This story is about an unexpected conversation partner.
A couple of weeks ago I threw a pot for the first time. Not across the room, just on one of those spinning things. Wheels, I believe they’re called. If you’ve never thrown a pot, the idea is to get the clay exactly centered on the wheel. So you build it into a column and then push it down into a lump over and over again, keeping it steady until there’s no hint of a wobble as it spins. We watched a pro with Madonna arms do a demonstration. I’m a little doughier than that so I was smart enough not to expect it to be as easy as it looked. Our assignment was to make a “tear cup.” We were asked to think either of our own suffering or the suffering of others and craft a representative “cup of suffering.” So I sat down at my wheel and slapped my little lump of clay down as close to the center as I could and I began to build it up and push it down, build it up and push it down. I never got to the no-wobble zone. I learned quickly that the clay was not simply going to yield to whatever creative brilliance I attempted to force upon it. This clay was not merely an extension of myself but an-other with which I had to work in tandem rather than work on. Throwing pots turns out to be a dialogical process. I had tons of ideas for a tear cup and my clay rejected every single one. The question I entered the process with was: How can I make this clay express my sense of suffering? But that question got lost as I pushed the clay and the clay pushed back. I put my whole body into steadying the clay. The clay burned my hands. I used more water. The clay slipped through my hands and dissolved into mush. I scrapped off my wheel and tried again. As we worked on each other, the clay and I realized there were a limited number of options as far as tear cups were concerned. We did not know each other well enough to do something complicated. God knows I tried! But the clay kept breaking off in my hands. As the shape of my tear cup changed, so changed the metaphors with which I framed my suffering. I ended up with a little shallow bowl. I cut it off the wheel. As I sat at the table with my classmates I continued to work on my pot scrapping away sections and giving it a lip. The end result was the pot you see at the top of this blog.
I loved my little pot, my little cup of suffering. I thought it expressed exactly how I felt. When my turn came, I explained to my classmates that I felt like a shallow pot, like a pot that couldn’t hold much. I felt I hadn’t been shaped right but that perhaps I was growing deeper. The grooves inside represented varying levels of depth and the possibility of growth. Perhaps I had been misshapen but that shape was not permanent. The lip represented both the inability to hold much (if you tried to fill this with water it would quickly spill out) and also my hope that I will become a person who is always spilling over with love and joy. Barb said she knew that pot was me as soon as I turned the lip out. For her it represented hospitality and, a true Mississippian, I am known for that here. Courtney said that me saying I was shallow was like Barb saying she wasn’t creative—a comment she made on the first day of class for which I promptly and repeatedly corrected her. But that’s how I often feel these days. Shallow. Unrooted. Improperly formed. Most of my classmates threw their little tear cups back into the bathtub of recycled clay at the end of class. I took mine home in hopes I could find someone to fire it for me. I wanted to save my little pot that I felt said so much about me.
As usual God had to argue about it. I was walking down Harvard Avenue, staring at my little pot, and God plainly said to me, “I did not make you shallow.” She meant both that I was not shallow and that She had made me and no one else. Her tone made that clear. “I did not make you shallow. And I certainly made you.” Okay but I feel shallow. “You are deep.” Right . . . note the sarcasm, God. “You are filled up with things you were not meant to hold.” I fell quiet inside. God was right. I am full of things I am not meant to hold. “Your shape is perfect.” Whoa. Okay, God, I have a mirror, let’s not get carried away. I felt God smile. “Your shape is perfect.” My shape is perfect . . . I am deep . . . The words felt true and also really, really far away. My eyes were wet and my heart was aching. You always fracking do this!
I still loved my little pot even though its meaning was now a little confused. A few days after I brought it home I was showing it to my roommate. I held it out to her with pride, “Look what I made in class.” And the happy little smoker that she is replied, “Oh, is it an ashtray?” “No! It’s my cup of suffering!” “Oh . . . it looks like an ashtray.” “It’s a tear cup!” “I could rest my cigarette right here.” She made a motion to rest an imaginary cigarette in the lip of the little bowl. I snatched it away dramatically and held it to my chest. My poor little pot! I was horrified at the thought of it being used for so crass a thing. I teased my roommate for being so unflinching in her insensitivity. We laughed. I told her I was going to find someone to fire it so that I could glaze it at The Clay Room. “Can I have it for an ashtray?!” “No!”
The next week I laughed with my classmates about this story and I reflected on it again when I blogged about it for our class experience blog. Half way through my blog God said, “Yes, that thing is an ashtray. You are not.” I fell quiet inside again as I realized that I had in fact made myself into an ashtray. My life had gone something like this: “You are an ashtray.” I’m an ashtray? “You’re an ashtray.” I’m an ashtray. “That’s right you’re an ashtray. Hold this.” Yes, I am an ashtray. Snuff out your anger in my palms. Pile the butts of your burnt out hopes in my hands. I’m built for ashes. Not for water. Not for earth. Only for ashes. “You’re an ashtray.” I’m an ashtray.
But God says—“No. You are not.” And I say—“No. I am not. That thing. That clay thing. That is an ashtray. I am not. You may place your ashes there. I do not hold ashes. I do not hold fears. I am not an ashtray.”
Maybe I’ll let my roommate use my little pot as an ashtray . . . for a while anyway. I have a feeling it has more to say to me and I’m always hesitant to dispense with a good conversation partner.
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