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| One upside to being alone and isolated in a remote place for several weeks while Sarah is back on the mainland is I'm catching up on neglected correspondence, both paper and electronic. Today I had a nice email exchange with Honza. (Astute readers might recall he translated some of this website into Czech way back in winter 2009.) Our paths had crossed a few times when Uz Jsme Doma toured the US previously but our friendship really took root in November 2000 when I drove him to where the band's rented van was being repaired. It was a dreary Northwest late autumn rainy afternoon as we crawled through snarled traffic in a borrowed car along the most dismal stretch of Aurora Avenue and discovered we shared a lot of common ground. It's been almost five years since I last saw him face to face but despite the distance our feet are still planted in the same place when it comes to making stuff. The words and Sestka clock designs below are all his... | ||
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On Thursday, April 17, 2014 8:30 PM, jan čejka wrote: AHOj! Yesterday morning I got your e-mail, read it and since then think about what you wrote and think about what I am going to answer. Good thing was that I had a free day (Easter holiday), making clocks, thinking about what to write back and switch between clockmaking and notes making. Here are some things I put down on paper It is a big difference between DOING SOMETHING BECAUSE YOU CAN AND WANT and on the opposite site is DOING THINGS YOU HAVE TO, YOU FEEL LIKE TO DO OR SUPPOSED TO DO. It is like with the little still life with tram station in my drawer. I did it because I thought it would be fun, it would be something cool. It is totally useless but it stays in value for a long time and you can think about it and enjoy it every time you see it. It is really great to do SOMETHING USELESS WITH THE BEST (OR AT LEAST PROPER) CARE! To do things at the right time and proper time and spend as much time as you feel on it. If you work on something, it is great to STOP if you feel like stop and SWITCH if you feel like switch. Stop and think, switch and forget for a while. Go back. Maybe leave something. Start something new - without pushing, without the worm inside your head speaking: you HAVE to, you SHOULD to... Let ideas flow out of your mind freely. Because if you let them out, they are like new born and you have the room in your head for another ideas to be born. Every time I put something on the paper - it is like take it out from my head and create space for something new, yet the "old" idea is still living in my mind. But it is not knocking on the door in the prison of ideas. TO HASTE somewhere is usually only a way to find out you are more faster in same place and from where you will HASTE SOMEWHERE ELSE. IF you do things freely and properly, in a smooth way, you can propably even SUCK THE ATMOSPHERE around. You remember more and with better quality. You feel something special which stays forever fresh and tasty. If you want to do something NEW, you need to EXPERIMENT. And you can experiment only if you have free BLOCK OF TIME. No disturb - neither physical or mental. As for my job now. Teaching gives me probably the best solution of making steady money and having lot of free time. I think the ratio between my salary and free time is great. Of course I can imagine I could have much better job - for example doing only the things I want:))) But as for now I feel very grateful for this opportunity. The first year in school was very hard for me but now it is much better because I learn how to handle things and how to save energy. As for clocks. I realize that the situation (you nicely named "it's a shame there are not more supporters for your clock work") gives me the best freedom I can imagine. Now I do ONLY clocks I want. I do not take orders from people with any special specifications. No custom work on peoples wishes. I listened only to my mind and having the feeling I used to have on the beginning of my clock career. Which also means I only do the "Gramophone" clock now because I like them best now. And one more thing for the end Only if you work alone, you can do things really freely. If you work with people you are a part of some machine. You can imagine the machine like building a house. There is an architect (he wants to do something original and perfect), there is the chief of the company who built the house (he wants to make the best profit of it), there is the worker on the building site (he wants steady job and he does not care what is building and how is the quality) and there is also the FINAL MAN who ordered the house. And he can only WAIT AND PRAY. Because he is not working alone... It is great you write. Writing is probably the biggest freedom of creating dreams in this world. good to hear from you have a great time (even if I know you have:))) cau Honza |
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