The Bowl That Should Not Exist (And Why I'm Keeping It)

There's a clay bowl sitting on my passenger seat right now. It is lumpy. One side is noticeably taller than the other. There is a small crack along the rim that the instructor assured me would 'add character.' I made it today at a drop-in pottery class at the community arts center, which I signed up for approximately thirty-six hours ago because I walked past the flyer, stopped, thought about it for too long, and then went home and thought about it for another day before finally just putting my name on the list.

I want to be honest: I went in expecting to be okay at this. I run now, I'm reasonably coordinated, how hard could throwing clay be? The answer is: very hard. The clay does not care what you want. You push it one way and it goes another. My first attempt collapsed entirely. My second attempt became something the instructor diplomatically called 'organic.' The third attempt is what you're looking at in these photos. I was so focused during the actual making of it that I forgot to be self-conscious, which honestly might be the whole point.

Concentration mode. The clay was not cooperating.

The class was two hours and I barely noticed. There were maybe eight people at the tables, all different ages, nobody particularly good, everybody kind of quietly trying. It smelled like wet earth and the windows were fogged up from the kilns. At some point I looked down at my hands, completely covered in gray clay up to my elbows, and realized I hadn't thought about AP exams or next year or any of it for almost two hours. I don't know when that last happened.

The bowl is coming home with me. It'll need to dry, then get fired, then I can pick it up next week. The instructor said I could paint it. I'm already thinking about going back before then, not for any particular reason except that I want to. Which might be reason enough.