On the Table

Still life with honeypot, glass salt shaker and fan. Fountain pen on paper, 9" x 6".

I've always liked the way certain objects recur in some artists' still lives, whether it's for their interesting shapes or their symbolism/role, or both. It seems like this little honeypot may be one of those objects for me. The top and saucer are silver, and the pot iself is glass. It was my mother's, and has a little chip on the rim from a spoon, but I don't remember her ever using it. In our old house there was a pantry off the kitchen, with broad shelves. We never kept food in there though - it became more of a closet for overflow dishes and seldom-used equipment; my father added a coat rack for our winter coats, and built a hanging rack for the vacuum cleaner hose and nozzles; the pantry was the home of the carpet sweeper...that sort of thing.

The honeypot lived on one of those broad shelves, behind a teapot and a set of cups: I can remember it quite clearly, but it never came out to the table, probably because we seldom used honey, except for the squeezable bear that was kept with the baking supplies. Eventually, when my parents moved to their house on the lake, the honeypot came along and was kept in a more prominent place near the everyday sugar bowl and cream itcher, but it was never filled, and never used.

So, a few weeks ago when I was at the lake house, I took it out and brought it back with me; I polished the silver and cleaned the glass, and set it on our table -- that's when I made this drawing.

Last week I bought some new honey with delicious flavor -- a piece of comb suspended within it like an insect in amber -- and filled the pot. I study it as I sit at the table: the little silver bee perched on it the top of its old-fashioned, domed hive, reminding me sometimes of pair of bronzed baby shoes and other times of ancient Greek gold ewelry in the shape of bees. I sit there wondering why it intrigues me so much, wondering where it came from, aware I'll probably never know.