O Tannenbaum

Resurrecting the Hopeless

This post is a mini-photo documentary and a special one to listen to. I’d love it if you hit play to give it a listen

Welcome to Excerpts from Wonderworld, December 18, 2023

Dearest Friends,

I write to you in the glow of fresh gratitude from learning Ruby’s cancer is in remission. What began as a painfully difficult holiday season has transformed into a celebration of our Christmas miracle, a healthy Ruby. Instead of the latent dread of anticipatory grief, the struggle of watching my doghter declining and suffering, I feel a lightness of heart, a joy in having the darkest of clouds lifted. I never would have imagined after only two months of chemotherapy and steroids, Ruby would be cancer free! It still seems almost unreal.

Beyond my expectations.

But she is! A cancer survivor.

Ruby’s cancer and the forced mental preparation for her potential early departure brought me so much despair. I couldn’t imagine a tolerable life without Ruby’s companionship, comfort, humor…and demand for walks. She is so good for me, in so many ways.

Ruby’s love and life force is powerful. Powerful enough to cooperate with the medicines and beat that cancer. And I know the prayers and the power of SO MUCH LOVE directed at Ruby from our friends, family, Facebook community and Beyond revived her.

LOVE and HOPE revive the sick, the dying, the broken.

Charlie Brown

the Charlie Brown tree all dressed up

Ruby and I wandered through Home Depot’s sparse Christmas Tree selection, finding a whole lotta Charlie Brown trees. In the darkness of our big box home improvement store’s neglected outdoor gardening section, I selected a skinny, wonky balsam fir and watched as two very inexperienced men sliced off the bottom inches of that tree with a chain saw and “sort of” wrapped it up in mesh for the ride home.

I didn’t care — I would love it in all it’s Charlie Brownness. Really. I was just excited to have a real Christmas Tree this year. “Somebody cut the tree down; I’ll keep it alive and celebrate it for as long as it will stay with me,” I thought.

That skinny, wonky tree opened up! And as its branches dropped, it morphed into a lovely shape. This year, I brought Mom over to help me decorate it, and now look at gorgeous Charlie!

Life is full of gorgeous surprises.

A Tale of Two Trees

The need for perfection diminishes so much when you’re in survival mode, and “whatever” becomes very acceptable.

Ruby’s cancer diagnosis blew up my semester at the Ann Arbor Art Center. At the start of the ceramics course, I planned to build something very practical. For myself. Something to hold and display my earrings, to contain all of them but make them viewable. I had an idea…a jewelry tannenbaum.

It started off like this.

Tannenbaum One, ready to go into the kiln.

Tannenbaum One ended up like THIS:

In the dump bucket, after I personally knocked it over and it broke into pieces.

My first thought: “Oh well. Whatever.”

Honestly, that’s so not typical of me. But when your kid has been handed a cancer diagnosis, really. WHO CARES? WHO EFFING CARES about a stupid lump of mud.

I actually laughed it off, telling our studio manager, “I’m not at all emotionally attached to my work right now.”

My dear teacher, Daria, offered a couple of suggestions as to how I might build a more solid second version. But I missed the next class because cancer’s wave of overwhelming sadness and fear pulled me under.

I returned for a makeup class the next week and started afresh.

A more solid base. A broader mold. A wider tree with thicker layers. A different design, less likely to topple or break.

I used my beloved great aunt Dora’s 1960’s doily to imprint this cool design onto the wet clay. The doily is made of some kind of rubbery plastic which has held up through years of use. Off to a good start here.

Using a stronger mold, this Tannenbaum would have little trays for feet, to hold my little collection of post earrings.

But then…I had to go up north to close the house for winter. Another missed week of class. If you’ve worked with clay and molds, you know what this means.

Disaster for my tannenbaum.

As clay dries, moisture evaporates and it shrinks. Tannenbaum Two shrank so much I could not lift it off the mold! It was SO tight, even slipping a thin knife between the vessel and the mold (and newspaper between) was useless. My only recourse was to slice the vessel in half, cutting it and peeling it off the mold. Ugh.

Poor thing was dead.

“But wait,” my skilled and hopeful classmate Eugenia says. “Maybe you could use Daria’s glue to put it back together?”

“I don’t know, Eugenia. It looks pretty dead to me,” I reply, imagining the satisfaction of throwing those stubborn halves into the junk bin.

“I think you could repair it,” she nudged.

And so, over the course of the next few classes, I gave Tannenbaum Two another chance. Piecing together the halves with lots of scoring and Daria’s magic clay glue, I slowly restored the base, removing the mold promptly (lesson learned!) This iteration of Tannenbaum would include two additional tiers with space for bracelets to rest.

1. Finished wet clay 2. View from above 3. Dried and on the shelf to go in the kiln. 4. Successful bisque firing! 5. VERY CAREFULLY holding my fired Tannenbaum!

With the first firing finished, the relief let me just enjoy the rest of the process. It was fragile, but nothing like the greenware version. I love the snowy white of the unglazed tree, but I imagined it with what’s called a “wash,” where the pigment dust would settle into the doily impressions. A peacock wash with hints of hazelnut and blue.

1. Washes. 2. Washed with Peacock and two highlight colors. 3. Closeup of the base. 4. Closeup of the treetop, all washed up ; )

With each phase, I felt like I plodded through, so cautious that I might knock it over and break it again. But I made it to the final dip into the clear glaze bucket. The relief of seeing it on the glazing shelf…priceless.

1. Pre-glaze 2. First dip into clear glaze, base first. 3. Second dip, head first 4. Carefully lifting out! 5. Phew! 6. Earring holes got plugged up 7. Clearing the holes 8. On the shelf, FINALLY ready to go into the kiln 9. Empty kiln awaiting Tannenbaum Two!

It is typical that one semester will yield at least several pieces of finished work. It appeared I would complete just ONE vessel this semester. This intruded-upon semester.

Perhaps my tannenbaum was resurrected as a sign, a foreshadowing of Ruby’s revival and healing? Tannenbaum Two seemed determined, at the very least, to teach me to keep going and not give up on it. In the perseverance, something beautiful did finally result, complete with more stability, more character, and more learned lessons.

I needed my Tannenbaume (that’s the German plural) to determinedly pull me into a creative challenge, away from the ache and angst that had characterized this trying season.

And VOILA! It survived the glaze firing and I actually carried it home without breaking it! The vision was brought into being, with the generous help of the team at the A2 Art Center! And here it is, bedecked with ornaments just in time for Christmas.

1. Glaze fired! 2. Close up of detail swirls. 3. Finale: Tannenbaum Two as I envisioned it, with hook earrings as ornaments all over the tree, post earrings in the little base trays, bracelets on the second tier and rings on the top!

Why do I tell you this long story? Not just for my own entertainment, though it has provided so much to me.

I share this mini photo documentary because I hope to bring you a little distraction in the midst of what is often a distressing season. A season when people are overwhelmed by loneliness, enough to sometimes wear out and give up. My next post is a special message to remind you to care for yourself well during this holiday season.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this mini-documentary and missive. May it be a reminder that disasters both great and small can suddenly change. That Charlie Brown-ish things or people in our lives may become more wonderful to us as we give them care and allow them time to flourish. That broken things may need to be tossed in the bin, but if we don’t give up, we can create something more glorious the second time around.

Don’t miss your wonderworld.

With Ruby Love, and mine,

Linda

P.S. Thank you for reading to the end! I’d love it if you would take a moment to hit the like heart or write a comment. Those comments really do mean the world to me.