Post 6 — “The Button Machine That Started Everything (And the FedEx Driver Who Will Never Be Forgiven)”
Tales from a Tractor Pull
If you want to know where OceanNova Enterprises came from, I have to take you back to a tractor pull.
My birth father George loved tractor pulls. The noise, the diesel smoke, the sheer stubborn audacity of a machine dragging more weight than it should — yeah, that tracks for the man I knew. At some point, somewhere in those bleachers, he noticed something. Someone was making buttons. Photo buttons, the kind with a picture of a tractor right on the front, and the men were wearing them like badges of honor. George being George, he wanted in. He talked about buying a button machine. An instant camera. Taking pictures of those tractors and turning them into something you could pin to your chest.
I listened. I didn’t think much of it at the time.
George passed away before any of that happened. My stepmom followed him a month later.
I kept my stepbrother in my life through all of it — though if I’m honest, I’m not always the best at staying in touch these days. That’s a story for another post.
And then…
Years later — 2008 or so — I was scrolling eBay the way you do when you’re not looking for anything and somehow find everything. And there it was. A button machine.
I don’t know exactly what made me stop. Maybe it was George. Maybe it was just the particular kind of 2 a.m. energy that turns a casual browse into a life decision. Either way, I bought it.
FedEx lost it.
I want to be very clear: I have not forgiven FedEx. I will not be forgiving FedEx. This is not a grudge I am working through — it is a commitment I have made to myself and I intend to honor it.
I got a refund. I saved up more money. And then I went to USA Buttons and bought a brand new 3-inch button machine, made specifically for photo buttons. The good kind. The real kind.
I still have it. It’s coming back out soon.
Trying something new
Here’s the thing about buttons — they’re not hard. The learning curve is gentle, almost suspiciously so. You figure it out fast, you make a few, you hold one in your hand and think *I made that* and something in your brain quietly catches fire.
That was the spark.
From buttons, I found vinyl cutting machines. Then sublimation printing — I’ve got an Epson EcoTank set up for that now, and if you haven’t gone down that rabbit hole yet, buckle up. Then lasers. I have a small one I’ve used, and a bigger one still in the box waiting for its moment. A resin 3D printer, also in the box. A Snapmaker, also in the box. I know how that sounds. I have no apologies.
For every single one of these, before I ever touched the machine, I watched YouTube videos until my eyes crossed. Hours of them. Tutorials, reviews, disaster reels, the works. I wanted to understand what I was getting into before I committed. That’s just how I’m built — I don’t leap blind, I leap *informed.* Then I leap anyway.
An early video showing how to make a 1” button
What about that weird name?
But here’s the thing nobody knows about OceanNova Enterprises.
The name is older than the business by about fifteen years.
In 1995, when I first got on AOL, I needed a screen name. I was driving a Nova at the time. And I had this quiet thing I carried around — a want, really — to see the ocean someday. I’d never seen it. So I put the two things together. OceanNova. That was me, in a username, on a dial-up connection, before any of this existed.
I just never let it go.
In 1996, I made it to Haystack Rock on the coast of Oregon for Mother’s Day. First time I’d ever seen the ocean. I stood there and looked at it and it was everything I thought it would be and also completely different and that is exactly how the best things work.
I also came home with a hedgehog that day. His name was Sonic. Obviously.
And so it goes…
So that’s where this started. A man at a tractor pull with an idea he never got to finish. A button machine that FedEx lost and I replaced out of spite and love in roughly equal measure. A screen name from 1995 that turned out to be a business name all along. And a coast I finally got to see.
George didn’t get to make his buttons. But I made mine.
I think he would have gotten a kick out of all of it — the machines, the mess, the YouTube rabbit holes at midnight. He saw the possibility before I did. I’m just the one who got to run with it.
This one’s for him.
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*”Hey, where are we going? And what am I doing in this handbasket?”*
— Ocean 🌊
*OceanNova Enterprises · Made with love. Seasoned with attitude. Your vibe… personalized.*