Today, closer to midnight, I suddenly wanted to turn on the oven. Not because I was hungry or wanted something sweet, but simply because I felt like the air was missing the aroma of vanilla. I opened the drawer, found a pack of flour, vanilla sugar and literally at random kneaded the dough.

While it was rising, I turned the music very quietly, but after a couple of minutes I turned it off - there was such an amazing silence in the room that I did not want to disturb it. I heard the rustling of paper under the pan, the quiet tapping of a spoon on the edge of a bowl. Everything seemed to slow down. The heat from the oven softly spread throughout the kitchen, as if filling it with some almost invisible light.

When the dough turned into a golden crust and the air was filled with a sweet aroma, I sat down on a kitchen chair and simply watched. It felt like the whole house was breathing with me at that moment. A simple process - mixing a few ingredients - suddenly became like meditation.

I carefully cut the first piece and slowly tried it. The taste was so delicate that for a second it seemed like it wasn't a pie, but a memory materialized right on the plate. I thought that maybe baking at night is not food, but a way to regain a warm inner balance. Even if it's dark and cold outside, you can create your own little microcosm in the kitchen, where everything is clear and calm.

The pie was left to cool, and I sat at the table for a long time, feeling the soft warmth of the oven, as if someone had carefully covered me with a blanket. Such moments cannot be planned, they must be allowed. And this is the greatest value - spontaneity, from which a real feeling is born that you are truly living.