Susan from Hamilton, Ontario by way of Embro, Ontario, asks, “As someone who also grew up in a rural community and has lived in cities for what I imagine is now the majority of your life (me too), how do you define home at this point in your life? When you think of home what do you think of?”
Susan, thank you very much for your heartstring-strumming question from the The Great White North (a beauty way to go). For those of you who were with me for the last post, entitled Canadian Soup Love, you might recall that I am powerfully enamored of Canada, for its trees, its waterways, its good manners, and its canoes, among other winning attributes.
Math-wise, I have lived the longest in my current home place, to wit, 25 years now in Los Angeles, California. I spent about 4 years in Chicago and have tallied maybe 2 years cumulatively in New York City (a coastal hamlet due east of Pittsburgh). Before the Chicago chapter came 17 formative years as wee Nick, aged zero to college, participating with relish in my expansive and benevolent family, made up of farmers, teachers, nurses and librarians.
Yes, my family eventually added a brewer and purveyor of craft beers in my brother, Matt, taking us right over the top in community service. My Dad is now the Mayor of Minooka, and other aunts and uncles hold seats on the Village Board, the School Board, the Fire Department, and the local Seward Township Board, where I used to shovel gravel for Kenny Bolte when he was the Road Commissioner.
If you’re a discerning reader, you’ll have noticed that my family covers the municipal waterfront, as it were, but we also have a controlling interest in the local supply chain of beer and books. That means we Offermans and Robertses shape the culture of my hometown, which is a very powerful reason that I still feel the influence of Minooka upon me and the trajectory of my life. My beloved family, the beer, and the books.
Megan and I still visit frequently (when not kept away by pandemic conditions) and love to sit down to dinner at Mom and Dad’s, usually surrounded by all of my siblings and their families as well. It’s about as ideal a hometown experience as I can imagine.
But when I think of “home”, I think of the place where I make my life with my wife, our dogs, my woodshop, and our best friends. Los Angeles is the headquarters of our work as entertainers, and an amazing place to live, despite the minor downsides like the storied traffic and being made to eat babies so as to qualify for membership in the cadre of Hollywood libtards to which we subscribe. Now, before you freak out, please rest assured that the children are sustainably harvested, and Soros-sanctioned, amply refueling our wokeness as we labor to achieve the Great Replacement. Home.
Utkan from Minooka, IL, asks. “We have a common friend named Jimmy DiResta. Do you have a memory with Jimmy you didn't share yet? Maybe from the time you guys built the Lucky Boy or other times you were out together looking for trouble.”
Thank you very kindly, Utkan, for your question. Jimmy Diresta is one of my all-time favorite people, and I am deeply grateful to count myself among his friends and students. For anyone unfamiliar with his work, please avail yourself of it here, and you can also check out his new Netflix show, Making Fun. He’s the most prolific Maker I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet, and his appetite for learning is insatiable, which means he has simply continued to compile knowledge and skills for the 40-odd years he’s been handling tools.
I wrote a loving profile of Jimmy in my woodworking book, Good Clean Fun, and you can also get the canoe video we made together for a couple of fine Canadians named Joan and Ted (Bear Mountain Boats) at my website as well.
The memory I’ll share is this: in the winter of 2007/8 we drove Jimmy’s pickup from New York City to Peterborough, Ontario, to meet with Joan and Ted and discuss making the aforementioned how-to video to accompany their great book, CanoeCraft. This was pre-Parks and Rec, and I was living in New York for a while as my champion bride Megan was starring in Young Frankenstein on Broadway.
Joan and Ted explained that they would give me the materials necessary to build 2 canoes (one technique with staples, one without), which meant a big batch of 1/4” x 3/4” 20’ cove and bead cedar strips, plus a large quantity of fiberglass cloth and 2-part West System marine epoxy. I would then build the canoes while Jimmy documented the process. We looked at each other and agreed without a moment’s hesitation to jump into this effort with both feet, and a lifelong friendship was struck, both between us and with Joan and Ted as well. I’m so grateful to have friends like them, because we all understand the inestimable value of many hands pitching in to make good art, whether it’s a canoe, a video, or just a dinner.
Jimmy’s canoe, Lucky Boy, appears in the finale of Parks and Recreation, and she looks awfully happy being paddled across an indeterminate “Indiana (California) lake” by a beefy guy with a moustache. Our Mr. Diresta is an extremely patient and generous collaborator on our television program Making It, keeping his cool up to 87% of the time, which is historically quite high for a Long Island curmudgeon. Every time I see him he gives me a present, usually whatever his latest creation is, from assorted custom ice picks, to DIRESTA branded carpenters pencils and utility knives, to random articles of clothing to which he has sewn extra pockets or other cool-as-hell gadgets.
I’m glad you made me have to stop and think about him, because I miss him. Maybe if all 17 of you reading this post will pester NBC in a strategic fashion, they’ll give us a 4th season of Making It. Thanks for that in advance, my mighty muleteers.
Love,
I greatly enjoy creating these pieces of content for all you muleteers. If you want to get the extra goodies on the weekend, like videos and what-not (who knows what confections lie beyond the paywall! Sugarplums? Maybe?), plus the ability to ask questions on the weekend post, then please become a paying subscriber. Otherwise, see you back here on Thursday next.
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