I decided to watch the “The Lovely Bones” and there’s this thing that captured my interest. Although the movie is centered on a girl being murdered with the rest of the story lying on the many depths of different relationships within a family, the scene where Mark Wahlberg as the father teaches his daughter how to make ships in bottles really earned my attention. The scene may have only run for a few seconds but the emotion and truth underlying it was so poignant. It was then that making ships in a bottle came across my mind as something that’s worth learning for a lifetime.

I found out that making those intricate things isn’t really easy and others who have become the masters of its art and craftsmanship actually spend years and years to learn it. Some of them became disheartened at first because their ships would always capsize and their finish works would always look like crap, well of course, in accordance to their descriptions. But the reward of their patience, hard work, and excellence after the many years of polishing has turned their work into more than what we call masterpieces. Every bottle with a beautiful ship in it is their creation out of passion, imagination, and dedication, which I think is worth more than awes and praises. It’s love that’s in every bottle I believe.

Now I begin to think that making such art is another great way to spend our free time, whenever we’re bored or simply have nothing to do. Finding materials in making the ships is so easy with the use of either a cardboard material or wood, some clays in different colors, paint, wooden sticks, glue, and old clothes, while old bottles of wine for the main housing. We can actually do some recycling out of scraps we’ve got in our house or ask for these materials from our friends or neighbours.

This craftsmanship is exactly what I’d want to see my family doing besides the common knitting and embroidery, or collecting stuffs which are only common for the ladies. This kind is definitely enjoyable by anyone, by adults or kids, by men or women. As long as you have passion for creativity and vision for art, making a miniature of the Black Pearl would be surely fun and interesting. More to that, we can always make souvenirs and gifts out of our craft and much more because they’re made out of our passion. So, for the lovers of the sea or for the lovers of art, this time is always the perfect time to make ships in bottles.