I noticed that the happier I get, the more I talk about baking and recipes and cooking. And if you look closely at me, you''ll see that I don't really eat all that much (well, for the most part, I don't)- but that doesn't stop me from thinking of food and sustenance when I'm thinking of good times.
My Mom doesn't cook anymore. She doesn't do much of anything anymore except to smile and love you with those blue eyes of hers looking at you with quiet joy. But Mom used to fill our house, growing up, with food- lots of food, hot food, weird recipes, cream of wheat hot breakfasts, hot apple crisp for dessert. Mom cooked and cooked her way through all our ups and downs of family life. And she made me think that nothing could be better than to be loved well and be well fed.
I try to do that. I try to love my kids and my husband and feed them as though I had no other way to show love than to cook and bake for them. When I'm especially burden-free, I cook up a storm. The kitchen becomes a mess. I'm covered in flour. But I'm happy and there's something good to eat at the end of it all.
And at the end of a day, I want my loved ones to feel full: full of happiness, full of peace. I can't bear the thought of children starving anywhere. And I can't bear the thought of a child starved for attention either. There's something haunting about someone who aches for love and cries out to be noticed.
That's why I love that old hymn about "Bread of Heaven, feed me till I want no more... Fill my cup, fill it up and make me whole". I realize that God is not only in the business of feeding His children, but He loves to feed us; He delights to feed us. We can open our mouths to heaven like little birds chirping in a nest and know that something good is coming every time we cry out to Him for whatever it is that we are, deep down, hungering for.
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