The Fire That Inspires

My mother read me National Geographics while I was in the womb. That says just about everything you will ever need to know about me.

From my grandfather, I learned to love the seasons and the land he farmed. From my grandmother, a love of archeology and anthropology and all things old and secret. From my dad, a love of creatures and the environment they live in. From my mom, a love of teaching and the creativity to make it fun.

I have woven the threads of my family's passions into my own tapestry: a teacher of studio arts. Jewelry, painting, casting, spinning, weaving, dyeing, cosmetics, herbal remedies, native gardening, and many more. I have yet to find a craft I don't like, and my first thought on mastering the basic skills is how can I turn around and spread this new-found joy to other people.

My friends have made a game of trying to find a craft I don't like. They haven't won yet. Now, there are some I'm just not good at (round knitting comes to mind), and there are some I don't get to practice often (underwater basket weaving), but the challenges each new craft skill brings keep the game from getting stale. My embroidery can make a cat laugh - and I have the pictures to prove it - but I can spin the silk thread and dye it with natural dyes I grow in my garden, and even make silver needles to sew with and gold-wrapped silk thread to give it some shiny bits. My friends like to take classes with me, to see what hilarity ensues. I don't mind, it's all in good fun. Besides, we all get to learn something cool together, and isn't that a fundamental basis of a friendship?

My specialty is glass beads. Instant gratification, courtesy of fifteen hundred degrees.

I love making beads, but I also love teaching others how to make glass beads. Selling my product is enjoyable; the glow on a person's face when they find the perfect bead is pretty amazing. But the glow on a person's face when they find they can also do the amazing thing you make look so casual? That's phenomenal!

I've had people I've taught turn around and turn it into a business for themselves. Should I be jealous? Nah. I could teach each and every person in the world to make beads, and each and every person will come up with ideas and color combinations that I never would, not in a million years. I love finding out what my students teach me in the way of texture, color combos, designs. Besides, those students-turned-merchants are selling their beads and kit components, not the teaching itself.

How addictive is it? Let me turn on the torch and tell you - ah, you're no longer listening. Yes, the blue-white flame draws people like the proverbial moth. Especially at night. Once, at a street faire, I drew a crowd of kids away from an ice cream stand to stare open-mouthed at that flame. So many, that the owner of said ice cream stand came over to yell at me for taking away her custom, but suddenly.... "Ooooh, pretty fire! What's this all about then?" I sold her a pair of beads to make into earrings, and she skipped away happily.

At that same faire, the next year, I was surprisingly alone for a few moments. I decided to really concentrate to make an awesome bead, only to have the hairs on my neck stand up. I was being watched, rather intently. After scolding myself for how silly I was being - it was a street faire, of course I was being watched, that's what I'm there for! - I looked over the fence to see a little girl and her mom staring at the flames. The ice cream cones in their hands were completely forgotten, and melting onto their hands. I smiled, leaned over as much as the torch would let me, and stage-whispered. "See? Girls can play with fire, too!"

I wish you could have seen that little girl's face - again, incandescent, and I mean it, her face lit up with surprise and delight and even a little bit of creative mischief. She gasped and looked at her mom, and her mom smiled back knowingly and nodded to confirm what I said. To me, it looked as if those words were never said to her - or, perhaps more importantly, those words had never been said in a way that she heard and believed so deeply. And that is why I teach crafts: to empower those who didn't believe they could make such amazing things. To show people that reaching inside yourself and finding the courage to get that close to a flame that will melt silver can be done for less cost than the "professionals" charge. To let you believe in the power of yourself, with a solid piece of real evidence that you can really do it. Beads to take home, or wear immediately. I keep a roll of strong cord in my kit because everyone always wants to wear them as soon as they come off the mandrel.

I want to be able to help every person find a creative talent they can pursue as much as they want, without breaking their bank.

It's hard right now, coming out of pandemic status. Word of mouth is a powerful draw in this area, but I know there are still bills families need to pay, and I don't want to pit my teaching skills against basic needs. Though my husband lost his job before lockdown, he now has another better one, and our needs are simple; we can make do till customers have some discretionary income again. We have some bills to pay off too, so an advertising budget is only a future plan at the moment.

I was never invited back to that street faire. I was set up on the porch of the faire's organizer, to bring sales into his business inside. I did my job a little too well...they came onto the porch, bought my beads, and left again. The organizer's wife had a fit of epic proportions, and refused to pay me my demo fee. Then they refused to pay me my teacher's fee, for all the people I taught in a class they'd organized for me to teach the next day. Next I heard, they had skipped town with all the proceeds and their shops were boarded up.

It serves me well as an important reminder that greed is a powerful motivator, and one that I must be careful to avoid. But I also remember that little girl's face, and the reminder that it also holds: I can change a life, one class at a time. She has not been the only one that has gotten that look because of my torch over the years. I wasn't paid in money that day, but I was more than repaid with a child's belief that she could do anything.

Small changes can change the world, one concentrated fire at a time.