In early 2024, I had my first go on a pottery wheel. I said at the time I would definitely do it again, and this summer returned for another taster session, following which, (after a fair amount of hesitation and prevaricating) I signed up for a longer course.
To be honest, it felt like an extravagance in terms of both time and money but it also felt like a good decision. It was the end of the summer when, as recent posts have suggested, I was feeling a little overwhelmed by the state of the world and very conscious that heading into the autumn, I needed to take self-care seriously. A commitment to two-and-a-half hours a week in a pottery studio, doing something entirely different, just for me, just for the pleasure of it, was one of the ways I have been doing so, and the benefits have been numerous.
We were a small class so, over a number of weeks, I spent time with a completely new group of people. Over the course we spent together we exchanged gentle conversation and learned snippets about each others lives (and, mostly, talked quite a lot about clay!) They were people whose lives were generally, different to most of those who make up the other communities in which I exist, people whose paths would, probably, otherwise, never have crossed my own (or possibly each others). And yet together here we were, building a friendly, supportive community, albeit a temporary one.
I have turned my hand to quite a few different arts and crafts over the years and if I had to put my finger on why this one has (at least for now) really captured my imagination, I think it would be something about the very physical, tactile nature of it. There is something indefinably pleasing about just handling the clay: even before you have begun to create anything. I guess it is not dissimilar to the pleasure of putting your hands in soil when planting things: it is after all, really just earth.
One of the things I had to learn very quickly is that it has to be fine to fail. Several of my attempts were, frankly, disastrous and ended up squished back into a ball of clay to be reused later (some others possibly should have done too!). There was something freeing in the knowing that it really didn't matter, in the letting go and moving on.
I realise there doesn't need to be a hierarchy of benefits, but possibly the most significant was that there are, it turns out, really quite a lot of things to think about when throwing on a pottery wheel. Both hands, and quite a lot of the rest of your body, and your brain, all have to be fully engaged and focused on the task in hand ... which leaves no space for thinking about, or doing, anything else. For a couple of hours a week I was thinking about clay, and very little else. Living, as I do, a life where my work and home lives bleed into one another, and where I am frequently dealing with emotionally intense issues from which it isn't always easy to switch off, it proved an incredibly valuable space in which to be.
I am very, very far from being able to describe myself as a potter, but I do feel like I have made a bit of progress and the last things I made are at least marginally better than the first. There is a satisfaction in that, undoubtedly, but there was also a deep satisfaction inherent in the process, much more so than in the product (although I was, I confess, also very excited to collect my pieces when they emerged from their final firing).
And so I reached the end. It still felt like it was a very good decision. And so, admittedly still with a fair amount of hesitation and prevaricating, I signed up again for January. The journey continues.
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