Baking cookies...

I baked chocolate chip cookies for my little ones tonight and I got that feeling again--the feeling I always get when I bake cookies for them, when the house smells of decadent, buttery sweetness, when their anticipation swells with every baking sheet from the oven, when they praise me for the having "the best cookies in the world", when they beg to have the first one from the oven, the biggest, the one with the most chocolate chips. The feeling is hard to describe--satisfaction, I suppose.

I feel a sense of completion, like I have created an offering of love much like mythic offerings to indifferent gods but this, an offering to my children. A gesture of grander scale than opening a package of store bought cookies. A token of my interest in their happiness and health, of my willingness to invest care and time in what they dunk in their organic milk, of my commitment to their understanding homemade in this age of fast-food, dinners out and microwave food.

I love the look of a plate full of cookies on the counter top, fresh from the oven, patiently waiting for the following day when they will be savored by the family they were made for--the children. When every bite brings them pleasure and me praise. To me, the plate full of cookies signifies someone's home--mom's home, and if mom's home, then they're home--I still have them for now.

I love knowing that I prepared this snack for them--not some distant corporation with no interest in their health, their happiness, their likes and dislikes or their preferences for milk to drink or milk for dunking. I hand select every ingredient with care and caution and ardently oppose artificiality or preservatives. They sneak in hydrogenated oils and high-fructose corn syrup. I sneak in wheat germ and whole wheat flour.

Baking cookies restores me on some level--I will not always have this fanfare when I open the oven and pull forth the "best cookies in the world". Their hands will not always reach for the first, the biggest or the one with the most chocolate chips. One day I will bake cookies for myself alone or for get-togethers--the sacred ritual of cookie baking as an act of love for my babies will be no more than a common potluck requirement. But for now, for me, baking cookies centers my active, busy mind--reminds me of who I bake for and what they mean to me and for the moment, I am present and aware, I am methodical and meticulous--I am a creator, I own the moment...and I bring the cookie.