“Mahogany Mornings”

Childhood Saturday mornings filled themselves with the

sharp blade hisses and wood-burned mists of

Dad’s sugar-pined passions.

Orange tawny sawdust scents

and heaps of sharp colored wood glue

pasted themselves to my adolescent dreams

that wanted such calloused hands and chipped oaken poems

built in our warm mahogany mornings.

Now in dusk's cherry whisper we rest,

two men among soft-dusted maple moments

and purple heart pauses, carved with all that is lost,

Comma-curled at our feet.

I grew up with a woodworker for a dad. Richard Lee Bailey was a public school woodworking teacher for decades before we lost him to Alzheimer’s in 2010. But he is still around me everyday.

I have core memories of the sounds of saws and sanders zipping away on our driveway on Saturday mornings while I watched Looney Tunes cartoons in the family room. Every time a Roadrunner cartoon came on I would run to the driveway to drag him back in to watch. I don’t know if he found any interest in those cartoons but he always dusted himself off and came in to watch with me. I did the same thing with my own children when they wanted me to see something. Just like my dad.

As the years passed, I spent less time with Bugs Bunny and more time standing next to Dad, watching his hands skillfully slide maple, oak, or mahogany through a saw to create beautiful mirrors and cabinets and a whole host of other projects. Eventually I got to use the push stick on my own and start projects I found fun. And eventually we started building and designing together. He was a wonderful mentor and that was a perfect way to spend a Saturday.

Smash cut to 2023 and I am about to start year 30 of teaching high school English. I love teaching and I plan to finish with as much love and enthusiasm for the experience as when I started. But I still wood work. Just like my dad.

I still drag my table saw, my bandsaw, my planer, my compound miter saw and dozens of other tools out onto my driveway on weekends the way he did. I still find love in the quiet hum of machines and the soothing drift of woodgrain. During the COVID-19 pandemic, I decided to use my down time to start experimenting with epoxy resin and wood. It has opened up whole new creative opportunities from tables to clocks to serving boards to coasters. This has been a fun phase in my woodworking experience.

So now I plan to see if anyone is interested in these creations. Hence, the little side hustle- a woodworking design project. Dad and I love woodworking. Dad and I love design. Dad’s favorite color was yellow.

WELCOME to Yellow Wood Designs.