ceramics

Hi there world, it's frrrriiiday! I have had such a weird sleep schedule this week, that all I can think about it "yay, I don't have to wake up early tomorrow." Except - I am planning on going to the Irvine Fine Arts Center early in the a.m. to do some throwing. the IFAC is the very first place I ever did any ceramics work on the wheel. We went with my Girl Scout troop when I was about 12 years old. I remember being so excited to do this - I've always loved mud and clay - and I was so excited that I put a very full bucket of water on TOP of the wheel, and then pressed the foot pedal. The water flew EVERYWHERE. I was so embarrassed. Try #2 went much smoother.

The next year I enrolled in the ceramics class at Cypress College, where legendary Char Felos was teacher. Ceramics was one of those things that came as easy to me as breathing. I remember the 1st week we were learning to center, and Jim, an advanced student would come up behind me as soon as I got it, and "thump" the clay off center. He'd do this again, and again, and again - and I really think that's how I learned to center so fast.

They called me speed-demon (because of my love of throwing with the wheel going way way way too fast), copper-girl (because of my, uhm, enthusiastic use of copper powder at the beach firings), and I loved it. I grew up there. I was 13 when I started, and stayed there for years. Maybe 8? I ended up getting my first real job at Laguna Clay Co. thanks to one of the Cypress lab techs. I also ended up working at the Cypress Studio as a lab tech for one semester as well. They gave me a key to the ceramics lab. I remember throwing by myself in the studio til 2am.

I remember it in texture - how slimy lotion felt after a day throwing clay, the buttery feel of Southern Ice (drool-worthy porcelain from new zealand - translucent at cone 5), the cold gray taste of soldate 60 (how do you think air gets into bottles to make them expand?), the heat of the firey backlash from the raku barrels, the grip of the tongs when I was loading the raku kiln, the cold gritty glaze up to my elbows when I was mixing them in the big trashcans...

It's where I learned to love Tom Waits, Bob Dylan and Sarah MacClaughlan. It's where I learned how to journal thoughtfully. It's where I learned about ideal communities and personal responsibility.

I haven't seen many ceramics folks lately, although we have been reconnecting through facebook a little bit. The best friend I ever made there just had a baby, and it blows my mind. The last time I saw Char was at Jon Danner's funeral. Danner started the same semester I did, and we shared a locker for much of the time. He was one of my mentors - and could throw the largest sized vessels of anyone I knew. He married another ceramic student, and they had a baby boy. Danner always asked me to sing Adia, and made me one of my favorite tools (a sponge on the end of a long stick. haha. yes). When I arrived at the church for his funeral, his wife laughed and choked and said "oh Roya, you got big!"

Anyways. Ceramics was a huge part of my development and how I became who I am. There was a long time when I had a hard time doing ceramics anywhere else - after Char retired I was just SAD anytime I was in a ceramic studio that wasn't hers. It's been years now, and I can enjoy going to the Irvine Fine Arts Center - because I still do love the actual hands-in-clay-making-cups-in-stuff process. But there was nothing like Char's class, and never will be.


And now, for your viewing enjoyment - a picture that has nothing to do with ceramics at all (I did not make the cup in the photo). A cup full of earrings!

today

tonight - I picked up tshirts for bowling blast (work), went to the grocery store, went home, made chicken/bellpepper/onion kebabs, grilled them, swept, wrapped up joel's bags, did dishes, cleaned the fridge, watered the garden, made asparagus, went to karate, went to the gym and went swimming.

Now I am tired. very, very tired. I believe it is time for bed. I bought a bunch of barley, lentils, and split peas at the store - I am suddenly very excited about cooking grains and legumes. The lentils I made the other day - plain old lentils with nothing in them - have been hitting the spot all week. I can't wait for barley.

I drank all my water today, got some exercise, and kept up with sparkpeople. I kept up with house chores and remembered to hang my keys on my new hook so I don't spend ten minutes every day looking for them. I remember Char always saying that success is a series of small good habits practiced every day. So all these little things- remembering to hang up my keys and water the garden.....success. All success.

ceramics studio memories, again

you know what's strange? I don't know quite how to write about this, either. I am not one for believing in angels, or any kind of tangible "life after death" I don't believe in ghosts, nothing like that - and I know it's just because I've been thinking about it, but Danner feels so crazy *close* the last few days. I've been obsessing over my ceramics more, and he is very tied up in that for me. The more I think about him and ceramics, the less time seems to have passed between the last time I saw him. Ducky and I have been talking a little bit because of it, and Rebecca and I keep in touch via etsy - I will probably see Char at Jon's funeral, and Janelle will be there - so ceramic people are suddenly *present* in my life the way they haven't been in five years.

