There’s a rhythm to this life out here. Somewhere between the nickering of a horse and the hum of a kiln. It’s quiet most days, but never still. The land has its own voice, and if you listen long enough, it finds its way into your hands.
When I’m building, rolling slabs, pressing textures, gathering pieces of nature, I feel that rhythm settle in. It’s in the raw edge of a broken root, the soft curve of clay before it dries, the way light moves across the studio floor. My art begins there, where earth meets spirit, in the space between intention and surrender.
I’ve always been drawn to what’s a little wild. Weathered wood, rusted metal, a deer shed found in tall grass. They all carry stories. I don’t polish them or hide their imperfections; I honor them. They remind me that beauty often lives in what time leaves behind.
The wild teaches me to embrace imperfection, to follow instinct, to trust the untamed parts of myself. The clay listens, and it remembers. It holds fingerprints, tool marks, and small surprises that the fire will later reveal. Every imperfection tells the truth of the process, that nothing meaningful is ever made without risk or patience.
But the wild alone isn’t enough. There’s grace, too! The kind that comes quietly, like dawn light over the pasture. It’s in the patience the work asks of me, the humility of the process, the small gratitude that builds each day. Grace softens the edges and keeps me steady when the clay cracks or the fire surprises me.
Grace reminds me to slow down, to breathe between steps, to see beauty not as perfection but as presence. It’s the pause after the making, the moment when I step back and recognize something larger at work, something I didn’t control but was simply allowed to hold for a moment.
Each piece I make carries both a little wild, a lot of grace. They belong together, like wind and root, like soil and flame. It’s the balance I try to live by, in the studio and in life. To make, to listen, to be grateful and to let a touch of wildness remind me that art, like life, is never meant to be too tame.
Until next time, with love and Grace
xoxo
Cindy
Psalm 98:11-12