The Sixth Day: Harmony

Yes, our trip was so blissful we all reached a place of harmony.

Well, we went to Harmony anyway. Believe me, there was lots of disharmony (is that really a word?), even while we were in Harmony. But I digress.

Harmony is a tiny town, between Cayucos and Cambria. We stopped so the boys could see glassblowing. We thought they'd like it. You know, the fire and all.

James did especially, and we watched this gentleman and his 2 assistants blow a glass bowl. It was really a lot of fun to watch.

There were so many steps involved: the putting in the fire, and taking out, and blowing and shaping and holding molten hot glass in his hands (with gloves of course, but still) and bathing it and back in the fire, and cutting it and pushing and molding, and finally, getting the shape you want.

James guessed it was a bowl long before I could figure it out. I thought it was a vase.

I am glad we stopped. I really enjoy about seeing where things begin. Yes, we can go to IKEA and get a glass bowl for $3, but we lose something in the process. We lose the appreciation of all that it takes to turn sand into glass, into a bowl! It is amazing.

We drove past a raspberry farm and people were in the fields picking the fruit. We pointed them out to the kids and I thought about how people often complain that fruit is so expensive. "A little basket of raspberries for $4 dollars? That is crazy."

Really? Think of all it took for those raspberries to make it into that basket. Think about the planting, the growing, the picking. Have you ever picked berries? It isn't easy.

It is good to step back from our mass produced lifestyle every now and then. Those handmade, homegrown things might be more costly, more difficult to get, but they offer something a little more. It is nice to show these things to my kids. It is a beautiful world out there and there are so many things that are better outside of a big box store.

To see more pictures of Harmony, go here.