I wonder if T ever reads this. She's the one I should have hung on to with all my claws.

I wonder where Fil is, and Morissey, Jeremy..all these people who were SUCH an important part of my life that are just gone now. You know, they are the ones I wish could be at my wedding, for instance - they mattered so much to me for so long. I love the people I work with, but I've only known them a year, so they haven't formed that crazy connection yet. And ceramics was special. Char made it something special. I hope I am not the only one who feels that way.

I remember at closing circle at Not Back to School Camp, Eira said something once that if any of us ever had grandchildren who needed a couch to sleep on, they were welcome at her house, JUST because we had been at NBTSC together. The island trip had something of that same bonded feeling. Just because you had an experience - even if you weren't at the same session or there the same year - you share something special. Ceramics GOT TO ME in that deep down soul altering way, and I don't know how else to commemorate it except keep throwing clay and writing about it on here.

I have to keep remembering how young I was - I started when I was 13 and Char retired when I was 18. That was also the year Grandma died. I lost a lot that year. The five years preceding it made me me. I had pink hair and silver glitter converse and Jeremy introduced me to Tom Waits at the same time that Daniel was making me the same CD's. Char played Bob Dylan while Jon and I raku'd and Les got me the job at Laguna Clay where I met Paul and everyone, and I was surrounded on all sides by clay. I didn't have to do the final because I was the only one to get the other test 100% and Rebecca made me that great Guitar plate (which is hanging in my room) and Mike Lewis introduced me to Nina Simone and Santa Monica, and Mike Duckworth cackled in the background of all of it.

I need to stop this now or it floods. Anyways - Danner, he feels like I just saw him the other day, and ceramics is still as engrained in me as ever.

How I can make one day feel like three

Phew! Yesterday was a very long, very wonderful day! I have discovered the key to my having a good weekend - going to sleep by 10pm and waking up before 8am! Friday night I went to my dad's house and watched Top Chef with him, and then had along heart-to-heart. I was at home, asleep by about 10:30. I woke up around 7am the next morning, and spent a few hours happily sweeping, scrubbing, cleaning... then I headed over to Amber's house, where we stopped at Whole Foods, and then went to Aardvark's for clay, and then went down to the Irvine Fine Arts Center!

Now -for those of you who don't know, ceramics has been an obsession of mine since I was about 11. It actually started at the Irv.FAC - we went with Girl Scouts once. I loved it (although the first time I went, I was so excited, I went and got a bucket of water, and set it down on the wheelhead. The first thing they said to do was test the peddle. So I did. And water went FLYING. It was so embarrassing, but I survived.) Then, I was at Cypress College when I was about 13, and walked past this door...

I peered inside, and there was Bob Dylan and Tom Waits playing, murals painted all over the walls, the wheels, and the cubbies, and a big flashing sign that said "CERAMICS" and this silver haired woman with the brightest shirt I ever saw going around and encouraging everyone. I signed up for ceramics the next semester.

That class turned out to be so much more than a class for me. I stayed there for 5 years - they helped raise me. Char and all of the lab techs took me under their wings and taught me everything about throwing, glazing, and firing. Les would help me load the kiln, Ducky would show me how to use the power chisel to clean the shelves, and Jeremy let me raku with him. Oh, rakuing. That's a whole separate post. Oh man. My heart palpitates just thinking about it. Greg Morissey was the handbuilding/low fire glazing expert, Jim used to come up to me when I was learning how to center and thump my elbow and say "oops, center it again" so I learned how to center really well and really fast. John Danner and I started the same semester, and stuck together - he ended up making me some incredibly useful personalized tools, Rebecca, Fil, and Tifani started a little later, and when I met them, my life was complete! Rebecca now lives in Utah, but is still doing ceramics out there (and is thinking of opening her own etsy!) Fil lives who knows where, but apparently resurfaces every once in a while, and Tifani is her own fairytale, which I ruined, and is also another post.

