I’ve been thinking a lot lately about talents and interests
and how they are formed. I’ve thought about my own childhood and how my
experiences shaped my life. I’ve thought about my friends and how they formed
their talents and interests. Sometimes talents and interests are the same and
sometimes not. For instance I have a great interest in hiking and it’s
something I regularly do, though I don’t think hiking is something I’m
particularly talented at. In fact, often when I’m with a group I might be the
last one to make it to the destination. Both talents and interests enrich my
life and the life of my family
However, there are two things I’m particularly talented at
and I have been doing these two things from very early on in my life. The two
things are writing and pottery. My
mother is a writer and during my childhood wrote for the local newspaper. She
took classes. She read us her stories and it sparked my interest. My aunt Emma
Lou Thayne is also a writer. Though I never talked to her about writing when I
was little, the desire to be something like her was instilled. I had teachers
as young as third grade who had us write stories and share them in class. I
found out quite early that I had some natural ability. In eighth grade while
sitting in a science class and feeling rather bored I began to write a story.
It was a story about an abused boy. It was a touching and yes, sappy story but
my mother thought it was wonderful and entered it in a contest with the League
of Utah Writers and it won an award in the youth category. I was hooked. From
then on, I wanted to be a writer.
Now about this same time in my life, I also had an interest
in art. I had very artistic brothers and while I was less artistic I was still
interested. I took art classes in school. In ninth grade the teacher Mr.
Neilson had a unit on clay. I loved making things out of clay. One of the
projects I made was a giant tennis shoe. I gave it to one of my friends and she
still has it, some 40 years later. Then Mr. Nielsen brought the potter’s wheel
out of a closet for a couple of days and we each got a short turn on it. My
first pot was thick and small. Pottery is something that no one really has any
natural ability. It is a skill that has to be learned, practiced and perfected.
From the time Mr. Nielsen brought the wheel out of the closet I was hooked, but
it would be a couple more years before I would have the opportunity to learn
the skill in high school. I think about the rest of the kids in my class. Why
was I hooked and they were not? What has to happen to our brain that turns
something from an interest into a skill?
I had another friend Susan who was also in lots of my art
and English classes. In high school she learned how to do the wheel right along
side me. After school she got on the bus and rode to her house up Provo canyon.
Often rather than going home, I would stay after school and throw. (that’s what
it’s called—throwing) I would stack the balls of clay up on my wheel and try to
center them. And when I’d fail which I inevitably would, I would try again, pot
after pot and by the end a pile of slop and sometimes a pot worth keeping,
firing and glazing. Eventually my teacher, then Mr. Bird would have to go home.
I along with another student or two would beg him to let us stay. Sometimes we
stayed until midnight, promising the janitor that we would lock up. Eventually we got into some trouble for
that and we had to get permission from the principal to stay late, but they
capped the time at 10 PM. My dad had a hard time believing that’s what I was
really up to, but after months of this hours and hours after school, long into
the night, I started bringing home my wares—then he would proudly show off my
work, even my rejects that I’d thrown in the garbage, he’d dig out and show his
co-workers and try to sell the “junk” for 50 cents or so. He’d give me the money he’d earned.
What I’m trying to get at is that I didn’t have any natural
ability in pottery making. I was creative, had a lot of desire and worked hard
to learn the skill. So many other things I do and have done spur ideas that
transfer somehow to my artwork or to my writing. My science class –contributed
to my first good story—because I was too bored to listen. Eventually I majored
in art—not because I had any real talent in drawing, I still am just “pretty
good” at drawing, but Ceramics/pottery was part of the art department and
pottery was something I was passionate about.
Now back to some of my other friends, Susan. In high school
Susan was a fairly skilled potter, but the spark that hooked me didn’t hook
her. So what did? When Susan went home from school she often went to the sewing
machine. She became skilled and developed a real talent in sewing. Both Susan
and I took home ec in junior high. Both Susan and I had to sew first a hot pad
and then a skirt. That was about all I ever made. Sewing was ok for me, but I
didn’t love it. I never went home from school and sewed. So because I excelled eventually in
pottery and Susan excelled in sewing. Was the home ec class as waste of time
for me? Were the art classes a waste of time for Susan since she never made
anything beyond her classes? I don’t think so. I think being exposed to lots of
different learning activities in and out of school helps develop who we are,
helps us to find our passion, and helps us to find ways to contribute to
society. I can sew and have
sewn a couple of Halloween costumes for my children, believe me I’m very proud
of them because they were so difficult for me to do. It would have been easier
to call Susan and have her do it. I can mend a seam and sew a quilt block
though I usually have to have someone thread the machine for me.
