Sourdough

by Robin Sloan

(Goats only ever give side-eye.)

rhythm of baking, the quick bursts of attention alternating with mandatory pauses,

it is a lazy thing not to know whose world you live in.

food is history of the deepest kind. Everything we eat tells a tale of ingenuity and creation, domination and injustice—and does so more vividly than any other artifact, any other medium.

“And even if I fail—this is always the archivist’s consolation—perhaps I will have laid a foundation for someone wiser.”

I felt the disorientation of a generous offer that in no way lines up with anything you want to do: like a promotion to senior alligator wrestler, or an all-expenses-paid trip to Gary, Indiana.