I suffer from awful FONBATDI. Crippling really.
It’s a bit like FOMO. Or, no it isn’t. With FOMO all you are afeard of is missing out. There’s a remedy, which is to buy, do, acquire the thing for which you have the FOMO and there you are. Mended.
FONBATDI is much worse. It’s the Fear Of Not Being Able To Do It, whatever it is. I suppose some of the Olympic athletes get it.
Personally, if it were me at the Olympics, which it would not be, I wouldn’t even try in the first place. You wouldn’t get me to the top of the slope under any circumstances, so the appalling site of late middle aged me going down sideways in carpet slippers and curlers hanging on to a hot water bottle is not one you will be required to endure. There would be no shrieking, I’d just be trying to breathe.
As the show approaches and I just have to get on with it, the fear intensifies. This year I was not helped by the OH taking over the kitchen for a crucial fortnight, so I was late beginning.
So, did I set to with a will as soon as I was able?
No, I engaged in displacement activity. I went online and ordered stuff and then, when it arrived began playing with it. I cleaned stuff. I organised the garage. To be fair to myself I had to organise the garage, as the oven refit had involved moving kilns, moulds and all items associated in order to drill holes in the wall and I had to put them back, having sorted them out.
It wouldn’t be so bad if I just made a product. People do. Some doll makers purchase commercially available moulds, make them the same way for twenty years or more but dress them in different ways. As you know everything I make is my own from my own moulds from my own sculptures. I like doing new things. I could not do the same things for ever, I have a very low boredom threshold. I like inventing stuff. I like inventing different stuff. I like not knowing if it will work.
The real problem is that I do not make just one of anything. They are all individual, so you can buy one which is different from the others, whilst being the same item. I do this because I was a visitor to shows and a collector before I was an exhibitor. It is beyond annoying to turn up at a show, having made the effort to get there, for someone to shove in before you and buy the last one. This applies to artisan made objects, of course, not commercially produced items, whether factory made, or mass produced in whatever form.
You could argue that what I make is mass produced because I do make a few of each so that no one will miss out. However, every item and every part of every item is individually hand made. For every show there will always be completely new things.
Will it work? Can I make it? Can I pour it thin enough to be hollow so I can string it? Can I invent a metal part to fasten the wings to? Will I be able to dress this strange shape?
I am having to be careful as I get older that FONBATDI does not cause high blood pressure. I can hang around nerving myself to get on with it until the blood pressure goes stratospheric and I begin to get migraines.
Anyone sensible would begin immediately after the previous show and I would if I didn’t do so many other things. Writing this e.g.
If I were ready three months early that would be boring.
So it is, with only four and a bit weeks to Miniatura that I finally force myself to mask off the furniture, cover the floor, don the apron, headband and full face mask and actually sit down to see if I can rub down the outlandsish item I have invented and poured to see if it can be done. Already I have discovered that I moulded the baby’s head upside down, making it unstringable. I remedied this in the pouring, mostly, but other errors in other items may only show up when I try to rub the dry casting down. And yes, I have done babies before, but this one is articulated, and twenty fourth scale. I am always pushing the envelope. I don’t really care if no one else is interested, I want to see what I can do.
What of course, happens in the kiln, is in the lap of the gods, Vulcan, probably. Will they articulate? Will the bits that need to fit inside the other bits do so?
Or, have I just wasted months of my life training for something which is going to have to be binned?
It’s not even as if it is one something new. It’s about six doll-like items that have never been seen before, because they have previously been in my head. It’s not even as if they were just variants on one doll, or even as if they were nice big twelfth scale.
No there’s about six and they’re all titchy.
The only antidote to FONBATDI is knowing that there’s a hundred other Miniatura artisans and quite a lot of them are in exactly the same position. Do you work until late at night? Is it better to sleep and make fewer mistakes? Can you actually do it? Can you do it in time?
Have a look here www.miniatura.co.uk to see which poor souls are suffering from FONBATDI right now.
And then tune back here because you know I’ll show you, if it works. Or, better still, pop along to the show and find out for yourself.
Will I conquer my fear and BATDI?
Stay tuned.
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