yo-yo #64: laminated rd-1

my family and i were at target last week (or tar-jay, because we're high-fashion french-types). we were meandering through the toy section, idly discussing the bike that everyone knew we were planning to buy caitie for her 7th birthday. we had straight-up SOLD her bike at our yard sale the week before to an adorable 4 year-old, and cait had watched it go with a degree of nostalgic sadness. she could barely fit on the thing though; it was time for an upgrade.

i asked cait what she wanted besides the bicycle, and was surprised by her response: "a yo-yo... a nice one like yours". my daughter has never really paid any attention to my yo-yoing. sometimes she jokes that it's an embarrassment at the bus stop or imitates her mom in rolling her eyes when i play in the department store. lately though, she's asked to play quite a lot. she has several yo-yo's, most of them cheap party favors that she prizes not for their play, but for their depiction of favorite cartoon characters. i gave her a mosquito awhile back when she asked to learn the basics, and chris allen kindly sent her a yellow proyo awhile back, cause he's nice.

now, however, she was intimating that she wanted a "nice one". part of me fell into the mode of thinking that i experienced as a teacher whenever a kid asked me about buying an expensive yo-yo. "you don't need one. play what you've got, learn to love it and ask me again in a few years." the father in me though, was busy thinking "she's interested in what i'm interested in? seriously? where's my credit card??"

somewhere in between, it occurred to me that i really do have a lot of yo-yo's... probably an unhealthy amount. and lately, i only really play my no jives, my flying v's, and a few others with any regularity. it wouldn't make a whole lot of sense to buy a 7 year-old a brand new fancy yo-yo. i don't want her to feel tied to it; she's 7! at that age, one's hobbies should be as fluid as water. you feel like yo-yoing today? play your yo-yo. tomorrow you want to bury your yo-yo in the sandbox? knock yourself out. i'm not one of those parents that expects my kids to take their pastimes very seriously, but neither am i one to deny a birthday wish.

i decided to channel mr. miyagi, and asked her to choose. my wife suggested that i give her 3 options that i wouldn't mind losing, but i had other ideas. i don't like to be too attached to things, and when i get attached, i sometimes need to find a way to let go of the object(s) in question. i don't want to be the kind of person who would hesitate for an INSTANT if my kid asks me for something i can easily give them on their birthday. when my wife suggested i put limitations on what my daughter can have, my immediate reaction was "oh yeah, good idea". however, THAT VERY REACTION indicated a problem. that was really only my reaction because i'd be AFRAID that she'd pick one of my most prized toys. and THAT... is inherently lame; no getting around it.

to my daughter, all of the yo-yo's on the wall of the 'yo-yo room' are toys. as such, she has a much more accurate and unclouded understanding of them than i do. i equate them with 'value'; either monetary value or sentimental value. this is a problem, because my attachment to them obstructs my ability to see them for what they fundamentally are: playthings.

i gave my daughter an unlimited choice. from the 100's of yo-yo's in the room, which cost anywhere between $1 and around $450 (and several of which i would truly call 'priceless'), i said "pick any one you want". i did this for ME; not for her. i did this because the moment i said it, i was giving EVERY yo-yo in there to her. i was offering EVERY one up, and in so doing, i was severing the connections i had with each of them.

what if she picked the mg??? PICK the mg! TAKE IT. i'll set it up so it's tug-responsive and i'll smile when you do 'creeper' on the driveway. what if she picked an eric wolff??? PICK an eric wolff! i've enjoyed them all. and while i view them as high art, they play AWESOME... and i firmly believe that no yo-yo - NO yo-yo can 'do better' for itself than by being played and adored by a child. if it could talk, the yo-yo that shinya used to win worlds this year might say it's pretty happy... but i'd wager its joy would be NOTHING next to the one that any 4th grader uses to make his first loop-the-loop. and what if she picked "no jive #1"??? how could i give away my favorite yo-yo of all time? PICK #1!!! i'm always saying that playing that yo-yo taught me humility. i say it taught me that i don't need anything fancy to amaze myself, and that 'it's not the yo-yo that matters'... if i'm not prepared to give it to my kid, then i'm full of shit. and playing it hasn't taught me anything at all.

i think you need to be hard on yourself sometimes. i often make little challenges to myself and hold myself to them really strictly. some of them are relatively silly and easy like this, and others are harder. i don't want to be the kind of man who says one thing and does another. i'm truly more afraid of finding myself to be a hypocrite than anything else. some days i wonder if there's anything else to really be afraid of. guns and monsters and root canals... you can find the strength to face any kind of terror in this life. but looking at yourself honestly and recognizing your own hypocrisy? that's a whole different kind of scary.

