To "bee" or not to "bee"

Ever sit and watch bees? How industrious, swift and efficient they move and work? Everything they do is strictly for a "common goal" which is their production.

Honey production.

Maybe, the bees have "something" there. Maybe, we all should be more efficient and working for a common goal. Maybe, just maybe we should all be like "bees".

Whether it's something on a large scale as "global warming" or on a smaller scale like "weeding the garden" maybe, just maybe it would be swifter and more efficient if all work together for the "common goal".

Like for instance, bartering. People laugh and say that it's from another century and is not done in today's world. I for one think that's non-sense. What better way to get things done. What a better way to acquire needed or wanted things. If I have something you need and you have something I need, why not barter. Each one will be better for it. Hence, working for a common goal.

Most people think (me included) that they are an island needing no help just to prove something to themselves or others about their ability to survive and conquer. But as I age I come to find out that I am not only, NOT an island, but not even a chain of islands, I am totally and completely a "community project" on a huge continent.

Bees, growing in their cells, dependent on bigger bees until old enough to emerge. Then working fiercely in the hive until capable to go out into the world in search of nectar. Strong and confident the younger worker bees are, flying out scouting pollen from flowers, and nectar for honey, to support the common goal of the hive. Then one day they fly out never to return to the hive. Their life cycle. They've contributed their all for the common good. Same goes with humans. People, born into a huge world and totally dependent on others. Growing and becoming more and more independent as the years go by until one day they leave the house and scout out a life of their own. Strong and confident the young people are, running out scouting money from jobs and spouses for home. Until, one day, they realize that on the quest for immortality and lifestyle of being "independent" they neglected the "life" and neglected to see their "mortality" until it's too late. Sometimes being "independent" needs to be done together so as to not miss the "life" part.

Busy as bees. Together. Team work. Common goal. Sometimes can make anything you do become easier and quicker. Ideas shared by two or more become "brain storming" and great things can happen. Helping one another can be beneficial to all concerned. Trading this for that, or helping one another achieve or do something can be as rewarding or MORE rewarding than accomplishing it by yourself. Sometimes the reward for "Independence" is lonely. Who can you "high five" with? Who can you share your joy with? Who can do the "victory dance" with you. But the reward for "working together, dependent on one another" is team triumph. Tons of "high fives" and tons of "victory dancing".

So after much thought on the matter, I feel that the bee's way of life is best for them and maybe, just maybe, it's best for us too. Team work. Common goal. I've heard "It takes a village to raise a child" maybe, just maybe...."it takes a village to be a carbon being".

Now back to the hive, I have to get busy as a bee. buzzzzzzzzzz.

Countdown Commences

10...9...8...7...6...5...4...3....2....1...OH MY GOD tomorrow is the festival!!!

Festival day looms ahead of any craftsman like a dreaded job interview. Your await it anxiously and prepare the best you can and then as the day nears you become the worlds worse insomniac, thinking and rethinking all the things that could and sometimes DO go wrong. But you prepare and try not fret and torment.

You worry.

The day finally arrives...you suffer through it..and then when it's over, you may or may not have more money in your pocket than before, you may or may not have a smile on your face, you may or may not be coherent enough to care. But as you climb up into your vehicle, then and only then, can you breathe a sigh of relief. It's over.

You smile.

The whole festival process starts months before the actual event. That is to give you enough time to fully stress out and complete your nervous breakdown. Let's begin when you first get the application in the mail. Usually after we get them in the mail we put them someplace "safe", so we can fill them out later. The problem with storing something in a place that is "safe", is that the only person that it is "safe" from is you. Murphy is our God and his law says that when you do this, you will NEVER see it again, unless he thinks it'll be even a bigger laugh if he lets you find it. Which is usually the case and we find it eventually. Always remember we are put here on this earth for his enjoyment and he likes to laugh....mostly at us. So, say you actually do find that application, and that "murphy" is actually kind enough to let you locate it before the "due" date, then you will have to take the time and fill it out.

You sigh.

