Wow. I just woke up, having coffee, doing laundry, and getting ready for a long-ish bike ride. It's not quite 4:15a. My days usually consist of 8-10 hours at my day job, some time in the studio at least twice a week, food shopping, cycling, sometimes out with friends, and at least an hour or two of relaxing. I've never needed a lot of sleep. I can go on 6 hours. I have a potter friend who has a flourishing studio, a husband, 3 kids, and she still manages to blog every day. How does she do it? I realized it has been 8 months since I last blogged. Honestly, I was hoping to use this as documentation of what I do in the studio. I'm a slacker... Ha!
For me, creating is a compulsion. I MUST do it. If I take time away from the studio, I get moody, antsy, and irritable. The worst part is I feel guilty. But, I ain't superman, and sometimes I just need to back off. My studio is 5 miles, one way, from my home, and I ride my bike (rain, shine, snow, but not icy) to get there. Sometimes I just don't feel like putting my ass on that seat and pedaling. BUT, I only took about 4 weeks off from the studio this year. That's still not the reason I haven't put anything on this page.
The last 15 months, starting with the brief spot on 6 ABC for the 2017 Manayunk show, an award for Best in Category, invitational shows, group shows, people I don't know looking me up to buy work, awarded Master Artisan by the Pennsylvania Guild of Craftsmen (I'm going to backdate a short blog on that in a few minutes), a stellar show at The Haddonfield Fine Crafts Show in July, and now ramping up for the PA Guild's Rittenhouse Fine Craft Show in October.
I've been pushing myself to create pieces that are definitely unusual. With that unusual form comes a wrestling match with the clay that leaves me elated, with a huge sense of accomplishment, anxious during the process, and a lot of rolled out slabs that just didn't work. I've been thinking of trying some of these forms in very thin porcelain, but I don't know if the porcelain can handle the amount of coercion I will do to it.
I have been working, just haven't been talking about it.
Today, sadly, I will be attending a memorial service for a friend I've known for 26 years. Her passion was food, high qualty food, growing it, and learning about where other foodstuffs come from. She gave me a hard time about working 70-80 hours a week at two "jobs". But, she pretty much did the same thing. After that, I'll be heading to the studio for a much deserved time in the studio. Keeping my hands busy and seeing a piece from start to firing makes me very happy!
