It’s fair to say that I’ve never given myself to a hobby that involved creating something. Most of my hobbies center around the outdoors, like fly-fishing, duck hunting and skateboarding. I’m pretty sure there will be a clear river winding through the mountains in Heaven somewhere and God will be in waders next to me, slinging dry flies at monster trout. (I hope that’s not blasphemous). That’s exactly how I’d choose to spend every waking hour of my life, and every dreaming hour for that matter. I’m obsessed with that stuff. However, this little thing called “work” and the “real world” exists, and for that reason I have to be responsible and when you’re being responsible, you can’t pack your shotgun, fly rod, and a PB&J and hit the river every day.

In my first year after graduating college, the “real world”, for me, looked like a corporate job in the great state of Rhode Island… how is that a real state anyway? I was 1,694 miles away from anybody I ever knew in my whole life, in a job that I wasn’t super pumped about, throwing myself the biggest pity party that ever was. And one other thing…WINTER EXISTS IN RHODE ISLAND. Like, really exists. I’m talking three straight months of snow higher than Wiz Khalifa and temperatures as low as my self-esteem. I’m wimpy but that’s tough for a Texas boy. Not only was I confined to my little apartment that looked like a 1980’s ski lodge/summer camp, but I also couldn’t get out to the woods where I enjoyed life. I was struggling big time…

Before you start getting annoyed with my whiney voice, I just want to explain why I’m putting you through the agony.  Because without hearing the crap of my life first, you wouldn’t understand how leatherworking kept me sane. The first project I ever finished was a shoddy fly-reel case that I made from scrap leather. I made it using half the tools it typically takes to hand-stitch leather because I was too excited to wait for the rest of the tools to come in the mail.  My hands were bleeding from pushing a dull needle through low quality leather, none of the lines were straight, and the stitching wouldn’t pass my grandma’s eyeball test, but that sucker got done. It wasn’t beautiful, I won’t even pretend like it was, but it was handmade and it was awesome.  

Leather making was a virus and I was infected. And the more I got into it, the less I thought about everything else I was missing out on. I haven’t mastered the craft and I still can’t cut a perfect line, but I’m creating things…finally creating things with my hands and it feels good. I like teaching myself new ways to stain raw leather so that my finished product doesn’t make people want to barf when they look at it. I like the look leather takes on when it’s been in my back pocket for a few months and the dye from my blue jeans has bled into the waxed sinew and the hide develops a dark brown shine. When I give a wallet to a friend or make a journal cover for my sisters, the moment they take it in their hands, and they touch the smooth face of the sanded leather and the waxed edges rubbed together with a bone slicker, I’m happy. I’m happy because they’re happy. I’m happy because I have a new hobby. 

I’m happy because I’ve got a PBR in one hand and some tanned rawhide in the other while I look outside and it’s 12 degrees and snow is falling…again. And I’m happy that doesn’t upset me. I’m just happy.