Ten questions with a night-shift potter

This month's interview is with a reader I'll call M., who works nights as a hospital porter and throws pots in a shared studio on her days off. She asked me to keep her name out of it. Her answers are trimmed, not rewritten.

On working against the clock

When do you actually make things? Mostly on my first day off, late morning, when everyone else at the studio has gone for lunch. My body still thinks it is the middle of the night, so I have a strange calm.

What did nights teach you about clay? Patience with drying. You can't rush a pot any more than you can rush a shift. Both end when they end.

I stopped trying to make good pots. I started trying to make a lot of honest ones.

What do you do with the pots? Give most of them away. Colleagues drink tea out of them at four in the morning. That is the best gallery I could ask for.

On keeping going

What do you do on weeks when nothing works? I make the same small cup ten times. It doesn't need inspiration, only hands. By the eighth cup I usually want to try something again.

What would you tell someone starting a craft with a hard job? A few things I wish I'd heard:

• Pick a craft you can stop in the middle of. Clay forgives that if you wrap it well.

• Find one place outside your home where the tools live, so starting doesn't mean setting up.

• Count sessions, not results. My notebook just says the date and how many pieces.

M.'s idea of counting sessions is close to what I wrote about in small projects, honest deadlines, and I've stolen it for my own notebook since.

How long does a pot take, start to finish? About three weeks, most of it waiting. I throw on one day off, trim on the next one, then it dries on a shelf until the studio fires the kiln. I've learned to love that the clay sets the pace, not me.

Do you ever sell them? Twice a year at a small market near the studio. I price them so they sell, because a shelf of unsold pots at home makes me stop making new ones. The money pays for clay and kiln fees, nothing more, and that is enough.

What's on your wheel right now? Tea bowls. Small, slightly wonky, with a thumb-sized dent where you hold them. My colleagues say they fit a tired hand at four in the morning. That is the best review I've ever had.

Last question: what does making give you that work doesn't? Something that stays. A shift disappears the moment it ends. A cup is still on someone's table a year later.

This week's question: who makes something remarkable around a hard job? Hit reply and tell me about them. With their permission, they might be next month's interview.

— Ines