PORCH PONDERINGS

Making Something from Nothing

My husband and I went to a small town for a tourism board meeting. After the advisory part of the meeting, we adjourned to a small shop. We are considering this shop to be added to a tour.

A wonderfully accomplished woman showed us around her tiny workshop. She takes local wool fleece, washes and dyes it, cleans and cards it, and then spins it into yarn. From there, her yarn goes to one of her four looms. She showed us how the looms are loaded. She also showed how the patterns were noted and followed. All of watched in awe.

Wonderful craftspeople always amaze. It takes years for a weaver to know the warp, the weft, the tension, the yarns to use, the way to dye, the way to follow a pattern. and once you have all the information, a perfectly amazing product rolls off the loom.

So, of course as a writer, I found the correlation between this event and the act of writing anything from a sentence to a novel. You work on each word, you agonize about the right word, the right sentence. You work for weeks making just the right paragraph work. Then you work for months or years working on a novel or other large work.

The time has come. You take the fabric off the loom. it needs some work, a bit of tweaking. But once you are satisfied with the final product, it is time to send your baby out into the world. With any hope, your project will find some adoring fans. People will pay you wonderful money for your wonderful finished product.

But on the flip side, what if you're a flop? What if no one likes your work? You have still created something from nothing. And that is what art is all about.