I no sooner transferred all the tomato, chard, cabbage and marigold starts from their temporary shelves in the studio’s south-facing window and tucked them into the soil of the garden’s raised beds when my bookbinding supplies moved in with all their luggage—paper for signatures, waxed thread, fresh book board and repurposed hard book covers sliced away from their pages (scavenged from thrift stores), PVA glue and a bone folder for getting the edges of those signatures sharply creased. The book press Patrick made for me sits on the floor at my feet, and the guillotine paper cutter has a place of honor (and safety) on one of the folding tables I pirated from our farmers’ market set-up, its arm locked in place. The shelves barely had a minute to enjoy the absence of the weight they’d borne for the previous nine weeks.

The plan was to dismantle the indoor garden nursery and let the studio breathe into its less-cluttered self for a while, giving me a clear view out of that south-facing window from my relaxed spot on the couch (I need only turn my head slightly left to do this, and have a sweetly framed view of the cottonwoods that line the creek on it way to the Licking River). It never happened. I had lunch with my friend, Marilyn a couple of weeks ago, where she shared an apple-walnut candy with me for dessert. It was luscious and I said so, prompting her to find the box they came in, all the way from Washington state (her daughter brought them with her on a recent visit). The front of the box was charming so I offered to make it into a book, like I often do with someone else’s recycling.

It’s not difficult to make a book by hand; it’s just a process with a few moving parts and the need for space to let the steps of the process sprawl and evolve naturally. If I’m going to set up and haul out the supplies to make one book, I might as well make a dozen while I’m there, and the next thing I know it’s a week from last Friday and journals-in-process are still curing or awaiting their sewn signatures or covers are pressing as the glue dries. When I really get going, the process seeps into the living room where stacks of books serve as weights for book covers just glued up. The kittens enjoy leaping from one tottering pile to the next and I sternly shoo them away into another room but it’s no good—there are piles of books-turned-book-presses there too. At least I can close the door to the studio/guestroom and walk away for lunch or a tea break, hoping the kittens find other things to do.

Grateful as I am to be employed and insured, I think I could walk away from all of it just to sit in this space of creative ambition, hand-crafting books and journals and seeing what a Cheez-its box looks like with pages between its front and back pieces (I’m reluctantly gluten-free now, my last Cheez-it purchase a bittersweet memory, so now I’ll have to scrabble through your recycle bins on Thursdays or whenever you’re scheduled to put them out on the curb). To make it even more alluring, the rain this morning has been coming straight down in gentle sheets, letting me keep the windows open for sound and air—a cozy backdrop to the creative pursuits. It’s still morning as I write this, but looks like a cloudy autumn day, early evening. I could also be napping easily (the farmers’ market yesterday was a four-hour marathon of happy customers and dwindling inventory. I think I’ve earned a nap).

But the siren call of bookmaking has become part of me at a deep and cellular level ever since another friend, Evelyn, showed me how it all works. When someone says “forever indebted”, I have a new understanding and appreciation for what that really means. I also have stacks of hand-made books, all sizes and designs, waiting to be claimed by whoever their new owners will be. I give most of them away rather spontaneously and have recently been encouraged to sell them Somewhere. We’ll see. As long as folks keep eating Ghirardelli brownies made from a boxed mix or thrift stores keep selling hard-cover books for almost a nickel and friends hand over the rest of their long-abandoned scrapbooking paper, I’ll be at that table in the studio, rearranging the pieces into something that will press, cure and be wrapped in waxed paper for gifting at a later date.