Hot Mess Part Forty-Six: Thirteen More Sundays: Discarded

Basement Vase

2 March 2025

During the intervitrum, the glass I've put outside provides the only bright color in the dead of winter. 

Inside, too, the best morning light is when branches are bare and there's snow on the ground.

Now that All The Glass has quit and I can't borrow his, I broke down and bought myself a graphite paddle. The first thing that happened was that it left marks on my hands. "Paddle wrote this," I scrawled on the paper it was wrapped in and texted the photo to my glassblowing companions. They assured me this is normal, and warned me not to wear white for a while.

Still working through the ream of newsprint that All The Glass split with me several years ago, I began folding sheets for the spring semester. Wet squares of folded newspaper work like gloves: the hot glass rides on a layer of steam, while our hand shapes the glass from the other side of the paper. I was afraid to try this for longer than I care to admit. Now I cradle hot glass all the time. 

To "make paper," we fold a few sheets into thirds, then thirds again, tucking one end into the other. The last step is to cut the corners off so that, when immersed in water, air escapes from the layers and the paper soaks through.

So there I was, on the floor, a week before the start of the spring workshop, cutting corners, when Clementine decided to help.

When she was finished, Glooskap came by.

An overnight ice storm canceled classes on our first Sunday. We found out the day before, and there was much parsing of the announcement before we heared from on high that only our morning session was affected. 

Now we were owed another day. I wasn't pleased with the prospect of adding another Sunday, which would take us into the second week of May. That would be too far into prime biking season. But to give us a Sunday would mean keeping the furnace on, unused, for an entire week. Not likely, given how miserly the school has been of late.

Sunday morning was an ice slick. I went outside to take pictures before everything melted.

A college friend thought I should turn the balloons upside-down. She saw them as drops of water, and the splat a splash. Having an extra, unexpected four hours, I strung some hematite beads together, and taped the wire into the lip of the wonkiest pitcher ever. Why I still even have this pitcher is an unanswered question. The handle is far off-center, the lip has a twist to it, and the whole thing just about fits in the palm of my hand. I sent my friend a picture.

By evening, the tape had fallen off. The pitcher and beads are on my beading table, waiting for glue.

The next night, Monday, was my first evening workshop. 

I'd expected my first day back to go much worse. I've worked with GGP on and off over the years, but we've never been steady partners. She's got the same color curiosity as I do, and she's good at spinning out bowls and plates. I stuck with simpler shapes.

I brought in a box I labeled "All The Glass' Basement." The containers of large-size frit I moved toward Rose. The rest I stacked behind my notebook, pouring a few at a time into the scoops by the glory hole. I also had a couple of my own colors to test. There was more in the basement box than frit. This would keep me busy for a while.

Gold Ruby is one of my favorite colors. Last fall, I bought a half-kilo of "off-batch," discounted 50 percent because it had random black flecks in it.

In the basement batch was Brilliant Yellow, a color I already had and was running out of.

Halfway through the four-hour session, I remembered that a grad school friend wanted a blue drinking glass for her son. I'd bought some new Opal Sky Blue frit last semester, having run out, and I needed to test it. The glass came out taller and heavier than I'd planned for. When I sent a photo to my friend, she told me what she needed was something for a bathroom sink. Oops.

I took it home and drank from it instead.

Running out of time, I tested a basement amethyst powder that came out muddy. I'd dropped it into a square mold. It had a long neck that came out crooked. When I picked it up three days later, I sawed the top off and polished it. Only when I got home did I see that I'd cut the top at a slant, and that one side was still wonky.

I brought it back a week later to cut and polish it again. I'm seeing a pencil holder.

I was happy to discard two pieces without even photographing them. "New Red" was pale and muddy, and I'd hit the side of the glory hole door when I was making the vase anyway. "Pale Yellow" was off-white, which was fine, but the cup was too thick and heavy to leave the building.

Another thing I didn't take home was a paperweight I'd made a year before and discarded in the fall. Tall Vase had picked it up, thinking he might do something with it. The paperweight was still in the cabinet. I took it outside and nestled it under a chunk of tree trunk. It joins a growing sculpture garden of glassblowing discards. If Tall Vase still wants it, he'll see it there and take it home.

The following Sunday was a double shift for me. I jumped in when one of the afternoon folks called out sick.

In the morning, I set up at the same bench I'd always used with All The Glass. Murano set up there too. I assumed I'd be his partner for the semester, having been put through bootcamp to learn his ways last fall. 

