A (clay) form of patience

The crevices between my fingers are a dusty white.
The lines of my palm have changed from grooves to mountain ranges of sticky clay spelling out my fate: in the very near future you will learn patience.

I have made pinch pots and crooked vases and teacups with drooping handles and mis-shapen bowls reminiscent of deep sea creatures flailing on decks of a rusty old fishing boats.

I am sliding a board underneath what will be a box. I turn the three sided structure 90 degrees onto what will be its bottom. At this point the leather hard (technical term folks) clay slab that will be the fourth wall is wet and scored and stitched together and I am amazed when my creation stands on its own with Frankenstienish proper posture.

I have to add a little more clay to the bottom slab. Seems as though I didn't measure and didn't quite cut the piece large enough to fit over the irregularly shaped legs of the container. Hmmm. This is all part of the patience lesson isn't it? My thoughts flutter through gray matter to boat projects of failed epoxy and slightly too short cables and sticky varnish. Or disasters in the kitchen that involved flattened boards of banana whole-wheat non-bread. Or eyeballed dress patterns (some of those actually worked out nicely) with too long zippers and crooked, fraying hems.
Yup, this measuring/details thing has been a challenge for me in the past.
OK, OK, my whole life.

I'm just so impatient. I know the adage: measure twice, cut once. Yes, I realize that measuring can actually save time. But I just want to get the project done, have it be good enough. Move on.

Next the top is affixed to this cold gray structure on the table in front of me. I wet a comb, scratch the edges, press the damp pieces together. Take up the wooden stick for scoring, X's all along the seam, smooth the raw stitches with the opposite spoon-like end. I run my fingers against the clay, smoothing edges and decreasing divots. I like that my fingerprints remain- some smeared, some halved, some perfect swirls of me.
The clock on the wall spins its spindly arms but I only look up twice to notice hours flowing by.

I like the austerity of the plain box. I wet a sponge and slide it down the side. I graft a handle onto the top. I step back from the table. I call it done.

I sometimes get frustrated at my perceived lack of creativity. My impulse to just "get things done." Then I stop and stare at the wall and make a snowman salt cellar or whale and ship on the waves or a little cup perfect for wine out of leftover clay. I smile at my tiny creations knowing that only in a three hour ceramics class unplugged from computers and phones and to do lists, I create. And think.
And grow patience in my body. Who knew it just needed to be nourished with blankness, watered with time, given space to breathe.