Focaccia dough is rising on the kitchen counter as Mosi and Sam nap. Soon, this bubbling sourdough will be the most beautiful bread: soft as a cloud, covered in olive oil, studded with rosemary and baked until the edges turn gold.
Photo: Mosi makes bread in our shotgun kitchen
This is our Day of Rest Bread. This is our After Church Quiet Bread. Or maybe our Never Too Late to Nap Bread. After Mosi mixes flour with salt and his sourdough starter, all we have to do is wait until dinner time and it’s ready to bake for 40 minutes. Then it’s up to us to luxuriously eat it on the couch while wearing our pajamas, listening to the quiet that is Sleeping Sam Bear.
Photo: Focaccia, post-bake
We desperately need this rest after a full week bursting with all the ups and downs of life, life that started with a walk from Bondi to Tamarama beach for the Sculpture by the Sea art exhibit. A mix of playful art, people in Nikes (do other shoes exist here?), wind, salt, sun, and frigid water in which everyone, including me, pretended we weren't slowly becoming ice cubes.
Photo: Windy walk from Bondi to Bronte Beach
From there, it was all a blur:
Walking miles upon miles while Sam attempted to wrestle his way out of the pram, the carrier, or my arms;
Looking through microscopes (Mosi);
Buying a crib (me);
Carrying said crib two miles home (Mosi);
Rocking Sam for a combined one million hours (Mosi and me);
Exposing my breasts in various public places for the sake of Sam's survival (me);
Riding a train to the Blue Mountains (all of us);
Wishing I had the tent from the Quidditch World Cup in my backpack (also me).
Photo: Forcing Sam to take a photo at Echo Point, Blue Mountains
It was a good week, for sure. A slow one, not at all.
So, while the dough rises I reflect on the week, singing over victories (Sam is four months today! We made it to the Blue Mountains!), lament my own humanity (grumbling when things are hard), lament others' humanity (old ladies who laughed at me while Sam screamed his head off at Echo Point), and to give thanks.
Photo: What baby doesn't need fully functional overalls?
Thanks for my healthy, breathing, willful and concerned boy; thanks for friends to meet for coffee at every long walk’s end; thanks for my working husband who would rather be baking than in a laboratory, but does it wholeheartedly anyway, this man who never complains when he has to carry Sam (or his crib) two miles home; and thanks for our little family, growing stronger together in life, community, and faith.
Photo: Four months: Giggles on demand
(Wo)man does not live by bread alone, but it sure is lovely to bite into a warm slice of focaccia on a Sunday evening, and I am looking forward to it.
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