Why do you work?

Mr. Chester hasn't sent a response to my email of six weeks ago. Life's been busy for me, so it didn't really register when my friend Nick informed me he's done making bicycle frames. Excuse me?

So tonight I was checking out his blog, and he's declared he's calling it quits. Health issues, along with family and financial stresses are the big reasons. A few months back, he stopped taking orders until he caught up on the backlog. After months of promising to publish the waitlist, he finally did it. I'm number twentysomething of 27 frames left in the queue, not to mention 15 side projects / conversion jobs.

He cashed my deposit back in early November, so if you're doing the math, that's roughly 7 months, with still no firm ETA. Yes, patience is a virtue, but realize there's 20-30 more people ahead of me who've been waiting probably a year to 18 months (if not more). My last frame took about 10 months, yet now, time's been flying by without me really paying attention. Not a big deal.

Matt made maybe 300 bike frames total - and I'll be one of a very lucky few to own 2 of them. I might have to take better care of mine - they will likely become collector's items.