This is how I spend a lot of my time in the pottery studio, with ceramic greenware items resting on my crossed knee while I refine them with bits of window screen and wire tools after pinching the basic form. This step thins and lightens the piece, accentuates and sometimes creates the details I want, and generally makes the piece pop a little more, structurally-so at least, than it did at first pinching.New York City's been blessed for four days now running with the most gorgeous and inspiring weather--Clear blue, cloudless skies with penetrating, saturated sun and cool breezes.
The weather motivated me to ignore a stubborn, too-logical resistance I've harbored for the past few years about purchasing a bicycle despite a strong inner desire to have one. I wondered where I'd store it, would I ride it enough for it to be worthwhile, did I deserve it? Oy!
It was such a relief to let go of my resistance and just fall into the sweetness of allowing myself to have it--rational or not--my
low-end, cornflower blue Raleigh hybrid. I've ridden every day since purchase, and I've figured out a way to rearrange our entryway to accommodate a vertical stand and my bike without congesting the hallway too much. It surprises me now how strong my resistance was.I experience this same kind of resistance when making pottery--when I'm trying too hard to make something, trying to manipulate the end result instead of just listening inwardly and making what is there already.
