Side by Side : Maury and May Kingman share unusual hobbies and a zest for life.

“I cannot understand people who have nothing to do,” said Maury Kingman, a 72-year-old retired electronics engineer. “I already have no time to read anything but my serious magazines like Smithsonian and Strad, a violin-making magazine. I want to write a book. There are other languages I want to learn. And I want to sculpt in marble and clay.

“Believe me, retirement is not just sitting around. We’re so busy, we wonder where we ever found eight hours to go to work.”

After spending a morning with Maury and May Kingman in their Thousand Oaks home, I discovered the secret of their zest for life: Find something you love to do and share it with other people.

Since both retired in 1985, the couple have pursued their individual passions--and each other’s--with gusto. Maury’s card proclaims him to be a luthier-archetier . That’s French for maker of violins and bows.

But he also created his version of a Navajo rug on his wife’s loom. She, in turn, spins and colors yarn with dye made from Brazilian pernambuco wood shavings from his workshop.

Maury’s interest in making instruments began during World War II, when he developed a reputation for being a fix-it man and people began asking him to repair their violins or clarinets. He liked doing it. But by 1960, May said, Maury did not want to repair another violin until he had first made a complete one.

“But making violins is like eating peanuts,” he said. “You just can’t make one. And when I’m making a violin, I’m already thinking about how to make the next one better.”

So he decided to learn to do it properly. For eight summers he attended classes in violin and bow making and repair at the Violin Craftsmanship Institute of the University of New Hampshire.

To date, he has made 22 violins, two violas and more than 40 bows. One of the violins is a copy of the instrument used by composer Fritz Kreisler. But his favorite creation incorporates the actual boxwood chin rest and tail from the Stradivarius violin of 19th Century virtuoso Mischa Elman. “I remember hearing him play when I was a child,” Maury said.

He also shares his knowledge and enthusiasm for the craft by encouraging musicians and fellow craftsmen. Denise Aiani, director of continuing education at Cal Lutheran University, credited him with proposing the California Summer String Institute. It was established at the university last August to offer classes in violin and bow making and repair.

Aiani said the institute is the only place on the West Coast that offers such classes. And she emphasized Maury’s volunteer role in obtaining necessary equipment and securing internationally renowned instructors.

Another practitioner of lifelong learning is his wife, a 70-year-old former computer programmer. She was born in Lyons, France, the former silk center of Europe, and she learned needle arts at her mother’s knee. Twenty years ago she started weaving. And when I met her, May was wearing a blouse made from yarn she had spun, woven, and sewn herself.

Since 1983, May has been a member of the Greater Los Angeles Spinning Guild. And four years ago she joined the 80-member Ventura County Hand Weavers and Spinners Guild, based in Thousand Oaks.

“May Kingman is a weaving treasure and a weaving mentor,” said Susan Goldberg, president of the guild in Thousand Oaks. “She shares her information and knowledge with everyone.”

At the Artisan’s Faire at the Stage Coach Inn Museum in Newbury Park last month, Goldman said, people lined up to watch May demonstrate the antique art of bobbin lace-making. And she recently demonstrated spinning and weaving to 1,500 fourth-graders of the Conejo Valley Unified School District. She conducts workshops in special weaving stitches for the guild.

During my visit, May displayed a friendship coverlet, a replica of those created from white cotton and colored wool in the 19th Century by itinerant weavers in Pennsylvania and New England.

Her cornflower-blue coverlet contains traditional designs, including “Lee’s surrender” and “cat’s paws and snail’s trails,” which date from the Civil War era and before. She and fellow members of the Ventura County Hand Weavers and Spinners Guild spent almost a year on the project.

“Each of 19 people threaded their own loom with a certain pattern and then wove the same pattern in 19 different colors for each of their friends,” she explained. Kingman contributed “windows”--patterned squares--and personalized each by incorporating the year and initials of the recipient.

The Kingmans had just launched into a discussion of future projects when May stopped and said: “There’s a French saying: ‘The old lady didn’t want to die because there was so much more to learn.’ ”

FYI

* The Ventura County Hand Weavers and Spinners Guild holds meetings and demonstrations on the fourth Saturday each month between 9:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. at the Thousand Oaks Masonic Temple, at Thousand Oaks Boulevard and Crescent Way. The next meeting is July 25.

* For more information on instrument-making classes call 492-8685 and for fiber arts classes or weaving guild information call 495-7580.