My mom suffered a stroke in early November of 2020. When not helping with support and recovery, I coped in my workshop. All of that energy that I was looking to navigate and process worked its way into a project that became what I call the contemplation bench.

Fast forward 6 months and my mom’s dedication to her self care and incredibly positive outlook helped her recover the vast majority of deficits. Along the way, we’ve all been learning about neural pathways and the ability we possess to retrain and reform these connections when a brain trauma such as stroke can damage the pathways that previously performed our normal functions.

Grain patterns, mycelium networks, neural networks, intersections that create connections.

I’d been reading a lot of books about the incredible ways that trees roots and the mycelium underground form vast networks that literally communicate and exchange nutrients, water and signals in an interconnected way that seems driven toward balance around the principle of healthy life. Interestingly, the network of mycelium looks and seems to share lots of characteristics with the neural networks in our brains. Just like we have the incredible ability to form new neural connections in our brains to move around areas that suffered damage, mycelium grows and forms around obstacles to create a complex dynamic network that performs critical roles in the health and interconnection of ecosystems.

My love for working with wood as a material lead me on a quest to learn deeply into the trees that might ultimately come across my workbench. This has lead me to learn not only about the trees themselves, but also about all of the interconnected relationships that intersect, all the wisdom and modeling that are contained within these relationships about dynamic balance. The trees are a portal of connection.

What does this all have to do with the table of connection? Well, a few months ago my folks told me they needed a runner table and they wanted the design to be based off the design of the Contemplation Bench.

Table of Connection (front) with the Contemplation Bench it was modeled after (behind).

Live edge on one side, narrow long and at a height just under the window ledges in the room intended, with the design, joinery and detail work left to me. Also an addition of a low shelf and working some of my resin work into the design.

Low shelf added into the design with details of overlapping dutchman’s joints that reinforced weak spots in this section of the wood and flourishes of resin inlay to continue design aesthetic that tie into the sides of the right leg. (see next pic)

I had the chance to make something that pulled together my love and care for my parents. Something that pulled together all the meaning I could envision along the way. That pulled together the best that I have within me, my skillset and imagination.

My dad came with me to Street Tree Revival, my main urban wood resource. It was really cool for me to show him around the place and introduce him to the people there that I know. With his help we decided on a the 3” thick sycamore slab I’d use for this project. Bringing him into my process here at the very beginning and sharing this with him was one point of connection.

I have an old hand plane from my mom’s dad who past when I was very young so I have one direct memory, but his lore lives in our family stories. He was the kind of person who when he didn’t have a tool he needed, he’d go out to his garage and make it. A handful of old chisels he made have found their way into my collection along with one of his old hand planes. I took time to hone the blade, mindful that he had worked this very same piece of steel so many years ago before taking a few ceremonial passes to get the first promise of beauty that lie beneath the rough surface. Somehow, I feel like I can touch his spirit when I bring his tools in hand to a project and this project was the perfect reason. We lost my mom’s sister and her last remaining sibling, my aunt Bette this year. I wanted this table to hold her energy as well. The love and sadness at her loss. The happiness in her memory and her peace. Later, during the sanding process, my daughter came in and took a few smoothing passes also, bridging the connection through time, 4 generations.

Like all tables, there are the physical connections, how it’s put together. In traditional woodworking this is done primarily with joinery. The mortise and tenon is one that is known for it’s strength is employed where the stretcher that rides under to top slab connections with the legs to create the structural base of the table. Inlays such at bowties or dutchman’s joints can also be used both as structural and aesthetic such at bowties or dutchman’s joints used to reinforce cracks. This table has 109 inlays. On the table top, shelf and legs I incorporated inlays from previous artwork.

I also reinforced some through cracks on the underside of the top with some special wood that was given to me by dear friends of my parents many years ago and I’d saved without having a special project that called for them. This one did.

Hand Cut bowtie inlays to reinforce the cracks made from wood given years ago for no specific purpose from my parents dear friends.

Incorporating these elements in both sides of the table top created patterns and motifs that I tried to connect throughout the design, so the bowties in the underside are carried to the inside of the legs and a crack in the stretcher. The resin and wood inlays in the top are carried to the outside of the legs and mixed pattern on dutchman’s joints and resin pieces in the top are carried to the shelf below.

More bowties…This table has a total of 109 inlays throughout. By far the most of any project I’ve done before.

Early on in the build, before I had the design nailed down in my head. I got a call from my mom. She asked what I was doing and I told her I was talking to her wood. She got a kick out of that and asked me what I was talking about. I told her that I was just starting to learn the piece of wood. I’d just taken enough passes with the hand plane to get to smooth clear wood and I was running my hand over it. Feeling with my fingers what my eyes couldn’t see, letting it tell me where the grain moved and shifted. Where were there weak spots to strengthen and reinforce and where were the ones to celebrate and accentuate? Feeling the wood while also thinking about it’s life as a tree, plugged into the ground, sharing networks that stored carbon, breathed oxygen and took care of neighbors; reaching up in a canopy that provided shade and food for a whole creature network of birds, insects and other animals. Just as this table holds my aunt Bette’s energy, and my grandfather’s energy, and my mom and dad’s energy, along with my energy and that of my wife and daughter. I wanted this table to honor the energy of the tree’s life. I let this wood talk to me, telling me it’s story through the movement in the grain. Learning new secrets as I worked more and more into the wood, seeing the dance and poetry. Just as working with the wood, led me to deepen my love and understanding of the tree, so to has my love of the tree led me to deepen my understanding and love of life itself, of the wonder of nature, of the connection and sameness of all life on this planet…The health of home and the health of heart. The Table of Connection.

Connection patterns throughout the various elements of the design.