Pot, platter made it in one piece

The pot made it safely home intact.

(No, it’s not what you’re thinking.)

The platter made it safely home as well.

Both are ceramic, and both were at risk when we traveled back to Jay County earlier this month after some adjusting-to-retirement time in New England.

But that’s about all the pot and the platter have in common.

The pot is the better of the two pieces.

My wife’s sister is an art historian whose specialty is African artwork. She’s a serious scholar and will have a new book out on African pottery next year from Indiana University Press.

Her work has taken her to Western Africa more times than I can remember over the past 40 years or so. And when she was back for one of her research trips, she asked for some help.

A group of potters — women of a particular village — needed a shelter in which to do some of their work. It wasn’t going to be expensive, essentially a pole barn, but it was beyond their reach.

So my sister-in-law set up a GoFundMe account or the equivalent and started hitting up friends and relatives for donations. A big enough donation meant that the donors received a pot from the women of that village.

We signed up generously. The shelter was constructed. And we looked forward to receiving our pot.

Years passed.

Hints were dropped.

Jokes about the missing pot were made.

Then last month when we crossed paths with Connie’s sister at the family cabin, a box was produced. In it, the pot.

And it’s a beauty. Perfectly proportioned earthenware, it has a round bottom so it could be placed on a trivet above a small fire or hot coals for cooking.

The platter is another story entirely.

About our first week in New Hampshire this year, the two of us had enjoyed a CDC-approved, socially distanced lunch at a picnic table outside the diner in Peterborough.

We were walking back to our car when something caught my wife’s eye.

On a side street, someone had piled boxes of belongings out onto the pavement. There were books, framed prints and who knows what else.

And the sign bore the magic word: “Free.”

“Please,” I said, “please, don’t.”

By then it was too late.

My wife was already on her way across the street.

She could hear my eyes roll, but she was on a quest.

There was nothing a husband could do but find a spot in the shade and wait.

“You’d be proud of me,” she said. “I only picked up one thing.”

It was a platter.

“It’s perfect,” she said.

Who was I to argue?

To me it was nothing special. It wasn’t valuable. It wasn’t particularly pretty. But it was utilitarian and would be great for serving burgers to the grandchildren later.

It was also something my wife liked enough that we had to bring it back to Indiana.

So for the two-day trip home, the box with the African pot sat in the child booster seat we’d taken along for a grandson to use. The platter was securely tucked in a spot in the trunk.

Mission accomplished.