Notice the heart locket and the chain.
This week began with a
party. In fact it was a birthday party for a long standing friend who had known
Candace.
In fact her husband was
planning a party which he wanted to keep a secret from her. He’s been doing
this every once in a while over the years and has never succeeded. It seems all
her senses become 100 times more active as her birthday approaches. She’s
evaluating every nuance of his conversations and actions and somehow, she
successfully uncovers the truth of his plans.
About two months ago, he approached
me about doing something special for her as a gift for her birthday. He asked
if I could make a sculpture having to do with her past relationship with
Candace. He indicated that the celebration was to take place on the Thanksgiving Monday. And
of course he reminded me of his failures in surprising her and that this time
he was determined to make it happen.
I decided to do a version
of the winged “Project Angel” sculpture with reference to a heart locket
Candace wore as a symbol of friends and friendships.
So, I went to work. Meanwhile, every
so often our families would run across each other, usually at church. The
husband and I pretended all was cool. Occasionally we had a moment alone like for example, at the
coffee table, adding our condiments to our coffees. We'd have this “secret
service” kind of coded conversation. “So, how’s ‘everything’?” he’d say and I’d
respond casually, “Oh, ‘everything’s’ coming along great.” And he’s say
something like, “It’s so great when ‘everything’ comes in on time eh?” and I’d
respond with, “Yea, I do feel when ‘everything’ is on track you can tell it
will all happen exactly as one expects!” We turned around and standing there is his
wife...blanch!...My panicked mind moves much to slowly back into reality. (Out of the fog I remember he’d just returned from a week long work related trip.) I greet her warmly with “So you've got your husband back!” As we part he turns and give
me a subtle wink. Whew, I'm thinking 'all is well', congratulating myself with my smooth
transition from a coded conversation to reality! This, I thought was a close call, but also, kind of fun.
As you can see there is a
lot of detail on this piece which took some time. I’d scheduled the firing to
take place on Oct. 3rd and 4th, but when those dates rolled around, it was still not dry enough.
Someone else had the kiln after that and so I only had access to it on Saturday
evening. Meanwhile, I had a fan gently blowing on it beginning Friday morning.
Sat. night, after a social event at our house, I put the piece into the kiln and set it on low for the rest of the night. This way giving it a chance to bake and cook away any residue moisture in the
piece. Early Sunday morning I went to the studio and set it to medium. We went
to church. I was praying the piece would not explode! At about 1;30pm I was back. Now it had been on medium for about 5
hrs. Normally for a piece I know is dry I do 2 hrs. between setting changes. I
turned it to “high”. Checked the master safety clock and observed that it was sitting at just over the 4
hr. mark of time left before automatic shut-off. I went to an appointment I had with a
staffer at 2pm and when I returned the kiln had shut off. I checked the safety
clock which now stood at just under 4 hrs. left. From all appearances it
probably was at “high” for a little over half an hour. Normally this would be
about an hour and a half. Simply meaning that with the extended times in low
and medium it had come very close to the correct cone temperature before I had turned
it to high. The good thing about that was that the last bit of added heat at
high would have been much less shocking to the piece.
That bit of information made me believe it had survived. I’d had one piece explode recently and this was just too close for
comfort. I could not afford another and have to show a broken piece with the
promise of making another later. What a party spoiler that would be!
Monday, the day of the
party, I came to the studio, just before noon. Took a deep breath, and slowly
opened the heavy lid of the kiln.
(To be continued Sunday
am.)
“...Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what
is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize...”
Philippians 3:13b-14.
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