The Gradual Unfolding of Time

6″ diameter x 1 1/2″.  Copyright 2009 by Lynn Bridge.

Integral frame and ceramic inclusion by Roberta Mitchell.

Where I live, we have come to expect that time is a commodity in short supply. “I’m busy; I don’t have enough time.”  “Hurry up!”  “You need to learn to be faster.”  “We have a deadline!”  “I’m gonna hafta pull an all-nighter in order to get this finished on time.”  “I have 25 hours’ worth of things I have to get done in the next 24 hours.”  These are commonly heard and thought.  To a certain extent, each is true- if we don’t meet the deadline, we miss out on funding for the project, miss out on selling the product, miss out on getting to take a vacation by having to finish the work instead, miss out on graduating with our class.

In the short term, not getting everything finished leads to painful consequences.  In the larger scheme, we all know that constant hurry is painful, leading to stress, missed opportunities for relationship and community, and even physical illness.

I work best if I have a deadline- my creative thoughts flow faster and more freely, but not if the deadline is too tight.  In that case, my mind freezes up and I am forced to do the job in a less-than-satisfactory way in order to finish on time. Creativity is lost.

A quick digression:  I have asked my mom to make a lot of ceramic pieces for me to put into mosaics- a collaborative effort.  I have already incorporated a couple of her ceramic frames into mosaics- “The Song of the Canyon Wren” and “Still Pink”.  She wanted specific instructions on what to make, but I refused to give her any direction or advice.  I wanted whatever came out of her mind.  She delivered the first load yesterday, and what a pile of treasure I have sitting on my kitchen counter!  All the pieces appear geological to me.  So, I immediately started pairing ‘inclusions’ with frames to see what would happen.  Here is the first result, a mosaic study of time!

I was trying to recall what slow time looked like, and I think this is it. I expect the dressmaker pins to rust slowly in their bed of cement.  (Time to relax now.)