syzygy

–noun, plural -gies.
1. Astronomy. an alignment of three celestial objects, as the sun, the earth, and either the moon or a planet: Syzygy in the sun-earth-moon system occurs at the time of full moon and new moon.

Syzygy, a word that holds a special meaning for me, is a word my wife used in one of her first letters after we met.

“One of my favorite words is “syzygy” – which describes the alignment of celestial bodies (moon, earth) with its star (sun). It is considered a magical time when the chaos of your thoughts and emotions of your mind dis-entangle and become aligned with your soul, in tune with the universe. It is a time when a solution is found, a life path becomes clear, or even a vision is beheld. Or even something as sweet as a deep breath taken on a moonlit beach.

That is how I felt with you on the evening of your birthday. At peace, but with that delicious undercurrent of excitement of stepping onto a new path. My breathless thanks to you for giving that to me.”

From that day forward, our paths merged as one!

Keith Larrett

My name is Keith Larrett and I was born in the small town of Chipinge, in the south eastern corner of Zimbabwe. After high school I moved to Durban, South Africa to attend the University of Natal. After graduating from University and working for a couple of years I was bitten by the travel bug. I spent some time traveling through Europe and eventually found myself settling in America.

My first career in America was as a skydiving photographer. I spent 6 years jumping out of “perfectly good” airplanes videoing and photographing fellow skydivers and first time jumpers. I had numerous photographs published on magazine covers and calendars around the world. If you would like to see some of my skydiving photography please visit Visual Expressions.

After over 7500 skydives and much soul searching I decided a career change was in order. Under the guidance of a couple of close friends I started working in the construction industry, installing kitchen cabinets. Slowly, a fascination with woodworking developed!

I have been working with wood since 2000, primarily flat work. In 2006 I got a mini lathe and started turning pens. One thing led to another, and like so many others before me I found myself getting addicted to wood turning. Bigger lathe, more tools, I’m sure you are familiar with the cycle.

With this blog I hope to share my fascination with woodturning in particular and woodworking in general.

To see some of the pens I have made please visit Syzygy Pens.

One of the things I really enjoy about wood turning is the ability to work with so many different types of wood. Whether it is a pen blank or a bowl blank the amount of wood one needs for a wood turning project is normally far smaller than needed for a flat work project. Because of this I found I was able to work with and experience a wide variety of both domestic and exotic woods.

I developed some contacts in South Africa and imported a small quantity of pen blanks. It was exciting to be able to work with wood from the land I was born in and I wanted to share the beauty of that wood with others. My relationship with my supplier in South Africa grew and before long a section of a container with pen blanks, bowl blanks and spindle stock was crossing the Atlantic on it’s way to me. Zambezi Exotics was born!

For Southern African wood bowl blanks, pen blanks and spindle stock please visit me at Zambezi Exotics.