I was ambivalent about this. On one hand, I'd already learned a lot by working with him, and he knew I knew what he'd need me to do to make goblets. On the other hand, working with him last semester stressed me out. It's how I'm wired. I know this about myself. If something goes wrong at any point in his piece, I assume it's my fault, even if it's not. This is not a Murano problem. This is a Hot Mess problem, and I signed onto Sundays to get over it.

I didn't toally screw up the first set of things he asked me to do. "Beginner's luck," I said.

He helped me make a big bowl from Saffron out of the basement box. I had in mind a new flower pot for Mister Plant, a pothos I inherited from a college friend in 1988.

Like everything I make, it has a wonky side.

I didn't do so well assisting Murano during his second turn. When the blown foot failed, he moved onto something else that I couldn't directly screw up.

I watched CP and Sometimes work together. They seemed so relaxed.

My second piece was a basement Hyacinth Blue. I already had this color, but in a larger frit from a competing manufacturer. This one was prettier. I wasn't happy with the shape, though. "It takes me a few to get back into it," I said, as an excuse for having no control. Murano has exquisite control.

After I made my long-neck vase, Murano made one too, in a completely different style. Then I remembered the blue bathroom cup. This time I did it with one gather. It wasn't perfectly symmetrical, but it was light and thin. Two out of three. I'll take it. It's across the state now.

The label read, "Dark Amber, almost black." That it was, and it reduced to a shine in the annealer too.

In the afternoon, I worked with Sage, helping her melt rods together and swirl them into new rods to be sliced and picked up later.

I was able to relax. Over a coating of Enamel White powder from the basement, I twisted in thin coats of the barfy New Red and the disappointing Amethyst powders. A lot of colors react with Enamel White. I wanted to see if these would, if the colors had any redeeming value at all.

Not pretty, per se, but interesting!

I also got the shape I wanted.

On the hotplate, I laid out scraps from a fused sheet from the basement box. What I got was a random swirl of opaque colors on a long-neck vase.

About the hotplate: 

Tucked back behind the small pickup oven and next to one annealer is a stool that held a hotplate that had clearly seen battle. After our first week of class, it disappeared. This set off a text chain:

Pumpkin Master: What do you think happened to it? Same thing that happened to the lockers! 

Murano: It was probably considered "clutter." 

Murano: It's now a foot warmer in the dean's office. 

Me: I'll order a new one.

LT2 found a suitable model on Amazon. I ordered it for the whopping sum of $16.

Me, two days later: I color coded the cord at the plug end to match my tools. If anyone is going to catch hell for this, let it be me.

Rose: Nope. Tell them I did. Dean don't like me anyway.

Murano: "I'm Spartacus."

We have a secret spot for it now. I'll take it home with me at the end of the semester. That way, we'll know where it is. 

The last thing I tried was to mix Enamel White with an unmarked frit I labeled "Mystery Purple." Putting it against white would be a safe way to figure out what the color was like. It was late and I was tired. My jack line was uneven. I went with it, swinging the top out into an organic wave.

I was looking forward to another laid-back evening with GGP when Rose texted the workshop list. She had an emergency at home and would miss class. Who could fill in? Murano. GGP moved over to work with Sage for the night, while Murano, who hadn't remembered that I was also in this section, figured out what to work on now that he was stuck with me again. 

My plan was to mix the four colors a college friend had sent me for Christmas: Terra Cotta, Persian Green Opal, Jade Green Opal, and Gold Topaz. I'd had all of winter break to think about this one.

Hmph. Not what I'd imagined. Maybe Terra Cotta as the base color next time? The greens reacted with each other nicely though.

I'd laid out on the pipe warmer some red shards from the basement box. The pipe warmer was a poor replacement for the hotplate, but I managed to pick most of them up.

"This is a good candidate for a stopper," Murano said. "Maybe later," I answered. We'd have to measure the opening after it came out of the annealer.

I don't remember how my assistance went with Murano's pieces. 

I was getting tired. The basement fused scraps that I picked up off the hotplate blew out unevenly. Through my blowhose, I sucked out the air (not as impossibly hot as I thought it would be) and let the piece collapse. When I blew into it again, I sealed off the hole when I put in the jack line. This is a thing that happens to me at 9:00 p.m. I turned it into a paperweight, which I then mailed to a friend when I found out it was her birthday.

There was enough leftover glass on the pipe for me to blow out an almost-round ornament.

I did not sleep well that night.

When Sunday morning came around, I approached it with a sense of dread. I got to the classroom half an hour early so that I could be set up in time. I sliced more of the earth-tone rods. This time I would make the Terra Cotta the background color, layer on the greens, and add the transparent topaz last. 

