Knife Therapy

Lorien

Lorien

Nose to the Grindstone
Moderator
Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
Joined
Dec 5, 2005
Messages
27,886
It occurred to me the other day, as I was adding photos to my album in here, that I've been a member of BF for a little over three years.
Having just celebrated my fifth year in owning and operating a business, I got to thinking about the immediate past as a matter of course, and all the changes I experienced in my life during that time.

We are all subjects of a time of great volatility right now, but my life has been nothing but volatile for the past five years!:yawn::) In a good way, but I still have to get to bed early in order to function. But I digress...

I realized that just a little over three years ago, I was experiencing some worrisome health problems which lead to the diagnosis of a fairly interesting and mentally debilitating ailment. I won't go into it, but the significant thing is that that is when I really started to become almost obsessively interested in knives. My brain was constantly full of them, my thirst for knowledge seemed like it could not be slaked in a life time.

That obsession was so consuming, that I started out with little to no clue about contemporary cutlery culture, and now within a short time, have made friends and contacts who have deep histories and connections in this community. I now consider myself to be relatively knowledgeable on the subject and have started dabbling in the business of it. I've gone from discovering simple production knives, to knowing some of the intricacies, history and methods of the handmade knife, (thanks to this forum, and to David Darom and a couple of other Collectors here with extremely good taste, and makers who've taken the time to share their thoughts with me:):thumbup:).

There was another time in my life, which was extremely stressful and angst ridden, (some of 'The Teenage Years':barf::p) where I first really took an interest in knives, although the seed of that interest had been planted long before. Especially the 'hand made' part.

For me, the knife channels my focus. Provides me with tranquillity, especially once I started to become interested in throwing them well, which really helped bring my focus to the here and now and relax my thoughts. Like drawing an arrow. Became something of a monolith for me, and helped get me back on track when faced with challenge*

So, what I'm getting at is this; how have you relied on knives? What do they do for you? Mentally, physically... There is a reason why knives are so intrinsically interesting, what is it that flips your switch? If the fire was always smoldering, what was the gasoline that turned it into an inferno?

Hmm. The Riddle of Steel.
 
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Lorien said:
It occurred to me the other day, as I was adding photos to my album in here, that I've been a member of BF for a little over three years.

I realized that just a little over three years ago, I was experiencing some worrisome health problems which lead to the diagnosis of a fairly interesting and mentally debilitating ailment.......
Click to expand...

Boy, that explains a lot!

Best Regards,

STeven Garsson
 
My knives serve the same purpose as the art on my walls. But I can't quite put it into words, other than it must be therapeutic in nature.
 
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Knives helped me connect with my father. He gave me my first knife when I was 10. A couple of years later I foolishly ruined his "Navy knife" (have no idea what it was other than a sleek fixed blade with a stacked leather handle and sheath) when I clamped it in a vise and "sharpened" the edge with a disc sander! But he soon forgave me for that and set me free from some of the worst guilt I've ever suffered. I admired the fact that he would often take a home grown tomato and a sharp knife into a local restaurant and ask the waitress if it was OK if he sliced and ate his own tomato. He was never refused. People loved him. He just had a nice way about him. Then, when he was dying of lung cancer in the hospital, delirious and in a chest restraint I went to see him and discovered that he was hiding in his hand a small folding knife under the sheet. The blade was open and I asked him what the heck he was doing, having snuck a knife into the hospital! He looked at me and simply said, "Cleaning my fingernails." Ha! He ordered lots of what he called pen knives (small slip joints) through the mail and for weeks after he died, here and there a small package would arrive in the mail - some knife that he'd ordered. I have them all now as well as his AA sobriety coins and a fabulous captured Japanese WWII rifle and bayonet that his brother (my uncle Floyd) gave to him upon returning from the war (a broken and seriously traumatized man, I might add). Even now, sometimes my brother will say, "Buddy, I wish Dad was alive to see what you've done with that knife collecting hobby of yours." Me too.

I read that there's a motto at the Harley-Davidson factory - "Form follows function with both reporting to emotion." For me that's true with knives. Without the passion and interest born of those emotional connections, I doubt I'd own, like a lot of people, but one red Swiss Army knife.
 
For me, nothing really flipped the switch. I have had an interest in and have had knives for just about fifty years. I rely on knives as tools and I collect them because they hold a fascination for me.
 
I've been interested in them since childhood - so they have always kind of "been there" as part of my awareness. Like you, I spend an awful lot of time thinking about them.

Roger
 
Like some of the posts here, my interest in knives started young. My first knife was a Barlow given to me by grandfather around the age of 9 or 10. Got my first real knife, a Buck 110, at 12 to compliment a Stevens Crackshot .22 rifle my dad gave me.

Knives were tools to these men and growing up watching them build or repair just about anything made very aware of their usefulness. The ability to create, as well as, destroy is something unique to man - knives give us that a opportunity. I think its in your nature to love them - watch any boys playing - a stick can become anything but almost always ends up a sword.

I broke the tip off that Barlow and eventually lost it but my love of the knife is still strong.
 
Lorien said:
I realized that just a little over three years ago, I was experiencing some worrisome health problems which lead to the diagnosis of a fairly interesting and mentally debilitating ailment.....
Click to expand...

I hope, Lorien that you are referring here to some
knife collecting mental bug that your doctor (not a knife collector)
could not diagnose correctly....... :)

All the best,
David Darom (ddd)
 
hehe, not quite David. Ulcerative colitis was the problem, and kept me awake lots. Sleep deprivation was harder to handle than the actual condition.
It's all good now, but I credit the renewed interest in knives with helping me through a difficult time.
By reaching back to an interest which had been with me since childhood, I not only regained my passion for knives, but also overcame the diagnosis- so far anyway:).