My point is - I loved everything about it. I loved the actual act of throwing, loved the smell of clay, loved sticking my whole arm down in a glaze bucket, loved the old film of Paul Soldner rakuing, loved the day when we got to watch the slides of Char's favorite cups, loved the first day of class ("WOW" day she calld it - for "Weed out the Wusses") I LOVED cleaning that big beautiful silver sink and singing, taking breaks and hanging out on the patio by the aloe vera plant with all the smokers, organizing boxes in the clay cage, helping to load and unload kilns...I loved the precision of loading a glaze kiln, but I loved the bisque kiln because it was so big I could stand in it to load it.

Raku - originally a Japanese form of glazing, was Americanized and made popular by Paul Soldner, known as the Father of American Raku. He also happened to be one of Char's instructors when she was in school. He would come and visit, and every once in a while select students of Char's would get to go to his house for parties, potlucks, and sitting in his hot tub surrounded by the bush that looked like a water monster, and 80 different bonsai trees. I lived for the day Char deemed time to raku. At our studio it was a three person process - and my two favorite parts were definitly actually using the tongs and walking into the kiln to get the pieces, and watching the golden-molten glaze lift off in cotton-candy-thread-like pieces if they were stuck to the kiln shelves, and opening the lid of the reduction barrel - and the backdraft and smoke that would happen every time it opened. I actually lost my eyebrows once from that, and lit my ponytail on fire! Arm hair was a thing of the past. ;oP

Char ran an incredible studio. It was, as she always said she wanted it to be, a mini Utopia in a world where it's hard to find a perfect place.

Then she retired. I stayed on as lab tech for a few semesters after that, but it was too hard for me without her, and without most of the people who had been in class with me for 5 years. I moved to Wisconsin for a little while - found a spot where I did ceramics once, and cried the whole time.

Discovered the Irvine Fine Arts center, and I remember that I hated it the first time I went, for the sheer lack of Bob Dylan music and Char's big booming voice. I pretty much stopped doing any ceramics for a while.

But you know what? I couldn't quit it! I don't do it as much as I used to, that's for sure, but every once in a while my hands just ache for clay. I still get Char's voice about technique in my head when I throw, and I hope I am not forming any bad habits, but throwing for the sake of throwing is now just as enjoyable as it ever was.

However, I STILL HAVEN'T RAKUED SINCE CHAR RETIRED.
ohhh woe, woe, woe..

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wow, I sure left my original post. Okay, I guess that illustrates how much I love ceramics..the point is, getting to go throw yesterday was a very good day for me. Amber and I threw from about 11am-4:30pm when they closed. I had to stop throwing because I ran out of clay, and did handles/trimmed cups for the last two hours. I forgot how quickly I can go through clay. Next time I will be bringing more.
I used Soldate 60 - which was our staple at Cypress College. It takes glaze well, and has enough sand in it that structurally it's fairly easy. Next time I might take some B-mix, just to get some really fancy schmancy glazed pieces.

There was a lady there yesterday that actually knew Char, and we started talking - she said she could see Char's influence in my pieces. I am not sure she meant that as a compliment, but I take it as one - Char was always after my pieces to be more dramatic and have more direction. I felt really good about these cups.

After ceramics, Amber and I went and had some sushi at a new little sushi place in Seal Beach, then got the dog and went for a run on the beach. It's day 2 of week 5 of Couch to 5k, and it wasn't so bad running with Amber. It helped to run on the boardwalk between houses and ocean - I LOVE running in neighborhoods. Imaginging the people who live in each house and looking at their design is what distracts me the best from running. Adam likes the gym so he can watch people and the tv, but that's not distracting enough for me. He also likes the park, which is nice, but I have to retreat really far into my own head for distraction.

By the time I got home, ADAM was also home, which was nice since I hadn't seen him since Wednesday morning. He left at 6am this morning after a good luck kiss for Ventura for his physical exam for the State Parks.

Alrighty, I think this post is now officially four times as long as any reasonable blog post should be. I am going to go get dressed and call Amber - today is a bike ride to the farmer's market, and going to my little sister's performance of And Then There Were None.