me too many choices, ranging from absolute crap to some high dollar setups. I knew I did not want a piece of crap and was nervous spending a ton of money on the more expensive ones without knowing for sure they were high quality units.

I read so many reviews that my head was spinning, everything in the world has good and bad reviews and sometimes it is hard to determine which are bullshit and which are not.

I started considering using a company that we had recently used at work for sit stand radio and TV studio furniture. This made me nervous as I did not want any conflicts of interest, especially since my company recently spent over $200,000 with this company for studio furniture. I spoke to our CFO and CEO and explained what I wanted to do and got their guidance on how to keep all that above board.

I reached out to Alan Martin of Martin and Zeigler, headquartered over in Canby Oregon. I explained my concerns about conflicts of interest. He laughed and said you’ve already paid me, why would I do you any favors the furniture I just sold ya will last 20 year or more. We had a good laugh and went through my other concerns about conflicts. He is my age and started that company when he was in his 20’s.

I laid out what I was looking for and he gave me a neighborhood for the costs. He would need the weight and exact size in order to give me a hard quote. I weighed it, 146.5 pounds and took some craft paper and cut it out the exact size of the slab and sent it to him.

He came back with a price, that showed ZERO favor based on our professional relationship, I agreed, and he started building the mechanism. The systems we put in at work were top notch, smooth in operation and super quiet. And just so you know, the sit stand mechanisms cost me more than the slab. Ok, with that I had what I was building roughed out, it was time to get cracking.

The first work I did on the slab was to start working on the bark. My research told me there are many ways to do that from grinders with specialized blades to pressure washing it off. I did not like the idea of grinding, I wanted to preserve as much of the live edge as possible. I also did not like the idea of firing up the pressure washer either, I have been opposed to using a pressure washer on any wood, even decks, let alone this slab of walnut.

I decided I would take the slow route, scrapers, and putty knives along with hand sanding. It took me over 15 hours to get the bark off and get the live edge roughed in to where I liked it. I am glad I took the time, I am afraid that some details would have been lost using those more aggressive methods. There would be much more sanding to come as I progress through the various grits, all the way to 800 – which I know is overkill but I wanted this desk to be as close to perfect as I could get it!

Next, I spend a lot of time sanding. I started out using my 30-year-old Craftsman belt sander starting at 80 through 150 grit on the bottom. Then I moved to my little Ryobi random orbital sander from 100 through 180. That POS ragged out pretty quick, so I purchased a DeWalt variable speed orbital sander and continued the work. I know I had more to do but that was close enough for me to start experimenting, with finishes, with the epoxy and with the Dutchman joints.

I researched epoxies, colorants and how to do that work. I played a bit with the areas on the bottom with all things. I tried what was called purple but came out as blue, you can see that on the bottom. I also tried a brown that I really liked but, in the end, settled on the black for the top. Here are the tests I did of the purple

I trimmed the three end grains. I trimmed as little as possible, just enough to get to a nice clean straight edge with all the chain saw marks removed. This was the only sawing I did on the slab. I also started experimenting with how I would finish this thing. I really wanted to keep it as natural as possible. I tried a few things, I really liked Watco’s dark walnut Danish oil for the looks.

The only issue with Danish oil is that it requires maintenance and I am lazy and did not want to be reapplying Danish oil every year so, it required more experimentation. I tried water and oil urethanes of various sheens. I finally settled on Watco dark walnut Danish oil with a super thinned down satin oil urethane, commonly referred to as wiping poly.

I cleaned up the cracks and established where I wanted to put those bow ties first, three made of wood in total. Since I had never done one before I thought I would start on the bottom. I was somewhat disappointed with my first attempt, I did not spend any time ensuring my chisels were sharpened and honed. There were small gaps, most likely no one would ever even notice but I wasn’t happy with it. I spent a few hours sharpening them up and practiced more on some scraps. Each of those are about 5/8” thick.

Just a note on the joints themselves, the dutchman, the bowtie or as I prefer, the Nakashima joints, named after George Katsutoshi Nakashima. He was American woodworker who was a renowned woodworker, he actually accepted the Order of the Sacred Treasure in 1983. An honor bestowed by the Emperor of Japan and the Japanese government. Anyway, he was the first to truly use a dutchman or bowtie in a way that elevated aesthetics over the simple function of a dutchman or bowtie joints.

