贝弗利·法克森

Not long ago, on a gray day with a steady, percussive rain, I suddenly yearned to bake bread. I wanted that toasty bread baking smell, 我想要涂黄油的面包, yeasty warmth to be my reward at dusk.

我只知道一半, but I also wanted to feel the dough smooth out and take shape beneath my hands. It has been years since I’ve baked bread. 需要什么?, 当生活忙碌时, and bread baking requires hours at home, and our valley has so many good bakeries?

The need, it turns out, is in the kneading. 转动的节奏, 和摇摆, and pressing the dough returned to me without effort, 我非常高兴. My brain wasn’t required, only my hands. Indeed, my brain drifted away, and the bread dough and I, unhurried, made our way.

I was once told that, when I find myself distracted, I might just look at my hands. 这个简单的建议效果很好. I am brought back into the present by leaving my mind, 它的故事和障碍, out of it and instead watching what my hands are doing.

A friend who tutors preteen boys tells me the boys have a difficult time writing—their fine motor skills seem underdeveloped. The jury may still be out on the relationship between our devices and fine motor skills—surely all that texting requires much of our hands—but it seems possible that the way we mostly use our hands is, 至少, 既重复又有限, the difference between the pressing of keys and the stretching, 卷曲, 并要求捏线, 或针织, 或揉, 或胶, 或挖, 或堆栈.

“Touch me, remind me who I am,” wrote the poet Stanley Kunitz to his wife when he was 85. If being touched can bring us back to ourselves, the same is true of touching. I recently read that our palms’ relatively small surfaces contain about 15% of our tactile nerve fibers, capable of feeling something as spare as a spider web. From infancy, I was reminded, we find our way in the world by exploring with our hands.

My gray day of bread baking is yielding to the sun of spring—an easy time to leave the head behind and see the world with our hands. The fur-tipped ears of pussy willows beckon, as do the satin petals of tulips. 我们分开了, veined rhubarb leaves to grab the stalks and pull for pie, and we run our thumbs over the nubs of new asparagus. We brush against nettle and are brought to ourselves as surely as Kunitz was—we know who we are, fools who carelessly jostled against a stinging plant.

The earth calls, and nothing is more grounding than hands in the earth. Some studies have suggested that working in soil is good for our physical and mental health on a gut level—by increasing the amount and types of microbes in our intestines.

这对我来说很有意义, 但后来, I have always found myself soothed by the feel of dirt, 沙子, 粘土. I like to sift, I like to dig, I like to tunnel. Put me on a beach, or in a garden, and I am happy for hours. 在我祖父母的阶段, even a sandbox will do—I like to get right in there among ‘em for the soothing repetition of packing and burrowing.

If hands touching earth is grounding, then gardening is especially so: cold April soil warming up in the sun; the grit and grain of dirt sifted over seeds; the seeds themselves, from tiny self-sufficient orbs to bits of hope feathered, 刺状的或有核的. The grasp and satisfying tug on a weed. All leading to the summertime palming of a fresh tomato, 把玉米从茎上剥下来, 把豌豆从豆荚中分离出来, 大丽花的采集.

I first saw dahlias in abundance at Seattle’s Pike Place Market in the early 80s—big bunches wrapped in white paper in early fall. I loved then the red poms—an armful of cheer the color of Taylor Swift’s lipstick. But there are dahlias spiked and frilled; dahlias with gentle, modest curls; show-off dahlias called dinner plate, 因为这是它们的大小. 大丽花青铜色和大丽花紫色, 柔和的黄色和黄铜色的黄色, creamy whites and sunrise orange-pinks not seen elsewhere in my garden. I don’t know if this is common to all dahlias, but the colors of mine change not only over a single bloom’s lifespan, 但在整个赛季中. I’ve seen a July clump the red of a kid’s crayon give way to the September orange of a 60s back-to-school miniskirt.

When it comes to keeping my hands busy and my mind quiet, I’ve become a believer in the small cutting garden—rows that become unruly with spilled blooms as summer goes on; no need to honor landscaping; lots of blossoms to cut and share. I stick to what grows easily in my soil and share of sunlight—sweet peas, 宇宙, 燕草属植物, borage both for the bees and so I can pop those tiny blue flowers out of their fuzzy caps and sprinkle them on salad. 当然还有大丽花.

Last August, a crew installed solar panels on our roof. 他们在那里爬来爬去, looking down at the mosaic of our yard and gardens, 远处的玉米地. 第一天结束的时候, a crew member asked for a favor—could he take some flowers home for his sweetie? 我把他转向大丽花, and it made me happy to watch him carefully choosing, 然后是摇篮, 当他走向他的车时，鲜花. From the touch of hot shingles to the green grasp of dahlia stems at day’s end, 这似乎是一个令人愉快的进展.

The fruits and flowers of our work in the spring soil will eventually end up on the kitchen table, maybe right next to a cooling loaf of bread. All we can touch—the world alive in our hands.

提醒我我是谁