Muffin Girl

I'm a muffin girl. I started baking because it was something I could control. My life and body were doing their own thing. Without consulting me, my body had betrayed me. It went and got sick and completely changed my life.

I was sick and confused and out of control. But really I was too sick to do much about anything. I tried to control what I could. I organized.

Things needed to be in straight, orderly lines. I could put the game pieces into place, put them where they were supposed to be.

The baking started as a result of boredom. There's not much to do when you're sick and out of control.

It became something I found comfort in. The routine, the regularity. I knew where things were; I could create a product out of carefully measured individual ingredients.

I knew that if I followed the recipe, I would get a certain result. I learned the temperament of the oven and its tendency to overcook. Storing the information away, I would try again the next day.

From start to finish, I was in control. Everything was my decision. Whether to use whole wheat flour, which measuring cups to use, the order in which I combined the ingredients.

It was mine.

We ate a lot of muffins. I branched out, searched for new recipes. There was the failure of the nutmeg/molasses recipe that made three times the normal amount of a rather disgusting muffin. I felt guilty for making my parents eat so many muffins. Yet I kept baking.

The favorites: two variations of blueberry, apple, chocolate chocolate chip, raspberry orange, pumpkin.

There are the recipes that have notes and addendums. The ones I've perfected. The safe ones, the ones that envelope me in a hug as I sift the flour, beat the butter and sugar, gently combine the wet and dry ingredients, lick the batter off the spoon.

From clean kitchen to clean kitchen, it is my process. One I've perfected.

One that gave me hope that this sickness wouldn't last forever, because I had the energy to make so many muffins.

One that allowed me to take some control of something in my life, when it seemed everything had fallen apart.