Something else though that I gained from my friend Susan was
my interest in hiking. On Saturdays or sometimes after school we would walk up
the mountain from her house and hike to a waterfall. She taught me to love the
mountains. Isn’t it great what we can learn from each other? My love for the
mountains has always brought me so much enjoyment. It has brought my family
enjoyment and is one of the things I have passed on to my children. My
five-year-old grandson just hiked a full six miles with me without any help. My
love for the mountains is reflected in my pottery and again in my writing. One
benefits the other. Time is not wasted doing something we enjoy or that we can
share with family or friends.
Another friend I had was Shellee. From 2nd grade on Shellee was one of my best
friends. Shellee had a natural ability at all things athletic. If it involved a
ball, a bat, jumping, dancing, or running, chances are Shellee was very good at
it. In 4th grade whenever Shellee got up to bat everyone in the
outfield backed up. When I got up to bat the outfield didn’t even need to worry,
but the infield needed to move up. I had no skills, but I loved to play.
Sometimes after school, our neighborhood had baseball games. The whole gang
played--boys and girls. Shellee taught me how to hold a bat, how to watch the
ball, how to catch, and how to hit. I never became like Shellee, but I learned
to play well enough that I didn’t strike out every time. I had fun. I didn’t go
on to play baseball, but still it was not a waste of time—I was developing my
personality and gaining friends, and learning sportsmanship. Shellee on the
other hand didn’t go on to play baseball either. There weren’t a lot of
opportunities for females in sports in the 60’s and 70’s, but years later when
I met Shellee in a park for lunch with our young children, she brought her three-year-old
son and I had mine. Her three year old could already swing a bat, hit a ball,
and catch. Although she managed to pass on her athletic skills to all of her
children, at least one son went on to play professional baseball. Her talent,
her desire, her passion for sports increased her enjoyment and ability as a
mother. Shellee too was in the same art classes that I was, but did not take it
any further and yet she is the friend who still has that shoe pottery piece I
made in the ninth grade. Again
isn't it nice what we gain from each other and how we can bless each other
through our talents and interests?
Another friend was Rosanna. Rosanna was one of the
neighborhood gang. She played baseball. She took art classes too. But instead
of signing up for extra art classes she signed up for Drama and Choir. What
Rosanna ended up becoming passionate about was singing and acting. I’ve seen
Rosanna in performances at BYU, Sundance theatre, Hale theatre, in commercials,
and in church films and now during General Conference singing in the Tabernacle
choir. Rosanna made some pottery with me when I got my wheel. As far as I know
those were the only pots she ever made. Her passion was not clay but
performance! And look how many lives she’s touched with her talent.
Now back to writing. I learned in 3rd grade that
I loved writing. I learned by 8th grade that I had some natural
ability. So what did I do? Whenever I could I signed up for Creative Writing
courses. I took classes at BYU before transferring to USU. At USU I took poetry
writing, short story writing, and so forth. Eventually—like twenty years after
college graduation I attended the League of Utah Writers in Logan and met some
friends with similar interests. We started a critique group. I attended
conferences. I read books on writing. All the time I was writing some short
stories, but didn’t begin writing my first novel until the year 2000. In fact,
it was one of my century goals.
I didn’t really know I could write a novel, but I tried it
anyway and it turned out good. It takes a lot of work and it takes a lot of
desire. It takes a lot of practice and continuing to develop and learn. So even
though I always wrote a little I didn’t get serious until I was forty years
old. In fact it was a mid-life crisis that sent me back to college to get a
second degree in English which reminded me that I was pretty good at writing. Our
time to find our passion doesn’t have a time limit. There is no one setting a
standard except ourselves. Olive Ann Burns was 60 yrs. Old in 1984 when she
published her first novel “Cold Sassy Tree” which became a best seller. She
died of cancer before completing her second. And yet her book continues and is
being read by young and old alike today and has reached wide audiences and much
acclaim.
Talents and Interests are worth
developing. They are worth sharing. They make us who we are. Whether you make
the best Lemon meringue pie, or garden, or know how to be a good friend, or
write a book, making and sharing talents is important. We are told to let our
light shine. But we aren’t told what our light is. We each have a unique light
don’t we? Isn’t it nice that we don’t all love the same things? Isn’t it nice
that we don’t all know how to make pottery? If we did who would appreciate my
work? Isn’t it great that we all can’t sing a song or act in a play? Natural ability helps sometimes too,
but exposure can lead to desire which can lead to a passion, then add the time and learning and practice to really
cultivating a talent and reap the rewards. It takes all the ingredients. There
are no shortcuts.
