THE SLOW DOWN PUNCH

On occasion, when my mother was in the mood, we would bake bread. Ingredients would be poured into an old metallic bread bucket, and my siblings and I would take turns with churning the heavy mixture. When the dough eventually formed, it was placed in a large bowl and we covered it with a cloth.  My mother would remind me " We need a window with sun Lucy” and I would find just the right lit spot, and place the bowl there. Clocks were checked and we would wait.

Once the dough had risen, we took it back into the kitchen and she told us to give the dough a punch.

I would laugh, I didn’t understand why we had to punch the dough, but it was a really fun idea! Round one. Time to wait and let the dough rise again, and then we will put it in the oven. This was childhood slow-motion magic.

Sometimes the sounds

come back to me.

The thump,

as my punch sunk into

the sticky dough.

The giggles

The shouts

Us… the voices of our youth

“I want to mix it”

“Can I punch it again?”

I hear the serrated knife

cutting through the crust

Even the silence

of the butter

melting had

a sound like

slow moving clouds.

The patience, the watching, the churning, the punching, and the second rising were all such an enormous part of what made that bread taste so special.

I think humans are special in that way too. Our presence is filled with how we have been churned and spun, and what we each decide to feel and do about it. Sometimes I have felt punched down too, and I learn over and over again how one of the magic purposes of a “punch” is to first slow me down, and once I have truly rested, to wake me up. It is only then that I clearly see me and my course. You see, these are the times when it becomes necessary to look at how we are caring for ourselves.

Time & Presence. A gift to a future rising.

Have you ever had that happen to you?

Has life ever slowed you down, so you could sense what you really need and want, and how precious your life is?