Sometimes when you first take bread out of the oven it will crackle at you. It is ridiculously lovely, and gives the bread so much personality that you almost don’t want to eat it. It really does feel like it’s trying to tell you something–perhaps a creation tale of life at 450 degrees in a cast iron pot.
I like to believe everything is trying to tell you something, if you’re paying attention. The blue jay who took a peanut from the table where I was playing solitaire, and who cocked his head at me in a very cheeky manner had a message, but was too cool to care if I understood. The cards I play solitaire with every morning while I drink tea and blue jays visit; they tell me how the day will go, though they are often wrong, or right in a way that I don’t understand. But with the cards, I believe it’s more my own self telling me things as I let my mind wander with the toc-toc-toc of the cards. (And lately it is resoundingly telling talking to me about the movie Diary of a Country Priest. And a little bit Le Samourai. And Malcolm, a lot, visiting the dadaists in the National Gallery of Art, with him. My mind goes to these places every single time I play solitaire while drinking tea and forbidding anyone to talk to me. Which is every single morning. I don’t will it to go there, but there it goes.)
I make a lot of bread: boules, and baguettes, and bagels every week. I think that at some point the dough I washed off of bowls and spoons took a toll on our beleaguered kitchen drain, and it stopped working. We tried to fix it for a couple days, but we could not. So we called a plumber. I have such a real affection for the man who came to fix it. I like that after every fix he said “prayerfully” it would work now. And I love the fact that he listened to the water running through our drains. The water talked to him, and he could tell when it wasn’t quite fixed, and then when it actually was. He listened for the moment it stopped draining, and that told him where the problem was, he could hear exactly where the problem was. I love that. We also talked about how you can live without water, you can live without power, but if you have family you’re ok. We also talked about how the government should just take care of people. Sigh.
I love the soot sprites in Spirited Away and Totoro chatting to anyone who would listen.
I love this from Best in Show, when she’s waiting for a message from herself.
Every Good and lively-conversational bread deserves a good bread box, and here is the best in the world. Christmas present from David:
Out of the Ordinary 