pottery

Maybe it's a memory, maybe it's a childhood fantasy, maybe it's from that old Mary Kate and Ashley movie, It Takes Two, maybe it's a memory of a childhood fantasy from that old Mary Kate and Ashley movie. Whatever it is, wherever it's from, there is an image in my mind.

I have this image of me - a small child, bent head with hair in a riotous confusion of dark curls, the slightest pink tip of my tongue working itself back and forth between lips pursed in concentration, busy hands still dimpled and plump, lacking full dexterity, retaining the faint, yet visible echoes of babyhood. I sit, my short legs straddling a potter's wheel of epic proportions (in my child's perspective). I have cupped within my hands a whirling lump of silky, slippery clay. With fierce determination and visions of vases and beauteous bowls, I set out to find the fantastic form that is concealed within this mysterious mound. Each time, though, as I begin to apply, what I believe to be, the slightest amount of pressure, a clay geyser shoots up only to quickly flop and return to its previous globule form. Frustrated but as determined as ever I try yet again... and again... and again. But with the reliability of Old Faithful, I achieve nothing more than a clay fountain each time. With an exasperated huff I slump, wilting under defeat. I push an offending curl out of my eyes, smudge my face and give the even more offending lump of clay the stink eye. But from behind I feel another body settle next to mine and I hear a warm, reassuring voice whisper in my ear, "Try again."

"Huh uh." Even my child's brain can figure out the outcome. But once again that whisper comes, "Try it again, we'll do it together."

Weathered, practiced hands cup my own, enveloping mine, blurring and merging the lines of young and old. Slowly, slowly the wheel spins. Slowly, slowly we move our hands up and down. And slowly, slowly a form begins to emerge. Faster, faster I try to spin the wheel, eager to see the finished product. But gently, strongly the hands restrain and guide my own. "Patience, patience little one," says the voice once more, "in time we'll see."

I feel my life taking shape under the Master's hands.