Seeking Craft

I spent the better part of my morning and afternoon today with my pregnant daughter.  She had blood glucose testing and needed someone to be with her cause needles are scary.  With several hours spent waiting in the lab I had some time to catch up on a little reading. 

Of course there was also some time just to screw around as well.  I downloaded a pinball game on her tablet while she was doing homework.  Once that got boring (I don't manage sitting around well) I went to Hulu to watch some tv.  The tv in the lab had channels and such but it has been so long since we have actually used normal television that I couldn't get into anything there. 

At one point I was watching the latest episode of the show Go On.  If you haven't seen it, the premise of the show is a sports radio announcer recently lost his wife and is now in a grief therapy group to come to terms with his loss.  Odd premise for a comedy but I find the mix to be at least mildly entertaining (and if you were a fan of Friends it does star Matt Perry). 

There was a scene towards the end where they quoted a line from Yeats (it had been alluded to earlier in the show) "The world is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper."  I really like the line.  It seems a good tie in for much of what I have spoken about and thought about this week. 

I did do a bit of searching because ya, we all know the name Yeats but honestly can we really recall everything that brought him his fame other than he was a poet.  And I honestly hate feeling like a hipster by only knowing the name but nothing else.  It was cool to find that a favorite (thought paraphrased) quote of mine was attributed to him "Strangers are merely friends we haven't shared a pint with yet." 

In a google search of his name one of the first things to pop up his an essay he did pertaining to magic.  Yeats was a strong believer in the possibility of magics existence.  It was the basis for much of his poetry.  In that I find a bit of a kinship with him.  I believe strongly in the power of the craftsman (or craftswoman but that just gets too wordy).  It is in the tireless quest to perfect your craft that a certain quality is born.  Machines can only make a close facsimile, it is only through the blood sweat and tears of our labors that true perfection can ever be found. 

In this there is a certain quality, a magical notion if you will, that can never truely be explained or repeated outside the hands of the craftsman.  Dabblers will always exist, the ones who do a little of this and a little of that in a craft.  But it is the craftsman who dedicates their life to the craft striving each day to become better.