Every Monday, the ten students involved in my summer fellowship program assemble for class. On our first Monday, we sat around a long, rectangular table draped in a newspaper tablecloth. We expected our professor to assume her place at the head of the table and initiate a discussion, but instead she uncovered a huge block of clay and began handing each of us a small lump. Our assignment: make a pinch pot. Confused glances and puzzled looks were exchanged among the students, but we quickly realized there was a method to our professor’s madness. Here are some things I never thought I would learn from playing with clay:
1. Expect the unexpected.
Make a pinch pot? Nobody saw that coming. Arts and crafts did not seem like a relevant activity for summer research students. But the shock didn’t end there. We were about to begin kneading the clay when our professor started handing out blindfolds. For a bunch of left-brained people to be doing a right-brained activity is one thing, but blindfolded? Sometimes life throws you curveballs, gives you lemons, or does other weird, crazy things in all shapes and sizes that you can’t anticipate. You just have to be ready, and take them in stride.
2. Have patience.
It was easy to get frustrated making the pinch pots when we couldn’t see what we were doing. We were forced to really take our time and rely on our other senses, especially our sense of touch. Then, after we were done molding, we had to wait an entire week for the moisture to dry out in order to glaze and fire the pots and have a finished product. Michelangelo didn’t paint the Sistine Chapel in a day. The Egyptians didn’t build the pyramids in a week. Good things, big and small, take time.
3. Teamwork makes the dream work.
One week later, we all reconvened at the ceramics studio to fire our bowls. But our morning wasn’t as simple as putting our pots in an oven, and voila. We arrived at the studio and were immediately assigned tasks and put to work. Different jobs included arranging the cinder blocks for the kiln, spraying the pots with water when they came out of the kiln, submerging the pots in a bucket of sawdust, transferring the pots from the bucket of sawdust to a water basin, and standing by with a fire extinguisher. At the end, everyone contributed to the clean-up effort. We were all cogs in a machine, and without one component, the machine wouldn’t function as efficiently. Each person found their niche and helped the process run smoothly.
4. Attitude is everything.
So why a pinch pot? Why not a clay … figurine or something? (I’m not really sure what else you can make out of clay). According to Sue Bender, a bowl is a metaphor for one’s attitude. A bowl could be upside down, in which case one can’t eat out of it. It could be right-side up, where it could serve as a vessel for cereal, soup, or ice cream. But it could also be dirty and broken, so that anything inside becomes tainted. An inverted bowl is a stubborn, ignorant, or single-minded person. An upright bowl is an open and receptive person. A broken or dirty bowl is a judgmental, narrow-minded, or biased person. It’s up to us to decide what kind of bowl we will be, and creating a pinch pot to keep in our dorms is a constant reminder of that daily choice.
5. There’s always darkness before the dawn.
Cue Florence and the Machine. But seriously, our pinch pots started out as a moist, gray, ugly lump of clay. Then they dried for a week and were coated in a smelly glaze. After, they went in an 1800 degree kiln, then a garbage can full of sawdust, and then a bucket of water before finally emerging as beautiful bowls. In life, we have to take the bad with the good. Think about it: humans endure the physical and social awkwardness accompanying puberty before they become normal, functioning adults (sort of). How can you appreciate a rainbow if you didn’t face the rain?
6. Trust the process/journey.
I thought I would take off my blindfold and discover that I had made a piece of garbage, but I was pleasantly surprised that I had successfully molded my clay into a bowl. A week later, we had no idea what our bowls would look like when they emerged from the kiln, but we ended up with beautiful pieces of pottery. We just had to believe in our abilities and then trust the the kiln to fire the glaze just right. Have confidence in your own capabilities, and don’t worry about the things you can’t control. Things have a way of working themselves out in the end.
7. There’s always one.
There’s always that one tool who wears a white tux to prom. Always the one kid who forgets to wear long pants and closed-toed shoes to lab. Always the one student who shows up to an exam without something to write with. Always the one friend who floods the group chat with GIFs and memes. Well, there’s always one piece of pottery that breaks in the kiln. It was mine. Sometimes, you’re that guy.
8. Find the beauty in everything.
Our clay underwent a transformation just like a caterpillar’s metamorphosis into a butterfly. The outcome of each is something wonderful, and the process is amazing. But maybe the clay and the caterpillar are just as beautiful. There's also more than just physical beauty. Learn to find it in small and unsuspecting places. You don’t always have to seek it out. Sometimes it finds you.
So, making a pinch pot did have a purpose. We came away from the activity with skills and lessons that are applicable anywhere. Who knew arts and crafts could be educational?
