Bread

I have just been e-mailed a document about Eve that I'm thrilled to have in my possession and I'll share it with you just as soon as I digest it.  I actually have a number of articles which I plan to share.  They are wonderfully insightful and enlightening.   But, first, a story.

Dru went to 5 1/2 years of grad school during which we lived in a row townhouse in the university's Family Housing.  Right off the bat, I fell into a friendship with a lady and her husband who were master bakers of everything really, but mostly, bread.  They made bread of all kinds and watched shows on bread and read books on bread and on our early morning walks together she would share with me what new things they were trying to be able to make the perfect loaf of bread.  For Christmas one year, they delivered - I don't know how many - some-odd number of 3 loaves bundled to represent the gifts of the 3 wise men in the Christmas story.  Each loaf was a different kind of rustic bread.  That's a tremendous amount of lovin' goodness.  For our monthly game nights, they would bring homemade baguettes and challah.  After they moved on, they made a beautiful loaf for an auction to benefit the youth of their congregation.  It went for a pretty penny for being bread.

My mother baked bread about 3 times a week during the school year while I was growing up and I would watch her knead the bread and taste it as it was rising and smell it as it was baking and slather on the butter and gobble it right up when it was fresh from the oven, so bread making was not a foreign craft to me.  I just chose not to learn and do it.  (Actually, I was waiting until I had a KitchenAid or Bosch and 12 years of marriage later, I still don't have one.)

Loving this good friend's bread, I asked to be the recipient of their hard work and was thenceforth treated to a fresh loaf of bread weekly.  It was always warm.  It was never regular white.  Each loaf was a dessert of wholesome goodness that I deliciously consumed, with butter.

Didn't take long for word of their breadmaking know-how to get out among our community, and they were asked to do a class on how to make bread.  I was encouraged to come and learn myself but, silly, I still didn't have myself a Bosch, just a hand-mixer, so, you know - my time hadn't come.  Yet.

Come the time when my husband is out of employment and we're trying not to spend what we don't have and what I do have is a whole bunch of wheat down in my basement, in large 5 gallon buckets, so I start to make bread.  With no wheat grinder, I'd take my wheat to a friend's home and spend time visiting over the loud din of the grinder.  Then, I'd take that wheat flour home and with just a hand-mixer, I'd mix me up some bread dough and then I'd put my shoulder to the wheel, and I'd knead and knead and knead the dough, then bake it up for my family.  Always a cheerleader, my friend posted for me her magical ever-lovin' bread recipe and I've been a bread-makin' fool ever since.  (And did I mention, I still don't have a Bosch.)

And my family loves it.

But, and here's, why I share this with you.  There is information all over out there.  A lot to be had.  It's not foreign to us; it's not kept secret to us but we have to want it bad enough to either jump in and find it or ask someone to help us find it.  It's like havin' tons of bread at the store ready made and friends and parents that make it for us and no need to learn for ourselves so we don't ever bother to find out.  And then, something happens that gets us to needin' to know how it is made and we make it a point to find out and even go as far as makin' ourselves a loaf.

When I first started learning more about Eve and finding these documents I started wondering who already knew but hadn't told me.  Why hadn't anyone shared this information with me?  Why had I been in the dark for so long?   I was saddened to know I'd been floundering for so long.  But, truth is, the information had always been available, but until I started asking my own questions and having a desire, even an urgent desire, to know, I'm not sure I really cared that it was out there.  It's not, after all, daily conversational material.  Now, I'm ready and excited and wanting to share it just as my friends and mother did to share their bread with me.  Enjoy the feast.

Wild Flowers

I've been here now, almost 3 months.  I realize that is a short amount of time to be somewhere and to expect great things but I still do.  I walk into my children's school and I'm still not warmly received.  In fact I'd say some of the ladies in the office have it in for me.  Just once, a smile would be nice.  It's never a question of who'll I'll run into at the store, or the park, or, at my mailbox because I won't be running into a familiar face.  And our congregation is very kind and outgoing but it still leaves room for many awkward moments. 
I just returned from an evening for women at church.  A nice evening with mini-classes on how-to fix drain plugs and put out fires and what to do in a city chemical emergency.  A nice evening where I felt very out of place, very much the wild flower up against the wall.  It's where I sit and try not to look out of place -  not wanting to interrupt conversations, afraid to break into standing friendships.   The women must sense my anxiety and they sit down next to me and speak to me and ask me how I'm doing but I couldn't shake the sickening feeling in my gut and the instinct to run: eat the refreshment faster and slip out.

There are days when I wish there was someone I could fall into a conversation with, without first discussing the weather or how I'm liking this town.  Someone who I know a little more than a first name basis, and who knows, me.

Not choosing to be alone, but finding myself uncomfortably alone in a crowd, makes me very aware of just how many dear friends I left behind.  Makes me miss them a little more; ache for the closest ones.  It's one of those "without the pain, wouldn't know the joy" moments in life.  (sigh)