When you first fill out the application you are nervous wreck. Not about whether your work is good enough to get in the show or not, but because filling out all the information correctly and making sure you include all the bells and whistles they require, is enough stress to make a woolly mammoth loose his wool. Here are some examples of things that you must do properly to submit the application. First you must locate 4 or 5 of best slides that you own. Preferably your own work. Then sometimes they make you submit a booth slide also. This can be extremely daunting for a person who never steps outside the booth long enough to take a picture. But you make do. And after you get the slides together, you feel confident enough in your abilities that you believe with certainty that you can complete the rest of the requirements. Little do you know.

You hallucinate.

Label slides. This part sounds rather easy, and to most people it is. But to us few, who are blessed with totally "brain numbness" then it may be more difficult. You have to make sure the slide is on the correct side, make sure the up is up and the down is down..then you can proceed to write your name, the name of the piece, ALL your contact information, the medium you made it with, the process of how you made it, an arrow showing which way to insert it in the projector, and your first born's blood type information. All this has to be written legibly on a space no bigger than a postage stamp. Most craftsmen become very good calligraphers because of the extremely precise and small writing that has to be done on these slides. I still have NO idea how the jury actually can read this small of writing, but I do believe they make us do this for their amusement. I think they have contests on who can write the smallest. "hey Joe, come see this one, even with a magnifying glass I can't read it, they did gooood job". I think maybe this is how jury decides who gets the "Best in Show" prize.

You wish.

Then you take the slides, a SASE, the application, your bio, your artist statement, and any private information that you've kept in your safety deposit box for years and stuff it all into a small, legal sized envelope.

You astonish.

Go to the Post Office and wait the appropriate 4 to 5 hours in line and then you send it off. Two to three months later you receive in the mail, either an acceptance or a rejection. Which those two things are a "blog entry" unto themselves so we won't delve into them now. But in this case, lets say we skipped the crying, screaming and tantrums of rejection and actually got INTO the show.

You're accepted.

insert: (back ground music "flight of the bumblebee")
You're frantic. You're running around like a chicken with it's head cut off. You're working nonstop and not getting much done. You're studio looks like a tornado ripped through it. You're physical hygiene has become lax, and you're house is probably the health department's worse nightmare.

You're frantic.

The day is approaching and you're feeling less and less confidant that you'll actually have enough work to fill up your booth. You've decided that you have to approach congress to make some type of legislation that lengthens the day from 24 to 72 hours. The whole time you are working you're thinking "why do I this?" and bribing yourself with goodies like "if I finish this I will give myself a treat, I'll take a much needed nap or eat something". But after weeks of no sleep, you decide that sleep was overated to begin with.

You endure.

Tomorrow is the festival...there is nothing more you can make, nothing more you can do. This gives you a false sense of security and you decide that with all this free time, about an hour, you can sit and relax. But needless to say as soon as you sit, you remember that you didn't put something in the van, or you forgot to pack something so you immediately hop up and work some more.

You're anxious.

That night, knowing you need a good nights sleep...you don't. You're constantly worrying about "over sleeping" the alarm so you check the clock on the nightstand every 15 mins. The alarm finally goes off while you're staring at it and you get up. Usually for a person to get ready to go somewhere it takes approximately an hour. But because you're so anxious to get the booth set up that you shower, put on deodorant (this IS important at a hot festival), find your clothes, dress, put make up on, grab coffee (preferably in a cup) and run out the door in a fast 5 minutes flat.

You're efficient.

Now your there, at you're show. You've found you're spot, and you're setting up your booth. Setting up can take anywhere from an hour to all day depending on what you forgot at home, if there is any other vendors who claim that your booth number is really theirs, and if you don't stand around and talk.

You setup.

The show has started. This part is fun. I love meeting the people, talking, selling and EATING. Shows always have food. Most of the time it's greasy fried food that all taste the same, but still, it's food.

You digest.

The day goes by and hopefully you'll be selling and busy. Sometimes you are and sometimes your not. It's a gamble we all play. You get giddy with happiness if your selling and delude yourself with lies if you're not. "well, there are just no crowds here" or "it's the economy" or the famous "I really don't care if I sell anything".