caitie walked around the room a little bit, and then picked this yo-yo. a 2003 tom kuhn rd-1. made of purple, green, and blue laminated wood. it plays just fine. nice and smooth, not too heavy, and it responds well. this will be a good yo-yo for her to learn with, at whatever speed she wants. she's not really ready for a big gap, and i'm glad that she didn't choose one... but i'm glad for HER, and not for myself. i'm happy she picked the rd-1, because it was the one she liked, but i'm also happy because i passed the test i gave myself. it occurs to me that i'm relieved that i WASN'T relieved; that i could have handed any of those damn yo-yo's over to her with a smile. for a minute there, i was worried that it would be tough to do so, but i know better now.

happy birthday caitlyn. how time flies.

yo-yo #'s 43 & 44: Laminated No-Jives

when i determined to begin this blog, i told myself i wasn't going to worry too much about it. if i felt like putting something down, i'd put something down. if i had nothing to say, i'd say nothing (and not in the john cage "4'33" way either).

i scored these two yo-yo's within a week of each other. laminated no jives are among the hardest to find. there were never many of them (and they sure aren't making more), and due to their legendary play and unique look, they're pretty well sought-after by collectors. while part of me cringes at the thought of taking a chunk out of either, another part (the better one i think) says "screw it. play em hard." after all, LIFE takes a chunk out of everyone; disfigures everyone... or maybe just redraws us into images that best fit our most honest selves. i'm not proud of my scars, but neither am i ashamed of them.

the rainbow was the generous gift of one brad countryman. brad has effectively run tom kuhn yo-yo's since the 90's and has been very good to me.

the purple one i scored in a great trade to wayne in the uk. i think i relinquished an 888 and got a trio of gorgeous 3-in-1's.

these are EASILY the best playing butterfly no jives i've played. they're so ridiculously good that it feels like cheating. you know... when i eat a hamburger (especially from like a fast food-type place), i always wonder to myself just how many different individual cows i'm eating bits of. when i have a steak, it's clearly just the one. with these yo-yo's, which are made of bits of wood that have been compressed and glued together in to a dense laminate, i wonder how many trees were involved. it's a very different feel from a regular everyday 3-in-1.

they're also just really striking. the purple one is one of my favorite colorways of any yo-yo. nifty and complex. i used it quite a lot in THIS video. both yo-yo's feature a spangly holographic-foil stamp with the standard "special" logo (well, the rainbow one says "rainbow"). since grade school, i've always had an aversion to rainbows (aesthetically, not homophobically). in 1st grade i used to design superheroes on graph paper, and one of the dynamic duos i came up with was comprised of "rain man" (this was before the movie), who shot... wait for it... RAIN out of his hands, and "rainbow man", who shot rainbows. really, they were rainbow lasers or something - all of the heroes i designed basically just shot shit out of their hands. i'm still waiting for marvel to call. anyway, i maxed out on it and sometime thereafter, i started to find rainbows really garish and overwhelming. BUT, this rainbow no jive looks SOOOO rad when spinning. it ceases to show a distinct rainbow, the colors mottling together into a pearlescant brown tone. gorgeous.

the play too, is undeniably wonderful. since these bad boys are heavy (i'd put them around 61g), they really NEED some kind of friction sticker for consistent response. and since they need the sticker, it helps to shim them a bit, which has been tricky. the axle wells on these are deeper than most, so my normal methods for shimming gaps were all off and i had to experiment. they also require type 8 cotton (6 will not respond well, and will burn through QUICK - what a difference 6 grams makes!). once i got them dialed though, bliss.

anyhow, if someone with a big gun accosted me and said "quick. hit x, y, and z on fixed axle to save your own life RIGHT NOW!", i'd reach for one of these guys automatically. fortunately, no one has done this yet... but it's nice to know that when and if they do... i'm equipped.

in truth though, while i lift some no jives and think immediately of thrown gauntlets and challenges, when i play these yo-yo's, my mind drifts inexorably toward summer and warmth and easy grace. i like throwing trapeze with them and just grooving in it until they spin out, watching as the colors reorganize themselves into lines. a lot of people are totally different when busy and active compared with how they act in repose. these yo-yo's appear comfortable and beautiful either way, and at all stages in between.