Better Looking is Not Better

Pots sometimes look better after they are thrown but before they are bisqued, glazed, and fired up white hot to 2,300 degrees F (more or less cone 10).

After glazing, well, I guess if you've lived in Maine or rural Western Kansas in the spring when things are melting and wondered if you are driving a truck or a ball of sludge, then you have some idea what things look like after they are glazed but before they are fired.

Rarely does a piece of future stoneware look good after coming out of a bisque fire.  It just looks dead, no matter how strong the shape.  But no bisque fire before the high fire, and you got no stoneware.  It has to dry out, firm up, and find out if it wants to crack or explode (which can happen).

So shiny.  So seductive.  So delusion-inducing? I had a boyfriend like that, once.

Bisque stuff, and a failed attempt at off-kilter little bowls that I won't do again, I promise.

But all shiny and right off the wheel, you can fall in love.  Later on, you might change your mind.

"Look at us! We're taller than a Chapstick!  Slick and shiny!" said the pots, sitting on their bats, posing for photos.

A siren-song. Don't believe a word.