The Hush In The Presence Of The Potter
The sun shone high and the temperature of the air hinted to a promise of the coming of springtime. It whispered hope to my heart as it seemed to team up with the sun to form the perfect day. I may have had to be somewhere at a precise moment of time, but the breathtaking journey to my destination provided a buffer as cityscapes morphed into wide-open views of fields and forests, a low-lying pond hidden like a jewel as it mirrored the blue of the sky above. My eyes sparkled with the sunshine and I felt myself taking deep, slow breaths. I love moments like these. I love when creativity captures me in the midst of my day and gives me a cushion to delight-in in the variable depths of space, light, water, trees, open spaces, the contrast of one thing that gives way to a total opposite. When you can bask in all these depths at once, it truly makes you smile deeply on the inside.
The roadway was familiar. I’d taken this path before, my daughter and I having enjoyed a day of walking that particular spot many years ago when she was just twelve. She’s sixteen now. We had lived nearby here for a year and my heart reminisced for a moment just as the studio came into view. I thought to myself how fortunate the privilege just to pull into this driveway. How special it is to be invited at a certain time to this certain place on this special day.
It felt as if all of creation had laid out the red carpet and my time had come for what was to be, to be unveiled. I know that seems rather universal in thought.....but I know that nothing happens by chance. I know that nothing that comes is ever just a bang in the cosmos with its cause and effect. When you are a child of the Living God, He brings you to a place where you can sense His precious Presence and His guidance in your life and there springs appreciation He alone causes you to have for His handiwork. Earlier in the week, I had gone through a tough time and anytime a child of God goes through a rough time and cries out to Him, He hears. And boy does He hear! When God hears our cry as His beloved ones, He moves and He routed that darkness that had wanted to crush me. I am so grateful too. So when I write about the moment I was having, I know it was a gift for me. He was opening my heart to the beauty all around me. Darkness gave way to the light of His glorious love.
The wheels of my car stopped moving as I put my car into park. And as I tend to always do when the car motion and engine noise discontinues and there is the quiet before opening my car door, I lingered.
Knocking softly on the door of the studio, I could see the cheery glow of bright light upon shelves. Through the window in the door, i could see that the potter was bent over his potters wheel to the left. Two men were moving about to the right. And I opened the door softly and closed it behind me without a sound. All was hush and reverent inside. The potter was in the middle of spinning his wheel upon which he was delicately handling the clay. I can’t remember very clearly the form that was taking shape, but it was as if that moment was all that mattered to him. Here he had two admiring customers setting several precious items next to one another that they wanted to purchase, and a new customer walking in. Here were three admirers walking amidst his finished creations, yet he continued to work. There was something comforting about the artist working while I was looking at His finished works. Creating, while the created works were inspiring the ones who were near. I had come for a specific work I had seen on Instagram.
The potter looked up from his work and mentioned me by name. How special that was! And he mentioned gently how he hadn’t even seen me come in. I responded by telling him that it was totally OK, because he was working on his work. Could I even call it work? I could tell this potter loves what he does. He knows the long process each piece he forms from mind’s eye is going to take, and yet he lingers over every step in it and is delighted to do it. Why is it that each new beginning excites the Potter so? When he grabs that lump of wet clay and places it on the wheel. His finished works are all there in great array, but new forms have yet to begin. It’s not only that the yet-to-be-formed has a special place in his heart, he also is very proud of the ones that were finished. They gleamed with color and textures. The fine detail that exuded on their exteriors were the result of the long and hard process as each piece had to go through the hottest fires to come to this place where I stand looking in admiration.
The potter appreciated the fact that I had admired a particular work of his. He had even set aside the particular piece I had shown interest in. He went into his home to get it and came back to the studio with it in his hand. He seemed so happy that this certain glazing he had created sparked my interest because the colors matched so well with the work of another artist I love. Claude Monet was an artist who appreciated the designing of a piece of land he had purchased and the laying out of a garden he wanted to have. That glorious delight of planning and planting the garden around a pond inspired him to paint what he had designed. And he painted it in various light of day. Morning light was different from evening light. The way the shadows changed over the pond and the reaches of the setting sun illuminating this thing and that verses the rising sun. The color changes over the pond of water lilies and their interactions with one another. How often he must have sat and gazed and it obviously led to painting what he saw. His work dazzles multitudes in various museums throughout the world. And others are led to rest in the gazing of his work. To gaze and to rest. To rest and gaze. The enjoyment of time spent in what one see’s internally and the realization of those things seen, being created. And then the created forming something even more so than one originally intended and one is inspired all over again. The work that follows what is seen in rest creates restful inspiration toward creating again. How often does one get inspired by seeing ones own artwork to create again? Creation begets creation. Art inspires art.
The potter gave me special attention as he wrapped the pieces he had created in bubble wrap. I was able to help him by cutting pieces of tape for him to tape at the seam so the precious pieces of his work would make the journey from his studio to my home intact. He wrapped each one just as carefully as the first. I noticed how he paid careful attention to the whole process from creating to wrapping his finished pieces. What a delight the whole experience was. I thanked him and walked out of the studio, carefully carrying my bag of finished art and back out into the sunshine. My heart was full. What a joy to be in the presence of a creator! What joy to be with His created handiwork. And what would the experience have been if one hadn’t happened without the other? Can one have either or? Shouldn’t it be this way to have it all?