There are two different woods, one mahogany and two from curly maple. There are also two aluminum ones on the bottom. Each has a story that makes it important to me.

Each has significant meaning to me but the mahogany is especially dear to my heart. Back in the 90’s my great friend Evelyn McNurlan and I were building a dinner room table and chairs out of mahogany. It was a Saturday and we had wrapped up for the day and she went on home for the day, to soak in the tub She died of a heart attack in her tub, she was in her early 30’s. I was thunderstruck!

While she was not the first person I had lost in my life, she was the first really close friend, I was in my late 20’s. Since we were working on this project in my shop when I lived in Jacksonville Florida, I just kept all the wood. I never finished the table or even one of the chairs, I just could not bring myself to do it. Over the years I had incorporated little pieces of that mahogany into furniture I built, for me and my wife, for friends and other folks. I never told anyone the meaning of the wood in their projects. The largest of those was a nightstand for my wife.

The mahogany bowtie is from that wood I have kept around in the shop through all the moves and over nearly 30 years. It is very special and is there to honor my friend Evelyn, her name is written on the bottom side, which will never be seen.

The maple pieces are from some bits I got from my great friend John Wesley, who passed in the early 2000’s from COPD. He was a great guy and I miss him a lot. We tried out the turkey frying craze way back in the day, me, John and one of my best friends Mark – it was Yummy. He was quite a bit older than me, we met through our wives who met at Dog Club. We had a great many adventure and he was a really interesting man. One of the things about John was that if he had one of something, he had three of them. From tools, to firearms to you freaking name it, he had more than one of them. I have held onto those little bits of Maple all this time and have built a few things out it, a pencil box for my wife is my favorite. His name is written on the bottom of those as well, never to be seen.

The Aluminum ones in the bottom are from some bits I got when my neighbor Alva Robertson cleaned out his shed once. He was a great neighbor for me back when I was a brand-new first-time homeowner at the time. He was influential in that he led by example, and his example was a damn good one in every aspect I can think of measuring. I got those bits of aluminum back in the 1990’s and was sure I would find a use for them someday. He has passed as well.

The lid for secret compartment also has a very special meaning for me. I got the remnants of a coffee table from a man named Don Brady, this piece was in the exact middle of that table. I cut that down and thinned it out to work in this application. I first met Don Brady when I was 11 years old while delivering newspapers. We remained friends until he passed in 1992.

Don Brady was a once in a lifetime friend, mentor and all around AWESOME human being. He had a large impact on my life. As someone who lacked a father figure and I learned a great many life lessons from him. My own father was pretty non existent in my life and my stepfather and my young self, we did not get along AT ALL, we did later in life but that change was very slow, over a decade. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my Dad but he was just not there for us when we were kids.

I also used a couple of other bits and pieces inside the secret compartment. One of those was this little bit of maple from one of my Brothers' from another Mother Phil. This picture was snapped on a work trip to Atlanta right before the COVID isolation began.

All those pieces are situated in a way to hold things together or hold things in general, that is by design. When I think about those pieces, they represent people who have helped me along in my journey through life. They each offered examples of how to operate in life that helped me become the person I am today. I just love Evelyn, she was just a bubbly positive person in the face of a challenging life.

I wanted to also explain a couple of other components I incorporated into the build, around that broken edge. As I mentioned my childhood was not without adversity and I would not change one bit of it. I hear people wishing they could go back to their youth and change things, not me. I am where

I am in life because of that adversity, it helped form who I am.

The little turquois and silver bird came off a lighter case. Way back in the day, late 70’s, my late aunt Sue traveled to the southwest and purchased a few trinkets for folks. She got one for my Dad and one for Granny. It was basically glued to the side of metal tube that held a disposable Bic lighter.

I would not even be able to venture a guess as to how many disposable lighters that were cycled through that case, Granny smoked a lot. My Dad had both his and Granny’s and when he passed, I kept a few of his things, that was one of them.

Granny was the most influential person in my life. Parthenia Geraldine Dempsey Baily Smith Watson, had the largest impact on my younger self than ANYONE else in my life to date. After my folks divorced, I stayed with my Mom until she made me choose between her and him, a 22 rifle was at the heart of that. I stayed with Dad and then Dad and Granny until I joined the Navy in 1983. She was one who would tell ya exactly how she saw it, regardless when or where or who might be around.

