BREAD

I find that it is very hard to relax, I don't know if this is just the way I am or if it is the world we live in. There are so many distractions around us in our everyday lives and so many things to worry about. So little of life is simple and straight forward, and I think this gets worse as one gets older. What with bills and mortgages to worry about. More importantly what sort of future world is our little girl going to grow up in.

With all this going through my head it is very hard to sit down and just feel mellow, there is always something playing on my mind. So how can one relax, well I love reading and when I do manage to read I can get really immersed in a book and forget about the outside world for a few minutes. The only problem with this, is that I find it very hard to sit down and read at home as I am always getting distracted and quite often I seem to dose of when I do read. I don't think it helps by what I choose to read as I try to expand my mind with my choice of books now, unlike a few years ago when I was a regular visitor to Ankmorpork. Mind you Terry Pratchet did, at times, come out with some very profound thoughts on life in general.

Well what has all this to do with bread, it is simple really, baking bread is relaxing. It is not just the wonderful smell of the yeast starting to work or that wonderful aroma of freshly baked bread. It is just the whole process demands patience. To make really good bread you need one of life's most treasured ingredients, time. Unless you are willing to put this into the process the bread will be no good. Plenty of time is needed not only for the dough to rise but in the needing process. I think it is this part of the whole process that I enjoy the most and when I find it easiest to relax.