In 2010, a friend asked me to help her organize volunteers for Empty Bowls Houston. I said, “Sure … what’s Empty Bowls?” That’s me – I say “yes” without always knowing what I’m getting into. I usually regret it.
After teaching for almost 20 years, I retired and enrolled in a ceramics class at the nearby community college, where I met my new friend. I’d never taken ceramics before and initially wanted to enroll in a sculpture class, but it wasn’t offered at the college. The entire first year of classes didn’t go as well as I’d hoped. I was better at chiseling hard stone and working with industrial machinery, not forming delicate porcelain clay teacups and bowls. Finally, I produced something I was proud of – a vessel that resembled a small inkwell that was barely 2 inches tall and weighed almost a pound. Its best use would have been as a doorstop for a never-used bathroom! I proudly displayed it in my kitchen for a few years and, ultimately, it ended up in my memorabilia box as I got the hang of throwing on the pottery wheel.
My first Empty Bowls Houston meeting was held at the Houston Food Bank’s old location. I was a shy elementary school teacher, not cut out to be a committee member discussing ways to raise money for a large charitable organization. I was definitely out of my comfort zone, but this was an opportunity, something that I had been looking for – a way to make a difference.
In my last teaching job, I worked at a school where 97% of the students lived below the poverty level. I had taught at a few different schools before, but these kids were the most loving of any I’d ever had. They had tough lives. A single clean sheet of copy paper was like a Christmas present. A clothes’ closet at home was a nail on the wall on which they hung their clothes. I taught kids that had never slept in a bed their entire lives! One eight-year-old whom I thought was from a loving home had never played in the grass because he lived in a shelter. Another family lived in their car. I’d see the car at 6 a.m. parked in the school lot with the boys and their dad sleeping inside. The dad had a job with the school district and their mom had been deported. The school bus had a stop at the local motel to pick up some of the kids who lived there and went to our school. I knew extended families who lived together and worked 40-50 hours a week in the construction business earning only enough to eat one meal a day. Despite all this, they were extremely loving, well-mannered kids. If they were having a bad day, it was because they were hungry.
My husband and I sold our house in Conroe, leaving behind a great garage studio and moved into an apartment in the Museum District where I could be close to Glassell Studio School. I started taking classes there and turned the apartment’s small utility room into my pottery studio. My third year on the event committee, I accepted a challenge to make 100 bowls to donate to the event. I decided that I would throw at least five bowls each morning and that I wouldn’t eat breakfast until I was finished. I thought about all the kids that had touched my life while I wrestled with the clay on the wheel.
In 2014, I was part of Glassell’s group effort to make 1,000 bowls for Empty Bowls Houston. With each bowl selling for a $25 donation, Houston Food Bank – the event’s beneficiary –provides 75 meals. I did the math in my head, while working at the wheel . . . “How many people did I feed today?” And, of course, I thought about my former students.
I have been on the Empty Bowls Houston committee for 16 years and have served many roles – organizer of demo artists for the event, volunteer coordinator and even event chair in 2015 – and I continue to make and donate bowls for the event. I have learned that the Houston artist community is extremely generous with their time and talent and have met a lot of really amazing people. Being an artsy person, I was always the misfit in my family, but here I am in a community where I feel I belong! I’m still uncomfortable in meetings, stumble over my words when talking in public and I feel awkward asking people to volunteer to do things, but I know the pain of hunger is much more uncomfortable.
This year Empty Bowls Houston turns 20 – it is hard to believe! While we had to skip the event during the pandemic, we still found ways to make and sell bowls to benefit Houston Food Bank and fill empty bowls in our community and are so happy to be back to our in-person event. This year’s Empty Bowls Houston is Saturday, May 16 at Silver Street Studios from 10 am to 3 pm. Attendees may choose from more than 1,500 original one-of-a-kind bowls – made and DONATED by local artists! – for a $25 donation and will receive a light lunch from Salata, iced coffee from Katz Coffee and a sweet treat from Ben & Jerry’s. Live music by local musicians is being provided by Sofer Entertainment and potters, woodturners and other artists will demonstrate the art of bowl-making in their medium. It is a wonderful day of community and art!
We also have a ticketed Preview Party on Friday, May 15 – chaired, in part, by my daughter Anna and son-in-law Scott. I am so proud to have Anna on the Empty Bowls Houston committee with me and to see her spearhead the Preview Party!