She once called my girlfriend, whom she did not approve of, a twiddle twat, right to her face. Haahaha, that was a pretty embarrassing moment for me at age 16, she was right but to hear it out loud hurt a bit. She also tolerated my dumbassedness and let me learn so many things the hard way, because she understood that was the way I learned. She tolerated my underage drinking, my smoking pot and all the other dumb ass shit I put her through. She could see me learning in real time with an awful lot of extremely painful lessons. So many of those lessons are still in me, learning things about life that way makes them stick with ya and become who ya are in this world.

There has not been a day goes by that I don’t think about her, she was such an authentic soul, there was absolutely zero bullshit in her world, she had no tolerance for it. She could tell when I was lying before I even opened my mouth and would say bullshit! Hahaha, it makes me laugh remembering her in those moments.

I remember once coming home at like 11 or 12 at night stoned out of my head and I convinced her somehow to make me French toast, which hers was the best on the planet. She also made the syrup, although I have no idea what she used or how she did it. She not only made me French toast, she ended up making me a whole damn loaf of bread worth of French toast because I had the raging munchies. So much of who I am today I can trace back to things I learned from her, either by her directly telling me so or by her allowing me to learn it the hard way or by her sometimes unorthodox examples. She was my best friend and I loved her A LOT and miss her dearly.

Also over there are a wooden token from my Dad’s favorite bar, before they closed it down. As I looked through my mementos that I have from my Dad I thought that one summed him up better than all the others combined. Don’t get me wrong I loved my Dad but if you were look up dysfunctional relationship it would have our picture there. I have pondered it quite a bit over the years and have come to conclusion that what was broken about our relationship was related to his absence in my youth.

Without that bond that is formed between a father and son when one is a kid it creates a distance that can never truly be bridged. We never played catch, we never did things that would have us playing together. Without that it became more about being friends, the only problem for me was that I would not normally be friends with someone like my Dad. Weird I know and I wont go into it here but just know that wooden token that would have gotten him a free lunch sums up my Dad, it makes me cry to think that but it’s true. This picture was taken in July of 2009, a few months before he passed and the last time I saw him in person.

Also in there is a Queen Elizabeth II silver jubilee crown coin to represent my Mom. She was born in England and met my Dad in France when he was in the Army. I thought of all the mementos I have from my Mom that one best sums her up. I loved her a lot and miss her. We also had a strained relationship most of the times, especially when I was a kid. I was also her self admitted favorite, take that Siblings 😊. Most of the challenges with my parents were due to my own damned dumbassedness.

My Mom was great to my Bride, always so thoughtful. The two of them were sometimes thick as thieves and on more than one occasion I was super nervous about that. I was glad that she found happiness later in life when she married her 3^rd husband. I think he was the only one that she truly loved, the other two were vehicles to get out of shitty situations, although she never said that to me. This picture is from when she graduated with her Masters degree, she was within a year or two of the age I am now.

It makes me laugh even now that I look at the three of those items beside each other, preserved in epoxy for time and eternity. I am not sure if it would even be possible to find three people who were further apart with who they were and how they traveled through life then these three. I remember when I was living with my Dad and when my Mom called he would answer, not say a word and hang up. He would then proceed to say “your Mother called”. I remember when I went to boot camp for the Navy, both Dad and Granny both told me, in different words, not to bring home a foreign wife.

While I wrote this as I went along I am wrapping up this note about a month or more after I finished the desk. We are now looking at the end of the year before we consider going back into the office. Nationally the cases and hospitalization number are spiking, with Florida leading with 15,300 new cases in one day over the weekend. You will probably have the perspective of time by the time you read this but life in this country is CRAZY right now.

I do want to give a shout out to my Bride of 30 years in this Sandy. She did not really give me any shit about building this desk. She is the most tolerant woman in the world to put up with all my idiosyncratic behaviors. She really did like how it came out and has asked about maybe making a coffee table for our living room like this, smaller obviously. I will at some point I am sure it. Love ya Honey!

So, there is the story. I wonder what you must be thinking about this note, I also wonder what year it is and how you might have come to have this desk or be reading this note. I tried to capture the moment in time and the meaning of all the things on this desk for you the best I could. I hope you can appreciate this desk and the effort and love that went into making it.

I was not super great at taking photos of every single step or capturing video of the processes. I find doing it to be a distraction from the work and the zone I get in when I am engaged in any of hobbies. here are some pictures I did take along the way because some of my friends kept asking me how it was coming.

here are a few pictures of the finished desk