Celebrate the change.

Who are you? This is a question I've been asking myself this week. Probably and hopefully different from last year, a decade ago and 4 decades ago when I started on this highly paying gig. I gave more to the craft than I gave to myself. I now find myself committed each day to 25K of bike riding and usually 2,3 or maybe a big day of 5 hours in the studio. If it's a weekend and a bigger ride, I don't go to the studio at all. I still fight off the Protestant work ethic and the guilt of not filling the ware boards each day. As lame as this may sound for a potter I aim to make 4 pots a day. I completed these water buckets today and threw 4 jars with lids to finish tomorrow. Gone are the days of 90 teapots with lids in one day. What was I thinking or not thinking? "So what" pots versus "thoughtful pots". Change is hard. I am revisiting these water buckets but changing them. To some they see no change but to me they are very different with subtle changes. These pots were all brought on with the blooming of the clematis I planted for Dad wrapped around the iron lady tree I had made for mum. The day my mum died I was at USU and I made water buckets. I think they may have been the most favourite pots I have ever made. An old coot honouring his old coots. I am quite capable of making formal pots but is that the real me? The most fun I have in the studio is making WTF pots. I often don't know where they are going. I don't know what on earth they might be used for. I don't know who the hell might want one. My kids are all growed up. I learned them well. At mt age I don't really give a shit. How's that for a business plan? Here's my business plan in a nutshell- tomorrow I plan to go cycling. Ride on!