Every year on December 20th, I begin preparing the dough. The recipe hasn't changed in three generations. I don't follow written instructions anymore—my hands remember what my grandmother's hands taught me. This is knowledge that lives in the body, not in books. 💫

The house fills with a particular smell when the bread is rising. It's the smell of continuity. My mother recognizes it instantly when she walks in. She closes her eyes and for a moment she is not herself, but her mother, but her mother's mother. We are all present in that kitchen, even the ones who died decades ago. 🌾

My grandmother used to say that bread is honest. You cannot rush it. You cannot lie about how much salt you used or whether your hands were impatient. The bread will tell everyone the truth. If you made it with love and attention, people taste it. If you made it thinking about something else, they taste that too. 🤍

This Christmas, I'm teaching my younger cousin to make the bread. She's distracted, checking her phone, not really present. I want to scold her, but then I remember being seventeen and thinking that old traditions were boring, that there were more important things to care about. Now I understand: the traditions are the important things. They're how we stay connected to something larger than ourselves. They're how we prove that we matter, that our family's story matters, that love is not just a feeling but an action repeated across seasons and years. 💝

Is there anything more holy than passing something forward? 🕊️