MISSING, KISSING AND HISSING

The title of this blog came to me in the absence of any other ideas. I was missing inspiration and felt like kissing the wind which made me hiss mad. If we are not inspired, then we must inspire ourselves which is no easy task. It helps if you don’t mind writing rubbish and who cares if punctuation and grammar are missing?

I have made a few glass sculptures around them of missing. To be honest its easy. Just make something normal and remove a part. There is a temptation not to make a complete item and make it with a deliberately part missing so the piece was never complete in the first instance. But then nothing can be missing if it was never there originally. It’s a bit like the thought process around a vacuum in a glass tube. What’s in the tube? Nothing or something/ Then isn’t nothing something? All very confusing and way above my brain cell count. Maybe I have man cells missing?

A variation of missing is of course “missing out” and I am sure we’ve all been there in missing out on certain opportunities. Strange thing is that there is no standard for the exact number of opportunities that each of us are allowed to own. They come and go as quickly as you forget and perhaps as we get older, they get less. Not sure but they are different. I nearly missed out teaching a glass glassblowing because I was unsure of what to do and nervous about stepping in when the teacher originally booked had to move away at short notice. I nearly missed out on taking an important job as I was second choice and wrongly thought that would go against me. It did the opposite and for the rest of my life I have been trying to prove I am worthy of being chosen. Imagine if my employer didn’t choose me then they would be missing out!

As Chair of the Society of Caithness Artists then I am keen to make sure no members miss out on any exhibition opportunities. Hence communicating to each member with relevant information vital. Yet still one or two feel they are missing out. No idea why. The sense of being left out is a terrible feeling. Its like being back at school and being selected or not selected for the school netball team. Been there and done that and feel like I never want to play netball again.

One of the most traumatic experiences I had of a sense of missing is when my studio floor collapsed. It was wooden and had endured years of water ingress through the local river flooding. The floor had to be removed and replaced with concrete. I miss that wooden floor but not too much!

In 2005 my wife of thirty years, Maureen died and to say I missed her (always will) is such a huge understatement that my life is too short to absorb the impact. But, but, but I never missed out on love and that’s an important thing to hold on to. You can miss out in one way but if you have memories then how can you feel that something is missing? Of course, there are bad memories, but they are all memories.

I have heard that missing out in the business world can be devasting. Between 1990 and 2005 I estimate that I took part in over five hundred craft and art fayres. Several were fantastically profitable whilst others I felt I missed out on big orders. Secret is not to view each fayre as an individual event but more part of the big picture. Well, that’s the way I looked at it since being a glass artist or whatever is as far as I am concerned my career and it’s the cumulative effect of sales that are important as is trends. That way I feel I am not missing out.

Nearly coming to my final blog for this seventy-blog project for this year and when it completed it will not be me that is missing out but you the reader who will miss out!! Joking of course but we will see how the future goes whether I move on to other things but one thing for sure I don’t want to miss out.