watching the yeast explode in the bowl like I’ve been doing since I was eight years old; crescent rolls and pizza dough mostly
the recipe is in this old orange cookbook
Betty Crocker – 1969
you can find the recipe on the internet now, but I found my own copy of that old orange cookbook in a thrift shop in Valdosta, Georgia when I was twenty-five
my mother was convinced that I took hers
didn’t believe me until I showed her them at the same time
I don’t know why she cared, she rarely ever used hers
she doesn’t even like to cook or bake
that’s why we all learned so young
and I guess I’m grateful for it now, in a way, but I still can’t stand banana bread because I made it so much
there was no love in it just
it’s too dry
you didn’t do it right
do better next time
once this is perfect you won’t have to make it any more
(that was a lie)
*sprinkle in some resentment*
but when it came to dough it was different
people say the yeast blooms
but I saw a volcano
a cannon
a grenade
a calm before the storm then a rupture in the skin
add sugar, salt, and a sigh of relief
because this is something I was good at making
I knew how to take a near-death, bring it back to life
watch it rise, put it through fire
and turn it into something soft and warm and good
now I’m thirty-four
watching the yeast explode in the bowl like I’ve been doing since I was eight years old
add sugar, salt, and a sigh of relief
later my ten-year-old son will sit at the table eating the rolls I made for no reason other than it is today
and he loves them
and love is something I am good at making

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