3/12/26 - 3/14/26: goodnight giant Pikachu
3/12/26
I was making my emotionally improvised vase the other night while a hand-building class was going on nearby in the studio. I was thinking “wow, just a year ago I was in that class, and I didn’t really know anything about clay, and now I’m making tall slab vases with wild curves and growths and markings”. It’s hard to not feel obnoxiously cocky at my progress with clay. I notice the moment I do, though, the clay knows and reminds me how little I still know and how I will always not know everything about it. Similar to how we feel with some people, a continuous layer of mystery, like a glistening sheen, shall remain.
My next goal in clay, besides experimenting with slip trailing and getting good at it, is to take ceramic sculpture classes.
I currently feel confident centering 1.5 lbs. of clay on the wheel. It’s harder for me at 2 lbs. I’m currently in love with making handle-free cups. Some call them tumblers but I refuse to. They’re cups in my book. One way I think of clay is as another surface, other than fabric or paper, for me to make art on. For me to draw on. So, since I’ve gotten comfortable on the wheel, I’ve started making what I call creature cups. I’m obsessed with making them.
I grew up with a few handmade, ceramic refrigerator magnets I still remember fondly. A hand-painted pig magnet and sheep one both dramatically stand out in my memory. I’d like to make my own. My faces and various drawings as refrigerator magnets would be fun to create. I’m currently trying to suss out what the ideal adhesive is both for fixing broken ceramics and adhering magnets to ceramics. I also need to gain some magnet knowledge and figure out the top-tier kind for ceramics.
The apples I got tonight had a flavor meter on the bag they came in. Sweet to tart. I like thinking what my meter would be at all times. On the days where I’m in the studio, or literally having dreams of starting my business up again, then it’d read beyond sweet. Cloud 9, in fact.
Ok, let’s ponder what one would find in a bag, shall we? We shall. Bag of ___
1. apples
2. bones
3. groceries
4: memories
5. lettuce
6. steak
7. candy
I’m currently listening to a deliciously heady book about time. I have until midnight before I must return it to the library. I have such limited time to finish the book about time. I’m swooshing through the last chapter, and hurtling headlong toward the conclusion. Or as a goth would call the death of the book.
As I swoosh into sleep I hear “…long buried memories come to the surface…”, and “…the dimensions of the deep-seeded self”.
I think about David Lynch a lot more than I think I do. I adore how much he advocates for sticking true to your voice. Your creative journey is your very own, and molding and acrobatically bending to the opinions of others is against the Law of Lynch. I love anyone that advocates so positively for the artist. In an interview asking to explain his work he simply said “no”. This is always how I felt during art critiques in college. The art-making is its own language and adding any other language on top of that feels unnecessary. Not that it can’t be fun to add this unnecessary layer of explanation for that which needs none.
I used to bite my nails a lot when I was younger and anxious. Now it’s my lips. My mom has had some rougher days recently and everything has been making me feel so rushed. On high-alert.
I’m still on my friendship quest. I suppose I’ll always be. I love friendships. But I’ve had to relax my expectations about everything because life is so busy and I have such limited energy now that I barely sleep anymore.
My dream the other night involved forgetting my booth sign for a show and having to make one on the fly. My mind lives passionately in starting my business again. I’m getting there. I'm slowly coming up with a creative flow that makes sense to me.
What flows?
1. A river
2. Good conversation with someone special (can’t you feel that spark baby?)
3. What else? I can’t think of anything right now.
4. Doesn’t everything kind of flow? Why can’t I think of anything else?
3/13/26
It’s Friday the 13th.
As I try to go back to sleep at 5:11 a.m., with my alarm clock set to 8:10 a.m., I think of my own version of Goodnight Moon.
Goodnight giant Pikachu sitting near me on a chair. You used to live at Costco, and now you live with me and I love you.
Goodnight plethora of plants I’m bad at watering. I adore all of you even if I’m not always great at showing it.
Goodnight laptop on the floor near me. I like to use you for writing.
Goodnight giant jar of embroidery thread. I love you a lot. You’re perfect.
Goodnight eyeglasses that save me money on contacts. Thank you for assisting me in my frugality.
What power do I have really? Some days it feels like the size of a crumb cut in quarters hiding in someone’s pocket. Meaningless and microscopic.
Carrying around my sleep deprived body today felt too laborious. I got rejected tonight from the first job I’ve applied to in awhile. It would’ve been much more tolerable than most of the jobs I’ve been seeing posted. The rejection email from them was polite but I’m guessing they didn’t even read my resume. Well, I shall resume looking. And also seeing where the wind takes me, so to speak. I have hope that my second iteration of my business will work even better than the first go-around.
3/14/26