One of the finished pieces is intended for a friend. How I loved the thought of both her and I getting to sip coffee in these artful pieces that inspired me so. I couldn’t wait to share one with her....to surprise her with something I so enjoyed. Sharing the beauty of created masterpieces with others also brings delight. Delight does follow delight. Creation follows creation. Rest will follow rest. If only we’d lay down the striving and the grasping and give ourselves to Someone who is wiser in all His thoughts and ways than the wisest person on earth. By far! His ways are not our ways. He is far better in every way!
The roadway was familiar. I’d taken this path before, my daughter and I having enjoyed a day of walking that particular spot many years ago when she was just twelve. She’s sixteen now. We had lived nearby here for a year and my heart reminisced for a moment just as the studio came into view. I thought to myself how fortunate the privilege just to pull into this driveway. How special it is to be invited at a certain time to this certain place on this special day.
It felt as if all of creation had laid out the red carpet and my time had come for what was to be, to be unveiled. I know that seems rather universal in thought.....but I know that nothing happens by chance. I know that nothing that comes is ever just a bang in the cosmos with its cause and effect. When you are a child of the Living God, He brings you to a place where you can sense His precious Presence and His guidance in your life and there springs appreciation He alone causes you to have for His handiwork. Earlier in the week, I had gone through a tough time and anytime a child of God goes through a rough time and cries out to Him, He hears. And boy does He hear! When God hears our cry as His beloved ones, He moves and He routed that darkness that had wanted to crush me. I am so grateful too. So when I write about the moment I was having, I know it was a gift for me. He was opening my heart to the beauty all around me. Darkness gave way to the light of His glorious love.
The wheels of my car stopped moving as I put my car into park. And as I tend to always do when the car motion and engine noise discontinues and there is the quiet before opening my car door, I lingered.
Knocking softly on the door of the studio, I could see the cheery glow of bright light upon shelves. Through the window in the door, i could see that the potter was bent over his potters wheel to the left. Two men were moving about to the right. And I opened the door softly and closed it behind me without a sound. All was hush and reverent inside. The potter was in the middle of spinning his wheel upon which he was delicately handling the clay. I can’t remember very clearly the form that was taking shape, but it was as if that moment was all that mattered to him. Here he had two admiring customers setting several precious items next to one another that they wanted to purchase, and a new customer walking in. Here were three admirers walking amidst his finished creations, yet he continued to work. There was something comforting about the artist working while I was looking at His finished works. Creating, while the created works were inspiring the ones who were near. I had come for a specific work I had seen on Instagram.
The potter looked up from his work and mentioned me by name. How special that was! And he mentioned gently how he hadn’t even seen me come in. I responded by telling him that it was totally OK, because he was working on his work. Could I even call it work? I could tell this potter loves what he does. He knows the long process each piece he forms from mind’s eye is going to take, and yet he lingers over every step in it and is delighted to do it. Why is it that each new beginning excites the Potter so? When he grabs that lump of wet clay and places it on the wheel. His finished works are all there in great array, but new forms have yet to begin. It’s not only that the yet-to-be-formed has a special place in his heart, he also is very proud of the ones that were finished. They gleamed with color and textures. The fine detail that exuded on their exteriors were the result of the long and hard process as each piece had to go through the hottest fires to come to this place where I stand looking in admiration.
The potter appreciated the fact that I had admired a particular work of his. He had even set aside the particular piece I had shown interest in. He went into his home to get it and came back to the studio with it in his hand. He seemed so happy that this certain glazing he had created sparked my interest because the colors matched so well with the work of another artist I love. Claude Monet was an artist who appreciated the designing of a piece of land he had purchased and the laying out of a garden he wanted to have. That glorious delight of planning and planting the garden around a pond inspired him to paint what he had designed. And he painted it in various light of day. Morning light was different from evening light. The way the shadows changed over the pond and the reaches of the setting sun illuminating this thing and that verses the rising sun. The color changes over the pond of water lilies and their interactions with one another. How often he must have sat and gazed and it obviously led to painting what he saw. His work dazzles multitudes in various museums throughout the world. And others are led to rest in the gazing of his work. To gaze and to rest. To rest and gaze. The enjoyment of time spent in what one see’s internally and the realization of those things seen, being created. And then the created forming something even more so than one originally intended and one is inspired all over again. The work that follows what is seen in rest creates restful inspiration toward creating again. How often does one get inspired by seeing ones own artwork to create again? Creation begets creation. Art inspires art.
The potter gave me special attention as he wrapped the pieces he had created in bubble wrap. I was able to help him by cutting pieces of tape for him to tape at the seam so the precious pieces of his work would make the journey from his studio to my home intact. He wrapped each one just as carefully as the first. I noticed how he paid careful attention to the whole process from creating to wrapping his finished pieces. What a delight the whole experience was. I thanked him and walked out of the studio, carefully carrying my bag of finished art and back out into the sunshine. My heart was full. What a joy to be in the presence of a creator! What joy to be with His created handiwork. And what would the experience have been if one hadn’t happened without the other? Can one have either or? Shouldn’t it be this way to have it all?
One of the finished pieces is intended for a friend. How I loved the thought of both her and I getting to sip coffee in these artful pieces that inspired me so. I couldn’t wait to share one with her....to surprise her with something I so enjoyed. Sharing the beauty of created masterpieces with others also brings delight. Delight does follow delight. Creation follows creation. Rest will follow rest. If only we’d lay down the striving and the grasping and give ourselves to Someone who is wiser in all His thoughts and ways than the wisest person on earth. By far! His ways are not our ways. He is far better in every way!
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