The Boxer

[offcntr]

There's more to being a potter than pottery. More than throwing, glazing, firing, even going to fairs and Saturday Market.

As a potter, I'm basically a small business. I manufacture a product, I advertise it, sell it, maintain a wholesale, retail and online presence. But I also do other, less sexy tasks. Someday when I'm feeling up to it, I'll talk about bookkeeping and taxes. Today, though, is boxing day.

It generally happens after every firing, sometimes after out-of-town shows. I'll have an order from out of town, out of state, once or twice even out of the country, to pack and ship. Maybe I'll sell something in person to an out-of-town visitor who needs me to ship it home for them.

A potter friend of mine once told of an experience while apprenticing to a famous potter. One morning Famous Potter announced that his gallery had agreed to a show of apprentice's work, and that he should box up his best pots to ship off. My friend spent the rest of the morning packing and boxing, after which his mentor proceeded to kick and roll his boxes up and down the driveway, then open them up again to see whether the pots had survived. There was no show, only a learning experience.

I initially assumed that shipping company employees are like the gorilla in the old suitcase commercial. I double-boxed everything, two inches of packing peanuts* between boxes. Cardboard separators between individual items. Full insurance on the lot. Some of those boxes got huge.

As time passed, I got to feeling a little more relaxed. I'd buy big bubble wrap, swaddle the pots, then float them in peanuts in a single box. Send them off without insurance, confident in my packaging skills.

Last week, not one but two pie plates arrive broken. Guess they must have hired a new gorilla.

So it's back to extra boxes, extra peanuts, extra caution. And two more pie plates for the next firing list.

*I reuse packing peanuts whenever I can, buy new green ones when I have to. I don't use the cornstarch packing, because they shrivel and shrink in winter humidity. Plus mice see them as food. I used to get big bags of mixed packing from the University Bookstore warehouse, and one winter mice burrowed into the bag, ate the cornstarch peanuts and peed on the rest. Nasty.