I heart you

Valentine's day is all about sharing love with someone important. I got to thinking about all those emotions of love, lust and passion, and it was passion that I got hung up on. Passion is a strong and rare thing.

I'm not talking about passion between two people despite the fact that it's Valentine's Day.  No, what got me thinking was the idea that we can be passionate about something, not someone. How completely and utterly you can fall in love with something. I stand in awe of people who have the extreme good fortune of having turned their passion into their vocation. The really tricky bit is once it becomes your vocation, staying passionate about it.

FROM STEEL: The Making of a Soulcraft from michael evans on Vimeo.

I guess it should come as no surprise that my passion is bicycles. If you have read this blog for more than a moment or two, I hope that the sense of love and wonder that I have for two wheels has been evident. It is beautiful to watch the care and effort taken to produce a handbuilt steel frame from start to finish. It is funny how disdainful people can be about the cost of a handbuilt frame, but I hope that watching the video above gives you a better appreciation for how much soul a builder can imbue a frame with as they build it from start to finish. What magic there is in taking a pile of tubes and turning it into a bicycle frame.

So whatever it is that you do, try remembering the passion that you feel for it and give it that little bit of extra love that it has been lacking. Hopefully, you'll see a little magic in the results.

ps - Oh, yeah - the song in the video is from The Mattson 2. They're rad as hell, check 'em out!