the case for working with your hands

I just came across this New York Times article about an academic who more or less gave up his academic life and opened up a motorcycle repair shop. The article is called The Case for Working with your Hands by Matthew B. Crawford (HT Culture Making blog). This resonated particularly with me for a number of reasons.

1. My experience was the opposite of Crawford's--that is I used to be a tradesman and gave that up to pursue academics (though for the first 5 or 6 years of studying I returned to my trade in the summers for income).
2. I love motorcycles and at this point might actually consider leaving my research for the chance to work on bikes full time (okay that was [mostly] a joke)!
3. I recently bought an older motorcycle that needs some work to get it on the road (in case you are wondering the bike was manufactured by an East German company called Motorrad und Zweiradwerk, and though it's a bit rough around the edges I'm not ashamed to admit that I have completely fallen in love with it!).

It's also interesting because I have recently moved from a christian context in which working with your hands is an honoured tradition to a new context made up almost entirely of professionals (seriously, I can count on one hand the number of people whom I have met who do some sort of manual work, be it a trade or some other form of labour). Anyway, I'm not sure I have any great insights into this but I thought I'd throw it into the mix.

cheers!