The highest part of our season is upon us.  The B&B is bustling with activity:  people are tasting wine while watching the tractors carry loads of grapes to be pressed, we’ve been holding water color lessons and pottery lessons and Italian lessons, laughing and philosophizing.

Guests become friends and we hug them before the drive away.  They come from Switzerland and Germany and Denmark and the USA and every other imaginable place.   The days fly by, starting early and ending late. I am collapsing into bed, mountains of laundry behind me and loaves of unbaked bread in front of me.  It’s the same every year.

I dream of the pots I want to be making but can’t right now, making mental notes of things to try when the days get colder and wood fills the stoves.

I took to my studio this week, at a time when I could least afford to, and put together some glazes for pieces I had made earlier in the month.  The results were successful, and they inspired me to keep going, keep trying.

My color world is becoming larger and my ideas more fanciful.  I write and write in my journal, making sure I record the chemical formulations I used to get that olive, that yellow, that raspberry.  My knee jerk is to wedge some clay and get busy throwing pots, to maximize the creative energy I feel just looking at these glazes.

But I stop myself.  I stop myself because I know that on Tuesday next week, I teach a three hour cooking class and that Micha does an all day wine tour.  I stop myself because there are peaches to roast and tomatoes to be grilled under fried eggs.  I stop myself because I realize that if I get a tickle in the back of my throat right now from over working myself I won’t have the luxury of laying in bed and relaxing.  We’re booked solid through September and a good part of October.  I want to be present for those guests.  And God knows I can’t be present if my head’s really in my pottery studio, secretly calculating how much chrome oxide will cause that rich olive green to lighten just a touch.  To do a set of green on green plates, maybe.

I closed the door on my studio for now, on this first day of September, and know that it’s ok to not create pots until the season is finished.  I fully accept that simplification and mindfulness is far more important that scattered, frenetic creativity at times.  I cannot do it all simultaneously.  I can wait with some activities and do the other important things in my life justice in the process.

The thought of this, that there is a time for everything, gives me a sense of both peace and freedom.  I don’t need to get tied up in trying to do too many things at once.  If I do, I won’t do any of them well.  This way, by letting go, even of something that I enjoy, I free up time for rest, relaxation, and regrouping when our house has a constant stream of visitors. There is nothing more important right now than being present and feeling well.  In fact, there’s never anything more important than being present and feeling well!

I wish all of you peace in your decisions.  One thing at a time.

I am going to close with a picture of the most beautiful flower ever.  Can you believe that this is a caper plant?  This is what a caper bud looks like when it’s allowed to blossom.  Makes me never want to eat a caper again, that all the buds can bloom and be this beautiful (well then again, maybe not…I do love capers! ).