New Year...

It is 2:33AM.

I am baking bread.

It is the new year.

The night is more still than what I'm used to. Probably because it is now 2:34AM.

There is an occasional car that drives down one of the main streets. For some reason...none of the mufflers here seem to work too well.

At midnight, there were fireworks. I was mixing dough.

It is in the stillness that I can hear the clock ticking. My heart is beating. There is a low hum coming from the fan that Laura turns on to produce white noise when we're asleep.

And still...an occasional car.

Have I ever talked to you about my idea of the relative nature of time? I've talked to Laura a lot about it. This minute now is the fastest minute I've ever experienced, but it's not the fastest minute I'll ever experience within the breadth of all of time.

More importantly... does the shortness of this minute matter any more or less than the span of the minutes preceding or following this point in time?

In terms of time...no.

In terms of substance? Maybe.

I look at our Christmas tree. It's been up for nearly a month. This is something I've thought about for a while now, but just haven't found the time to write it out (until I decided to finish making bread at 2:43AM). That is, this Christmas tree is carrying the weight of sadness from the past. There are relics and ghosts who call out only to find themselves locked behind glass or lamps or plastic or yarn. They show the burden of years and bear memories whose depths are more than may be measured.

2010. Bread.