I did a tiny bit of yo-yo in the mid-80s when I was a kid, but I was never very good and never had any way to learn any new stuff – heck, how did we learn anything before the Internet, anyway?
I rediscovered yo-yos in September 2017 when my 8 year old son came home with a Duncan Butterfly XT. I was like, wow! This is awesome, but very basic … I wonder what a nicer yo-yo would be like? I started with the cheap metals on Amazon (sadly this included a Sidekick Pro) and from there found “real” yoyo shops online, as well as the ■■■■■■■■■■ videos to learn the basics. Yo-yos remind me of scooters. There’s something timeless and essential about them, they are these tiny basic machines that just… do one thing really well. Simplicity, yet surprising depth the more time you spend with it.
I also found that throwing helped me with some depression issues I’d been having off and on since earlier in 2017. What with the dismal state of american politics (seriously, WT-ever-lovin-F) and the way the tech industry I am in has become quasi-evil in some ways, I dunno, I just wasn’t so sure I wanted to be a human any more. I desperately needed something else outside of tech to focus on, and all I knew was, throwing these hand gyroscopes made me feel better. Tinkering with these hand gyroscopes made me feel better. Learning basic tricks and techniques for hand gyroscopes made me feel better. And down the rabbit hole I went… let me tell you when I go down a rabbit hole I go down harrrrd. I do not half-■■■■■■■■■■■ I … ■■■3 them. Maybe even ■■■■■■ them. I tend to become borderline obsessive.
But I also wanted to do something for other people, not just myself. So I started giving out throws to virtually everyone I knew, or had ever interacted with in any meaningful way in the past. I began by mailing out Shutters via Amazon, but I quickly realized that sending people an unresponsive throw to start with is kinda… cruel. Very few people have the patience to look at an unresponsive throw someone randomly sent to them, even a very nice one, and say “I’m gonna conquer this thing!” (Now the people that do say this, are kinda my people in general. But it’s a big ask and a little unfair as a an unsolicited gift that makes you do a bunch of work… to get it to work at all.)
So. Over time I started refining my technique, and I came up with this package that I mail to basically everyone I know (after asking them if it’s OK if I send them a little present for being there for me in the past), to hopefully share my joy of yo-yo with others:
That is:
- Basic responsive plastic yoyo (YYR Fay)
- Quality unresponsive metal throw
- Four extra strings
- Calvin and Hobbes comic aka “wtf did you send this to me”
- A YYE pro trading card aka “did you know you can get amazingly good at this?”
The Fay is great since it’s from a solid brand, and has been on sale for $10 for a long time and includes a bundled extra wide bearing. The metal throw varies but I tend to shoot for something roughly around the Silenius level of value, though if it’s someone I especially admire I’ll make it a bimetal, or a fancy brand pro model. I’ve sent out dozens of these little packages, and I’ve scientifically determined that 7 stamps or roughly $3.50 worth of postage will get them anywhere in the US:
Now, the reaction to what I sent varies, as you’d expect. Some people don’t reply at all. Some people give it a chuckle, reply with a quick thanks email “haha haven’t thought of yo-yos in years!”, and that’s it. I write this in reply, along with a link to the “simplest bind ever” video and a basic explanation of responsive vs. unresponsive, letting them know they have both kinds in the package to explore and experiment with.
Steve Martin once said it is impossible to be sad while playing the banjo. I believe this is also true of yo-yos.
Others, a rare few, really enjoy it – the yo-yo connects to something deeper inside them, like it did for me:
Steve Martin is one of my heroes. He also used to write for the Smothers Brothers who, of course, did a lot of yo-ing.
Also, my shrink loves the things. I’ve been using them to distract me when the PTSD hits. Normally I go to the marijuana for PTSD, but it sucks having to drug myself calm. Seriously, playing with a yo-yo is almost as effective as whatever people take for PTSD (since there’s no standard treatment protocol, PTSD patients have to make some of this up as we go along).
So, thanks again. Not just for some fun, cool things I could never have justified buying for myself, but for the fact that those things have been beneficial to my mental health.
It’s odd, because even though I sent that Steve Martin quote out a bunch of times, before that one person wrote me I hadn’t considered why I personally had become so obsessive about throwing. I didn’t realize it was an outlet to improve my own mental health, that I was driving myself down because I had to, otherwise there were some dark nihilistic places looming on my horizon. But there it was, and damn if he wasn’t right.
It is impossible to be sad while playing with a yo-yo. And that’s the greatest gift of all.
