Under a dark starry sky between tall trees, earth is formed into bowls. Quietly the oven gets warmer and while the wine flows, the clay prepares for the fire. A leather apron, fireproof gloves. Inhale.
After being heated to a thousand degrees, the bowls can come out. If you're quiet enough, you can hear the glaze tinkle and crackle with fright. Sawdust ignites from the heat and the cracks blacken.
Water washes away the remains and shows its surprise. This evening is about the interplay of air, fire, earth and water. Self made and yet amazing. Never the same, always wonderful. Simple and robust but endlessly complex. Exhale.
Wabi-Sabi
Wabi-sabi is a Japanese philosophy that respects the transient, the weathered and the imperfect. It is an art of living and aesthetics focused on simplicity, the influence of nature and human modesty. Finding beauty in the imperfect, the temporary and the incomplete. Acceptance of impermanence and imperfection as it is central to Buddhism.
You don't have to become a Buddhist Zen monk to bring Wabi Sabi into your life. It only needs a calm, courageous mind, open to the temporariness of the environment and ourselves with attention to the quiet and the small.
"A small bowl sitting in one's hand contains the whole of the universe" Raku Kichizaemon XV