You delude.

It's over. Big sigh of relief. Now it's time to pack up. Hopefully you are packing with a smile on your face and a sack of money tied around your waist. Packing is a joy unto it's self. You get the boxes, throw stuff carefully in them, rip the shelves down, collapse the tent, throw it all into your vehicle, get people to help you push the van doors closed and hope when you open the driver's door nothing falls out.

You exert.

Ahhhhh. You sit behind the wheel. You breathe, you quickly turn on the A/C, you sigh, you finally relax. It's over. You will actually be able to sleep tonight, and you vow to yourself you will NOT go into the studio tomorrow. Right then you decide that tomorrow is your day off. You start the engine and drive home, and look forward to the next show.

You survived.

Day day in the life of me/potters

For most people the day starts off with the buzzing alarm, a shower, breakfast, then taxiing kids to school and heading off to work. For potters it seems that when the day started it was not this morning, but years ago when we first touched clay.

Potter's time is different.

Our day began years ago when we first looked at a pot and then wanted to learn to make it. Since then there has been no "morning ritual of normal working people" , it's more like a continuing cycle of never ending work and play. Whether it's day or night it doesn't matter because the pots, kilns and upcoming festivals just don't care about time. So with throwing, trimming, bisc firing, glazing, day after day, it all seems the same.

A typical day in my studio which usually starts in the wee morning hours is somewhat like this;

I awaken from a light sleep. I shove slippers on my feet so I can run out to studio and check the kilns. I notice that one of the kilns is almost up to temperature. After this observation I head back to my room to flop in the bed, forgetting to remove my slippers, and then proceed to lay awake wondering if the kiln has finally shut off or not? And because you are fretting about it, you won't go back to sleep until you get back up to make sure that it did finally reach temperature and shut off. Only then can you go back to bed and sleep pleasantly until the next kiln is getting close to shutting off. This pattern continues each night and accelerates with frequency when shows or festivals are approaching. The coffee starts brewing at around 4 or 5 am. Coffee, by definition, is a intravenous fluid that keeps potters alive. So while having my morning IV fluid, I begin doing my paperwork. Potters are well known multitaskers, because while paperwork is being filled out, your mind is making up a list of things you need to do today.

After the first pot of java is consumed you can better focus your eyes and you decide you better head out to the studio.

First things first. You need to either mix clay, throw pots or sit and stare....depending on how the caffeine is making your metabolism preform.

During the day it's a constant dance of loading and unloading kilns, glazing pots, and throwing pots. Between all of that, it is necessary to occasionally eat and answer phones. Which brings up another wonderful "gadget" that I have recently bought. A "big display" caller ID box. I've had other caller ID phones for years, but this one is special. It is a stand alone unit with a HUGE display that I can read from across the room. Now this "gadget" I truly believe is a vital "tool" for any potter, because when the phone rings you can look up from what you are doing, anywhere in the studio, and see if the caller is worth wiping your hands for. And believe me with so many telemarketers out there, most aren't.

So with the potters "day" explained in "not so explicit" detail, now I will tell you about my day. I make coffee, check email for orders, check kilns, drink more coffee, unpack cooled kiln, eat Cheerios, glaze pots, pour some more coffee, make list of what to throw, stare at wall, wedge clay, drink even MORE coffee, pack items to be shipped, make sure TV is on channel you want to listen to while throwing, cover last nights thrown pots with plastic bags to slow drying, stare at wall again...this time noticing it needs to be repainted, then get all tools and bats lined up so you can throw, wander around studio for awhile not remembering what you were looking for, answer phone and tell them AGAIN that they called the wrong number and this is NOT Ron's seafood, sit down at wheel, stare at the list of items you need to throw, get up from the wheel to feed cats who are pestering the crap out of you, go to bathroom, then finally sit down again and throw for the rest of the day. If you take this list and duplicate it for each day, you'll see what a studio day is like for me. And the funniest thing is I love it, absolutely love it and wouldn't change a thing. Maybe next time I'll have to write about a "festival day".