More Than One Way to Do the Work.

After the Mic with Bro. Dean “Deano” Johnstone.

One of the things I’m beginning to appreciate about The Masonic Mic is that you can think you know someone reasonably well, sit them in front of a microphone for an hour, and discover there was an entire other bloke hiding in there.

Deano was certainly one of those.

I met him as a Brother and a distinctly creative character. I knew he was an artist. I knew he could sing. I knew he had worked in film. But there’s knowing those things, and then there’s hearing the stories behind them.

And Deano has some stories.

The Man Behind the Episode

His creative streak goes back a long way.

Deano grew up with a father who was a taxidermist, which is perhaps one of the more unusual artistic apprenticeships you could accidentally have. He described watching his father “take something dead and make it appear alive again”. There’s something strangely beautiful about that image, and once he said it, a lot about Deano seemed to make sense.

He has spent much of his life making things.

Painting. Designing. Signwriting. Building.

That path eventually took him to Wellington and the film industry, where he became Chief Signwriter on Peter Jackson’s King Kong, working on physical sets including the ship and the recreation of 1933 New York.

That would probably be enough adventure for most people.

Apparently not Deano.

He sings too.

And not merely “a few songs down at the local after three pints” singing. Deano has performed in Los Angeles, Mexico and Las Vegas. At one point he found himself onstage in Vegas singing with Big Elvis…

Because of course he did.

But it was the reason he began singing that changed the tone of our conversation.

After losing his brother, Scott, Deano told us that singing was simply the thing that made him feel good again. Something born from grief eventually carried him halfway around the world.

That stayed with me.

The Artist

There was a small comment Deano made that I particularly liked.

He corrected himself after calling himself an artist: he had been arty, he said, but being an artist was something you had to earn.

I’m not entirely sure I agree with him, and I suspect we could happily argue about that over a beer, but I understand what he means.

For Deano, art isn't merely having an idea. There is work involved. Practice. Failure. Learning the craft. Making the thing.

Perhaps that is why his approach to Freemasonry makes so much sense.

He isn't particularly interested in collecting titles for the sake of collecting titles. What seems to interest him is the work itself: contributing something practical, studying symbolism, noticing the artistic language woven through the Craft and occasionally improving the physical spaces around him.

He also gave us one of my favourite lines from the episode:

“The more you know, the more you see.”

Anyone who has spent enough time looking at Masonic symbolism will know exactly what he means. Once someone points out one little detail, suddenly another appears. Then another. Before long, a building, painting or ritual you've seen twenty times looks completely different.

It's essentially the world's longest-running Easter egg hunt, only everyone is wearing aprons.

What Stayed With Me

Perhaps the most interesting contradiction in Deano is that this bloke can sing in front of thousands of people, work on major film productions and create things from a blank page, yet standing in Lodge and reading ritual can still be genuinely difficult for him.

I like that.

Not because he finds it difficult, obviously, but because it reminds me how easy it is to assume confidence transfers neatly from one part of life to another.

It doesn't.

Every Brother brings different strengths to the Lodge room.

One man can deliver ten pages of ritual without blinking but wouldn't know which end of a paintbrush to hold. Another can organise a festive board for fifty people but would rather be anywhere else than standing behind a pedestal. Someone else sees a neglected wall, an old piece of furniture or an empty space and immediately imagines what it could become.

There isn't one correct way to be useful.

One Last Thought

Toward the end of our conversation, Deano talked about Freemasonry not being some instant transformation.

You don't walk through the door, receive a degree and suddenly emerge as the finished article.

The work happens afterwards.

Slowly.

Sometimes the lesson might even be as mundane as getting dressed, leaving the house and turning up when part of you would rather stay home. Deano suggested that perhaps making that effort is itself part of the learning.

I think he's onto something.

Maybe becoming a better Mason, or simply a better man, isn't about reaching some mythical finished state.

Perhaps it is about continuing to make something from the material we're given.

And if Deano has demonstrated anything, it's that there are plenty of ways to do the work.

Even if one of them occasionally involves singing in Vegas.

— Dan
The Masonic Mic
Masonic Frequency on Frequency.