The Potter

The potter was extremely happy that night. He was making a pot on his own, which he believed would be really useful to anybody who bought it. But he would not sell it. Nobody made an order for the pot that he was making, but he wanted to make it. He put his heart and soul into that one pot. It was even more enjoyable for him, because he was doing it on his own, as in, nobody asked him to make it, but he still wanted to do it. The clay was bad that night, it cracked more frequently than ever before, but that did not bother him, because he knew he would never get tired with the making of this pot. It would have probably irritated him if he was making some special order which was to be delivered the next day, but it was not so with this one. It was 'his' pot that he was making. It made him really happy.

It was 2:42 in the night when he realized this sudden surge of happiness that came piercing from the bottom of his soul (wherever it was, but he believed that if there was a soul, there should definitely be a bottom to it) and making its way through each and every cell of his body. Happiness... It was pleasantly, very pleasantly making its way through his body.

It has been happening with him for quite sometime now, with the way he felt about things. It was always the extremes. Either he was too excited, too jumpy, euphoric, when he felt the joy overflow from his soul. He was extremely creative at such moments, like the creative urge that made him make the pot that night. He felt as if he could achieve everything under the sky when he was in these highs.

But there was this other extreme too, when he felt the depressions for nothing at all. Suddenly he would feel down and would lock himself into his mental cocoon and would never let anyone inside it. He would get extremely irritated even for the simplest of things. That again would be momentary, a new joyous high would take over before long.

And so that night when he was making the pot, he wanted to take a break. He went out of his work-shop. The pearly moon was filling the space outside with its silver glow. The yellow lamps were there too, competing with the moon for thier own light space to fill. It was a healthy gold-silver mix, which pleased his soul. His mood saw more and more happy highs. He felt like a happy monster, a were-wolf. The thought of him being a were-wolf thrilled him, he raised his head, saw the moon on its face and let out a howl, after making sure that there was no one around. That made him even more happy. He got rid of his shoes, walked the empty streets bare foot. The feeling of raw gravel against his feet felt heaven. He walked bare feet for a while and seeing that the soles of his feet were a happy shade of dirty brown black, he decided to get back. He was much relaxed and he was ready to continue his work on his pot. He did an one foot hop, clicked his heels, smiled to himself and got back to work.

On the way he met his friend. He told him all these mood swings that have been happening with him. His friend said that these could be symptoms of a manic-depression, his being the hypomania phase of it. He was pleased at that too, smiled and nodded, and rushed back to work.

When he got back, the clay was still wet, ready to be moulded.