snow and home

North Carolina (at least my part of it) is covered in snow--6-8 inches, I'd say, which is just enough to keep the neighborhood chicos busy running around and pelting each other with frozen missiles. Outside my window are interlaced lines of happy footprints.

Although my roommate is scoffing at the two-day shut down of businesses (she lived last in Rhode Island), there is good reason: the roads are pretty bad, even the main ones. But it's the little connecting roads and parking lots that are especially tricky. I just had to cross my fingers and hope my car could get up enough traction to bump over the mounds of snow surrounding my poor car this morning. It did and I only arrived at church 15 minutes late to join the faithful few who managed to drive in, too (faithful? or optimistic? or daft? Probably the latter).

But now I'm back at home, waiting for my bread to finish its second rise and gearing up to throw my granola ingredients together so that I can bake both simultaneously. My pot is soaking after the macaroni and cheese, and my week's dinner is tucked away in the fridge. I've just finished a hot cup of cocoa from a mix I make regularly, along with two chocolate chip cookies I baked last week. It feels good to know what goes into the food I eat, and it feels good to save money by making things from scratch. But the biggest reason I make these things for myself is to stay connected, really; to keep mindful of the process, perhaps, and not just the product. I suppose it's like the difference between killing a chicken and buying frozen chicken breasts. You'll eat meat either way but one comes with an awareness of the life and death of the chicken and the other does not. You couldn't tell what sort of creature the chicken was just by looking in the Tyson's bag. It's disconnected from the real chicken.

These are the things I think about while puttering around the kitchen.