a meditation on bread

The literal meaning of the word “companion” is “together with bread,” signaling the innate association we humans have with bread and the desire for connection—breaking bread. It’s no wonder that bread-making became a cultural fixation at the height of the pandemic. At a deep level of collective awareness, our instinct was to turn towards the sustenance most strongly tied with community.

I’m not sure that there’s a better activity for putting ourselves in communion with one another and the world around us than the breaking of bread. The ingredients themselves are simple enough to be widely accessible, and each ingredient puts us in mindful touch with building blocks of creation: flour, salt, yeast and water. The oldest documented instance of a loaf of bread dates back 30,000 years, and the yeast required of leavened bread is itself a fungal micro-organism—the species of which scientists say has been around for over 300 million years. To eat bread is to put oneself at a table not only with our living and breathing loved ones, but also with those ancestors who have passed away and shared in the waters and living organisms that have been here long before us. Bread is our means to companionship with all that is, was and will continue to be. May the breads we make be warm, and may they be lovingly kneaded with our own two hands.