I let Murano go first. At the other bench, Low Key, pulling a double shift, was filling in for Sometimes. Murano had me help him with a blown foot again. I get these right about half the time. There's always something I'm doing wrong: the retreat from the glory hole not being level, my hand position on the pipe as I hold the bubble up, something in the shape of the bubble. If I don't get it right the first time, I'm a bundle of nerves the next.

On the second try I got it right, only for the vessel to fall off the pipe at the next step. Whether or not my bubble delivery had something to do with it, I took it personally because I'm wired that way. I felt bad about it and told him to go again.

My jangled nerves showed when we worked on the earth-tone piece. It was thin (good), but off-center (bad). I decided to, as Alchemy used to say, "embrace the anarchy," and swung the piece open. The bottom was too hot and rounded out when I swung it. I didn't notice until Murano pointed it out to me as we put it away. "I'll grind it," I shrugged. It looked ugly anyway.

And it was ugly. So I ground the bottom to accentuate the tilt.

Our Instructor used to say, "Someone will love it." I dunno about this one.

Murano moved on from blown feet. I seemed stuck with anarchy. 

I'd brought in the bubble mold from its home in the car. "You're set up for a drinking glass," Murano said. But I liked the shape as it was and was not in the mood to go for a perfectly straight opening. Besides, this piece was too heavy for a drinking glass. I was using the basement "pale yellow" again, and it wasn't impressing me much.

There was time enough at the end of class for me to make a quick, one-gather cup from the off-batch Gold Ruby. Even that had a slight sway.

As we were putting it away, Murano said, "I have to talk to you about something." 

Uh oh. 

"CP and I had plans to work together, before we knew you were in this class."

"Okay. I didn't know. I thought you wanted to work with me because you trained me."

"I do, for goblets," he said.

I didn't know whether to feel rejected or relieved, so I went with rejected. CP had already gone home, so I couldn't even talk to him to apologize. Why hadn't either of them said anything on the first day? Here we were, two weeks in, and I was ready to quit Sundays, tuition be damned.

It took an afternoon solo bike ride for me to put my head back together. I texted CP and, when he replied with a heart emoji the next day, I texed Sometimes to alert her to the change. She was fine with it. She's cool like that. I wrote, "I just wanna play with color!"

"Me too! LOL."

"I have SO MUCH frit! Let's play."

She responded with a heart emoji.

So I went into Monday night somewhat calmer, but I was still thinking that this might be my last semester. I'd thought this before, first when Covid shut us down, and again when the Colonel ruined things. Now, I was running out of shelf space, ideas, and patience.

I talked with Sage about the whole mess. She's the sort of person who gets it, and who doesn't take shit from anybody ever. 

Over the years, one makes a mental list of people not to work with. "I've been added to the pile of discarded glassblowers," I told her. "I'm in good company." I thought about the fall of 2019, when Glass Ninja did the same thing to me. That's how I became partners with Sleepless, which was so much more fun.

On this night, GGP and I were both playing with different parts of All The Glass' basement. We both picked up thick, clear shards. I made a long-neck vase.

GGP picked up thick stringers from her part of the basement stash. "What color are they?" I asked. "I don't know," she said. "Either blue or black."

On a single gather, I layered "Dark Amber almost black" on top of Light Iris Gold and hit it with the small torch before we put it away. "That was a long walk for a short cup," I said. "Sorry about that."

Next up, the bubble mold again, with the off-batch Gold Ruby. In order to get it to sit straight, I had to grind the bottom for longer than I ought to need to with my level of experience.

I tried the mold again, this time with Saffron, and got the drinking glass I was too timid to make the day before. At home, I put the tall, heavy, blue glass on the giveaway/sell shelf and put this one in the kitchen.

With Sunday and Monday's work lined up from left to right along the Window Sill of Judgment, I could see the tension on the left side and the release on the right.

It was time to integrate the basement with the rest of my frit collection. All of my frits have been decanted into small containers, one each for the suitcase that is my mobile locker, and any extra in boxes at home. There was now so much color that the zippers barely closed. Clementine helpfully added her weight.

You can tell so much about me from this picture.

It was far too heavy to be lugging back and forth from the house to the car to the classroom. It was the sort of weight that threatens to explode the wheels.

I sat down with a tote bag and picked out all the colors that spoke to me at the moment. That lightened the load by at least ten pounds. I could carry the bag into class and leave the suitcse in the car.

My mental load was lighter too. CP would be Murano's partner; I would take whatever I learned from him and use it at the other bench. I went to sleep thinking of multicolored shards.