Sunday, October 19, 2008

Black Swan / Order from Chaos


Today was a day of restoring order.

My mother used to have this sign hanging on the refrigerator. It had the word order at the top, and chaos at the bottom. In between were two words that were hybrids of the two - a sort of picture of how order comes from chaos.

As I vacuumed the house today, I thought about how the house just seems to naturally revert back to chaos. There's dust and dog hair, and kids' toys and junk left over from the work week. I, then, as Order Master, have to go through and revert everything back to the way it should be. Because I am the Master. Naturally.

As I was chainsawing apart a downed tree in the 'back 40', I though about fungus and how they would eventually clean up the tree if I weren't so impatient. (Maybe I really am a fun-guy after all! - badumbum - sorry, couldn't resist! *wink!*) Are they Order Masters, too?

As I folded laundry, I thought about humanity before soap. Eeww. But are we really any closer to being ordered than we were in the Bronze Age? (I know there are exceptions to every rule. *grimace* I'm talking about society as a whole here, not just those of us who have clearly evolved. Naturally.)

As I hammered silver wire to make these earrings, I thought about all those poor little molecules inside the wire. First they were in the earth, they they were dug out, the silver molecules separated by smelting, after which they were combined with foreign metals, remelted, then pulled into wire, cut, bent, and hammered, which forces them to align funny so that the whole becomes harder. The final insult was the polish - as if they hadn't been through enough! (Wait! I think I just summarized my life's story!) Did I create order out of all that, or are those earrings actually the penultimate of chaos?

Whatever the case, it was fun to come up with a totally new design. I call them the Black Swan Earrings becaue their shape reminds me of that most graceful of birds. The bead accent could be any color. Actually, in retrospect, I think they looked best of all without the wrapping and the onyx bead. They'll be in my Etsy site soon for about $24.


Here's to your week being full of ugly ducklings maturing to beautiful swans.

Pastel (and whatever) Guy

3 comments:

magicmyst said...

Hi Matthew, I like the earrings. I like the curves and they do remind me of swans. Your wife must think you are fantastic with at all the housework etc you do! Keep it up!

Morgan the Muse said...

Those are beautiful, they do look like a pair of swans out on the lake or river. Very magestic.
As for your theory on the silver wire..maybe you gave the atoms purpose? Like, for millions of years, they just sat in the earth, and now through you and several other people before you, they help make a beautiful woman even more so. You think?

PastelGuy said...

Hmm. I like your thinking, Morgan-the-almost-muse. I guess I just helped those little atoms achieve their destiny! And the lucky woman who buys them off Etsy will be the most ordered of all! Excellent!