Nikom Chimnok on fri 10 dec 99
Some 11 years ago I had just returned to Fairbanks, Alaska from a country
pottery village in Thailand where they were having fuel problems. Six
pottery owners had recently spent a night in jail for cutting trees
illegally; the forests had been closed. I was an energy-efficient house
builder with 3 books about the subject to my credit; I had a lot of data in
my head and an HP41-C in my backpack. After a few hours of calculations I
told one owner, "No wonder you need so much wood--you're wasting about 95%
of it." I promised that upon my return home I would research the topic and
see if I could come up with any solutions.
I'd already read everything in the library when I noted that there was a 3
week summer course in ceramics being given by one John Leach, whose name
meant nothing to me. I decided to sit in. There were only 7 students
attending, me and 6 women. John quickly ascertained that I had not signed up
for the course, and asked me would I please, as there were so few of us
already. I said I would rather audit. He wanted to know why. I said I
wouldn't tell in front of the class, but I had a reason, and I'd talk to him
later. That's when the women started to hate me. After class I explained
that I was on unemployment, which would end if they learned I was enrolled
at the U. I offered to pay him the normal fee in cash--$35 or $40. He went
along with that.
John's most famous for being a great production thrower, and that's why all
the women were taking the class. I tried throwing cylinders for two days. It
was boring, and I wasn't neat like the women. When I slammed a hump of clay
down on the wheel, slip spattered the high school teacher next to me. She
gave me a dirty look. I got a piece too thin at too high a speed and a great
blob of clay muddied another woman. More dirty looks.
On the third day I quit throwing, and just sat around talking with John
about kilns and ceramics in general. "Why aren't you throwing?" one woman
demanded.
"Because I don't like to," I answered. "I'm more into kilns and stuff."
"But how will you ever be a potter if you can't throw?" she asked.
"I don't know, maybe I'll hire one of you," I replied. "I'm sure you'll all
be great in a few years." Boy, did that ever piss them off. Most of them
thought they were great already. But I'm being unfair. Two of the women
didn't hate me--the youngest and the oldest. The 17 year old liked to go out
behind the building and smoke a joint with me at lunch time, and the oldest
was a real potter, part of the same small town arts community I was. We
vaguely knew each other. She didn't care if I wanted to throw pots or
not--she knew I was a writer and housebuilder.
John was a helluva thrower. He explained that he generally threw 200 pieces
every afternoon. "You start getting warmed up after the hundredth piece," he
said. He mainly did beer mugs. I asked if they broke. "Yes, thank God they
break," he said. "I'd have gone out of business a long time ago if they
didn't." He said he didn't know a great deal about kilns, actually--he was
still firing a 2 chamber softbrick job his father had built 20 years before.
He said he'd solved his firewood problem by buying some land and planting
fast-growing trees. He suggested the same thing might work in Thailand.
Meanwhile the women had noticed that I went outside and smoked cigarettes
from time to time, and more than one warned me not to try that in the
studio. I promised I wouldn't, even though it was a big high airy building
with unvented electric kilns firing away, and nobody would even have
noticed. But I wasn't looking for trouble.
Two days before the firing, which was the last day of class, John threw a
saggar. It took about a minute. Then, without measuring anything, he spent
30 seconds on a lid that fit. That's why I wasn't interested in throwing.
You don't start at age 38 and get good like that.
On the last day we all got into cars to head out to fire the potter woman's
Fred Olsen wood kiln. The driver of the macho 4-by I was assigned to warned
me not to smoke a cigarette in her truck, and I promised I wouldn't. I sat
and drew sections and elevations of the kiln while they loaded. The 17 year
old had brought along a six pack of beer, and it was a nice sunny day. Then
it came time to split firewood. The teacher who hated me went straight to
John and asked, "Should he be splitting firewood while he's drinking?" In my
best John Wayne imitation I replied, "Lady, if I didn't know how to split
firewood drunk, I'd be dead by now." She had a good job and didn't
understand what it's like to come dragging home at 2 a.m. after a couple
days of partying to a shack that's -55 F. inside, the same as outside, and
because you are a wild young man and there is not a single stick of kindling
to be found in the yard, it's chop firewood or die. John defused: "Oh, I
don't think he's drinking that much." Later the silly cow cut her finger
with the axe and I graciously taught her how to split kindling safely: grab
the wood in the center of the stick, lay the axe bit on top, lift them both
simultaneously, and bring them both down gently so that the axe bites into
the wood. Then with both hands on the axe handle, split it on the second
whack. She didn't even thank me.
Toward the end of the firing I wanted to see how hot the hard brick
chimney was on the outside. Hot! I jerked my finger away. The teacher
smirked. I spit on my finger and touched it to the stack again. Hot, but not
hot enough to boil water. I now knew more than the teacher.
While stoking the two fireboxes, we were supposed to pitch the wood
in, yell "Stoke!" and then the partner on the other side would stoke. I made
a mistake. I yelled "Yo!" and all the women got on my case. Finally I got
teamed up with the 17 year old and we yelled "Yo!" and "Okay!" and "Now!",
all of which seemed to work fine. Maybe it was the beer, or maybe we were
just less easily confused than the others. In six hours we hit cone 04 and
were finished. Next day John gave me a beer mug, since I had nothing to show
for my three weeks of study. Six months later I showed up at this Thai
pottery where I silll live, and announced that I was their volunteer,
whether they liked it or not. I still can't throw. Never even tried.
Nikom
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