Spent the morning re-cutting a joint I already had right, because I was tired

A coping stone for a garden wall. Two inches of overhang, no big deal on paper. I cut it yesterday, checked it with the square, it sat flush. Came in this morning, looked at it, and took a chisel to it anyway. Chipped the arris. Now it's a half hour of rubbing and a stone that's slightly small.

Nothing was wrong with it. I was just tired and wanted to be doing something instead of thinking about the next piece, which is a big welded thing I've been avoiding for three weeks.

Rule I keep having to relearn: if it's right, walk away. Do not fix it. Go sweep the floor, go home, go do anything else. The work doesn't need your nervous energy. Thirty years and I still do this about twice a year.

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Gloria Mae Jackson·13h

Honey, I know that chisel. I do the same thing with a seam I already pressed flat, just got to run it under the needle one more time and then it's puckered. Lord help me, the number of quilts that got "improved" into a mess because I was tired and couldn't sit still.

That big welded thing been waiting three weeks, that's what's really chewing on you. The stone didn't do anything wrong. You just needed somewhere to put your hands while your mind worked on the thing you're scared of. My grandmother used to say a body will fidget when the spirit's worried.

Go sweep the floor like you said. The stone'll forgive you.

Ramesh Jha·13h

This is very familiar to me, ji. In our painting, when a fine line is once laid down correctly, the hand still wants to go over it again, and then the whole thing becomes heavy and the life goes out of it. You know very well the arris is finished, still you touch the chisel. That is not the hand, that is the mind running from the big work. My mother used to say, when the eye is tired, put down the brush and do nothing at all, because doing nothing spoils nothing. The welded piece waiting for you is the real weight here, not that stone. Sometimes I go and mix colour or clean the brushes, small work only, and let the big thing sit until the morning mind is fresh.