Tom Ferguson

Somewhere there is an elegant quote that expresses the paradoxical idea that; there is nothing permanent in the world except change.

I like to start my day with a cup of coffee on the patio at dawn, watching the sky become light. This time of year is especially delicious because the air is cool, and the sun’s appearance and my rising are more closely synchronized. I find I’m focused more inward than outward these days and I’m paying more attention to the cycle of changes and events that mark the turning of the year. I’m thinking about how our lives cycle within the larger cycles of our planets’ progress.

There is a comfort to having a routine. We seem to crave structured activity and familiar repetition. Having time for this morning ritual before leaving home and family for the day allows me to collect my thoughts and consider the day’s schedule. Having an active mind like most people, various thoughts rise up to be considered as I sit. I often replay and marvel at the authentic and beautiful experiences that flow into my life and how there is repetition there too.

I see another set of cycles in my work activities of teaching, making, loading, and firing.

The end of my daily cycle is usually punctuated with a glass of wine and another opportunity to reflect.

Live. Enjoy. Repeat.

We just finished our fall break from school and I was fortunate to be able to spend part of my time with some friends and my son camping out as we paddled our boats down two great desert rivers, the Salt and the Gila. We’ve been down them many times before. I think a lot about our experiences on the river. I fell in with a “bad crowd” when I entered public education twelve or so years ago. I became corrupted. I found out about river running and now I spend a majority of my free time scheming about how to get a permit or organize a trip down a river. To have a select group of friends together in a wilderness area, for several days is a special experience. It simplifies the list of things you need to be concerned about. You focus on the place, and the tribe, or group you are traveling with. You move at the pace of the water. Even though the place is familiar there are always changes. I have come to realize that the river is an appropriate metaphor for life. Water, the essence of life, moves through the landscape in time. We use the water metaphor frequently such as: drinking in, absorbing, percolating, distilling, diving in, or using flood, torrent, flow, navigate, and a river of…to provide visuals for specific experiences when we attempt to express them.

The river is always changing, yet always the same, a constant and continuous cycle from the source to the sea to the source.

We live within a cycle inside a cycle inside a cycle. We expect that the events that help define our lives will reoccur weekly, monthly and yearly. Always the same, yet changed. We can’t always know precisely what to expect. There is beauty in that.

Thirty years ago I took a trip to Yuma to check out an art “thing” on the advice of one of my mentors. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. I figured I’d enjoy it. I ended up having a wonderful time. I met some new people who have had a big influence on me. I saw some great art. It was inspirational to listen to artists as they explained their work and their creative process. My personal creativity was rejuvenated. I was able to attend the next year, and I’ve been returning regularly. It’s the Yuma Symposium. It isn’t your typical art “conference”. I look forward to it every year. It is my favorite opportunity to reconnect with good friends and meet other like-minded creative folks. Someone observed that; “Friends are the family you get to choose.” When we’re packing for our Yuma trip I always have an anxious expectation of seeing those familiar faces, and anticipating the opportunity to learn and meet some new people. The format is familiar. The time of year and location are the same, but there are always surprises.

It begins with a pin swap, and it ends with a dance.

Tom Ferguson

Tom on the river

 

 Opening rituals at the Yuma Symposium National Saw File & Solder Sprints