Thank you guys for your stories. I find HTMD's to be most poignant.
 
I am not sure that is a disease or not, but as Buddy posted they helped me connect even closer to my dad and we were already close.

The other thing that comes to mind is that they opened the door to associations of various levels with what I consider the highest caliber of any group of people as a whole I have mingled with.

Not that I will ever be satisfied, but I know that I am a better person because of those relationships.

I very much feel sorry for those who ignore the best things in our community and apply their focus to the knives only. They miss the most important part.
 
I think knives are part of everyone's culture, whether they recognize it or not. Man's first tools included a knife. A flake of flint or obsidian is what first processed a game animal for the campfire. I got my first "knife" from my grandfather when I was about ten, a cheap "multi-tool" that wasn't a pair of pliers, but a crescent wrench that broke very quickly, but had a knife blade. I remember being so excited when I got it sharp enough to cut a string with no effort. My uncle gave me a stainless "trick-knife" when I was maybe twelve, and fascinated me with his instructions on sharpening it (turns out he had no idea). My other uncle explained that "a knife is sharp when it shaves hair from your leg", as he struggled to get his buck 119 to take the occasional hair from his thigh. Five or six years ago, my father-in-law, a gun-smith, engraver, and shade-tree machinist, loaned me a book by David Boye, called "Step-by-step knifemaking", which I couldn't put down. I caught the bug, and started planning my shop out. I had no garage or shed to set one up, so I had to be patient, but it was always in the back of my mind, simmering. I started collecting knives that fascinated me, and practicing sharpening, but wasn't very good. Eventually, I stumbled on Old Jimbo's website, which honed my sharpening skills, and which led me to Bladeforums, and my current addiction. I am now thirty-five years old, have been fascinated by knives for more than twenty years, am currently setting up my shop, have three stock-removal knives in progress, and have made a small coal forge, and forged two very small knives. My larger coal forge should be finished this week, and I can start on some larger stuff. Of course, I owe a big debt of gratitude to the members of this forum, who so readily and cheerfully share their knowledge and the benefit of their experience with noobs like me. It's nice to know that I am not the only knife knut out there, and that it is okay to be the way I am.;)
 
Lorien, I am glad to hear things are going better for you.
I would say I think about knives as much as anyone. Like all the time. Whether I am working on one or not. I have made some of the best friend's I have ever had, as I try to make the best knives I can make. For me knives have given me a voice that will be heard long after I am gone. I feel I am just getting started. steel is my canvas.
 
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I've been into knives since childhood and can't really say why I was fascinated by them. I lived a short walk from woods with ponds, streams and a swamp so a knife was always a handy thing to have.

In my teens, the Buck 110 was THE knife to have on your belt, and that led me to purchase Gerbers and other manufactured knives popular at the time.

I'd have to say it was the Internet that gave me the exposure to collecting and the custom knife world. Prior to that, I had never owned a knife that I did not use:D

Peter
 
Bastid said:
I very much feel sorry for those who ignore the best things in our community and apply their focus to the knives only. They miss the most important part.
Click to expand...

I do too. This online community has been a real pleasure for me to be a part of.
 
Bastid said:
I am not sure that is a disease or not, but as Buddy posted they helped me connect even closer to my dad and we were already close.
The other thing that comes to mind is that they opened the door to associations of various levels with what I consider the highest caliber of any group of people as a whole I have mingled with.
Not that I will ever be satisfied, but I know that I am a better person because of those relationships.

I very much feel sorry for those who ignore the best things in our community and apply their focus to the knives only. They miss the most important part.
Click to expand...


So true Bastid.

Custom knife collecting is much less stressful than other things I have collected.
The people are outstanding and willing to share everything they know, stakes are less, no counterfeiting/forgery to any degree to worry about.
It's all good. :thumbup: :)
 
Kevin Jones said:
So true Bastid.

Custom knife collecting is much less stressful than other things I have collected.
The people are outstanding and willing to share everything they know, stakes are less, no counterfeiting/forgery to any degree to worry about.
It's all good. :thumbup: :)
Click to expand...

Perhaps not in what you collect Kevin, but there is a HUGE counterfit subculture in knives like Civil War and antique bowies.

Peter
 
I have had an interest in knives (and guns for that matter.), since I was a little girl. My Mom gave me my first one! We used to go camping and fishing a lot when I was little, and was taught about the usefulness that a knife is as a tool.

Knives are one of my passions. I have made a lot of friends, gotten to know many knife makers. I never dreamed that my knife hobby would be such a fulfilling hobby, because of the people. I am always learning something new. The willingness of people to share their knowledge & experience has been mind blowing. I have had the pleasure of getting to know some of the BEST people on the planet, and that is such a wonderful gift. I feel honored to have the friends that I have through the knife community.

It has been wonderful to be able to share my knives with my Mom. Knife collecting has brought us closer as well. It has been such a pleasure to be able to give my Mom special knives. It is STILL something that we both share.

 
to me it seems like knives for many people aren't necessarily investments and are not necessarily for use, and aren't just things to simply admire either.

I really appreciated Bob's eloquent input into this thread, and the concept of a knife being a 'needful thing' unto itself is something that makes a lot of sense to me.

In practice, a knife can provide protection and can deliver the opposite. Symbolically, perhaps knives live the same kind of dual life. Warding off things that occur only to their owner/caretaker's mental realm, providing some kind of moral support or something. Perhaps they can deliver the opposite of that as well, but fortunately I can't speak on that with any personal experience.

To me, a handmade custom knife isn't simply a tool, even if I use it everyday. There is more to it which I can't explain. It's like a lucky charm or a talisman. A monolith, like in '2001'- crystallizing focus, opening new doors to learning.
 
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