Monday, July 17, 2023

Existential Bread

 

More and more bakers experience it than they used to. More and more bakers loaf around the kitchen, searching for meaning in every jar. Originally, the only conflict was between the baker and the bread. Now it’s the baker and all breads. Sweet breads they may have written off, cheap breads they avoid for nutritional reasons. Bread is an art form that when done right, hardly spends any time under glass.  

 

These lost bakers can barely slice it without sobbing. They don’t wash their hands, letting the flour cake into their fingernails.

 

Some have totally changed their outlook on who consumes their output. Why should you care that some rich fool paid for your brioche, when it’ll get moldy eventually? Someone always consumes it; it’s just not always who you want it to be. What’s difference? Whether it’s an epicurean or bacterium, the bread is out of your hands. 

 

Bread is a basic form of sustenance. Some wayward souls make gluten-free bread when gluten was always the point. There’s no recipe for success. No secret ingredient that no one’s every found. 

 

It’s a strange thing, this crisis among bakers. Some have found celebrity status due to the popularity of reality shows. They would knead more and more, rolling endlessly, always finding another bubble to press on the Sisyphean Road to perfection. Turns out, it wasn’t about kneading, it was about needing. Because every baker, no matter how brilliant, never seems to have enough dough. Even when feeling stale, we could all use a little grace, if not a full on challelujah

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