Pssst Over Here

Another episode of Visions from my Kitchen Sink.

Yours truly.

Sometimes I fail to relish in the wildness of life and wreck myself over what’s happening, how I can get my hands around it, pin it down. In my imagination I wrangle, tie and raise one hand in a Zoro-inspired-victory salute.   ah HAA!

Other times I relax with the wildness.

In both instances baking is one of my therapies.  I’ve written before about my mechanisms for pretending I’ve some semblance of control in my life.  While my opinion on the existence of control is roving, my mechanisms remain trusty.  Last night I tested my chops on a new recipe for country cracked wheat bread.  The bread up yonder is the result of 2 hours of measuring, temping, whisking, stirring, kneading, punching, braiding and waiting.  Some of the best 2 hours I’ve had all week.

Baking bread sinks me into a place of comfort.  Porch swing, grandmother humming, easy comfort.  I bent some thoughts around where that comfort comes from while waiting for the dough to rise.  Here we go: it’s old. Baking bread is one our oldest tasks as humans.  Shoot, I think I read that wheat was one of the grains present in the dawn of agriculture.  Right so—long damn time.

When I’m up to my elbows in dough, flour on my face, I feel like I’m tapping into an age old craft.  Honed by countless bakers since before computers, Captan America, the Information Age, the automobile! Shuffleboard!  Old. Really old.  There’s a sense of community in all those centuries of bread baking, like I’m in very good, very wise company.

With all the wild instability, beauty, cruelty and evolution of humanity, all of us in this place together and everything vast around us pulling at our edges—this is all so big and small and filthy and magnificent.  Taking up a wooden spoon and a handful of flour is one of the simplest practices.  Baking bread does not add a depth of control to my life but it sure does tame the topsy-turvy swinging.

Also, I have a boat load of bread so swing by with your favorite jam!

Yours truly,

Flour Face.

The above snap was taken in the heart of SoHo, NYC.  On first glance I chuckled and thought what charming graffiti.  I’ve taken a longer look since that first looksee and I’m realizing a deep rumbing desire to get ride of all my STUFF.  The rumbling is coming up from the depths of me, down past my kneecaps and it means I’m bothered by the message in the charming stencil work on that bustling SoHo block.  I still like the style of the graffiti and I still reluctantly think it’s cute – but I’m backing away slowly from agreeing with the actual content.

On a similar note I spent yesterday with my very dear friend, Charity, plowing through the old junk at Seattle’s prized Restore.  If you haven’t been and you happen to also adore decor of the barn-yard-vintage style, you should go.  Leave your wallet at home as a line of defense.  You will want old windows to hang on your wall like art-portals into older worlds.  Old bank deposit boxes for lord knows what nicknacks you have laying around in dire need of organization.  I wanted all that too, and more. Lots… shoot.  Boatloads more.  Truth is, though, I want less.  How do I get so damn distracted in the face of every vintage furniture or clothing store?  I wake up every morning and think about having less and doing more—a bit of mantra that traveled home with me from my hiatus in Mexico last year.  Then, post shower, run and breakfast I venture out into the world and fall gaga over all manner of total junk. I gotta remember the mantra beyond laying in bed in the morning!

Charity also has a noteworthy desktop image on her laptop.  Something to the pointed effect of own less, do more, be more.  I’m sure I messed that up but you get the gist. Makes me want to somehow burn into my brain: for every new purchase I save towards more travel. I focus more energy on who I am, not what I’m wearing. Where I am, what’s happening around me and interacting with my atmosphere.  I’d like to remember to play outside more too but now I’m just getting manifesto-esk on you.

In closing I suppose I’d like you to think less about buying stuff and more about you and me and the world.  I’ll try too.  Next time we need to buy something let’s both think about where we can get that same thing second hand, with second hand charm and character, for less mulah.  You in?

Yours Truly.

Ahoy friends,

I bring you another image-tribute to a perfect day on the Great West Coast.  Call this the sequel to my last blaaahing dedicated to Outside.  A few weekends ago my life-long amiga and I stumbled, cold and wind-blown, into the Blue Scorcher Cafe & Bakery to be greeted with the bone warming smell of fresh baked bread and coffee.  Like home.  Like Grandma’s home. The food was slamming, atmosphere exactly what I crave after a morning of blustery exploring and the company… my best friend of 25 years, steeped in the comfort of all our years together.  What an afternoon.  What a friend.

Go outside.
Yours Truly.