Story Pastry's Bakery

[Pastry]

#2: "Imagination"​

"Mark my words, you'll walk the plank!"

He shouted whilst driving a plastic sword into his younger brother. The younger one jumped back, onto another piece of the carpet floor that represented "the plank." She sat idling by, sipping her cup of cold coffee. She liked it cold, with no ice cubes or refreshing creamer or milk. The brother pinched his sword on the graphic tee shirt of his sibling. His pirate's hat slipped from his head and was a little too big. He pushed it up with his chubby 6-year-old finger.

"You've caused enough harm to our crew, you swashbuckling fiend!"

The words that came from his mouth launched spit across the room. At least he was learning some new words at school. The brother took tedious steps backward, acting terrified. The spouse entered the room, his boots and bright orange-and-yellow vest in hand.

"I'm leaving for work." His cold words echoed and hit the side of her face like it was an empty reminder.

"Have fun." She replied.

She stared at the wall, the ground, or the boys after he left. Making sandwiches, and preparing dinner for the family to enjoy. She hadn't smiled unless one of her children ran up to her and showed her something they found in the backyard. Hours passed by rapidly. She wanted it to feel like years. But the boys didn't let up in their "pirate game," and somehow the older brother was walking the plank as he returned.

She didn't look outside and noticed that it was hours after he was supposed to be back. She didn't look at the food she prepared while she ate with her two boys twenty minutes before.



But, she did notice how she now "walked the plank" with the man she once loved dearly.

 

[Pastry]

#3 "A Long Time Ago"​

"Haven't felt like this before, since can't remember when..."



She had a prowess to her steps. A glow in her eyes. A cigarette in her mouth. A small red dress. A boa draping her sculptured neck. He felt like he could hear her thoughts as she danced to the music. Or, maybe he could hear his own thoughts as he sipped his gin. She was stunning. With the loud music and the number of people, he saw her in glimpses. But every time he saw he she glowed. It was similar to a ray of sunshine behind her, highlighting her from the crowd. His heart pounded, he wanted to talk to her. But as he stood up, his buddy clapped him on the shoulder and asked what song he wanted to play next.

"Play My Girl."

His friend bent down in his crisp uniform and slid in the coins for the next song. He smiled whilst he did it. Soon after, it started playing. The crowd cheered and soon gathered into pairs.

The crowd flowed with fervor, with joy. Nothing in the world mattered other than themselves and their partner. But, the woman didn't have a partner. To protect herself from loneliness, she gracefully walked over to the bar, where he was sitting.

"Kind of a drag, this song." She said, her voice smooth, and out of breath from the previous song played.

"How so?" He responded.

"It doesn't account for the singles looking for a good time." She drew her finger along the table, her back against the bar.

He choked up a response.

"Well, you don't have to be single tonight." He turned from the bar and opened his hand for her to take.

She took it, and they walked to the dance floor.

Their rhythm was in synchronicity. Her hand was on his shoulder, the other slowly taking drags from a cigarette. She smelled like the summer, earthy, and flowery, with a touch of cigarette smoke. Her hands were soft, her face unblemished. Her body was pristine. His hands were around her waist. They slowly danced, the light hitting each other's faces. Highlighting their perfections. His uniform and her dress created the perfect balance. They chatted, they laughed, and in the end, they kissed. They broke their form after the song. But they kept dancing.



As he took her hand gently to not disturb her arthritis now, they danced to the same song. She still smelled like the summer, earth, and flowers. Not cigarettes anymore.

 

[Pastry]

#12: Breathing​

take a breath, slow down.

Thinking about the last time I didn't have anxiety.

My freight train of worry stopped. When the brakes screeched and hissed, and all of the thoughts got off the train, the plotholes and the storyboards of my life went and got coffee at a train station. Where the conductor didn't have to turn around and check on the passengers every second to be sure they weren't breaking anything. Then, check back on the track so they don't derail. But this track isn't like any other. It's one of the potholes, poorly built plastic screws. It's one where the track curves at a dangerous angle- putting the train on a lean. It's one with multiple turns and splits in the track. The conductor has to pick a direction. He can't because all those idiot passengers are trying to have tea and scribble on a board. These boards are full of gibberish, incoherence, and yet somehow make sense to them. But every time the train turns or leans- their writing screws up. They have to start over again, creating this endless loop of chaos. The conductor can't handle all of this chaos. He can't focus on both the train and its passengers. He's poor, so he doesn't have employees to control the passengers and get them to sit down.

The track will never stop.

There's no way off the train. Someone stole the navigational system. The conductor is screaming to take a break. He hasn't slept in 3 years. He can't figure out where he is since the headlamps on the train blew out a while back. The only support he has is his intuition. A feeling that he should go in a direction. But a passenger butts their egotistical head in, telling him to go the other way. He has to follow the passenger's requests because they're high-paying customers. He has to get them to their destination, but the destination they want was missed hours ago. But they return to that destination, trying to map another way to get there. But there are 100 passengers demanding destinations all at once. He has to go multiple ways to get where they all want to be.

The train is going to flip over. It's going to derail.


But it never will.

 

[Pastry]

#1: Francesca, Hozier.
Honestly, to say the phrase "there isn't much to say about this song," is such a B.S. thing. There is so much I could go into. Firstly, the song's inspiration is from Dante's inferno, where Dante talks to a couple in the second circle of hell. Francesca de Rimini, a woman who fell in love with her husband's brother, had an illicit affair. Her and Paolo, the brother, would keep this affair from her husband, until they were both killed whence they were discovered. When Dante speaks to Francesca, and listens to her recount her story, she affirms that if she was given the chance to live again, she would still be with Paolo even when married to his brother.

SHE WOULD DO IT ALL AGAIN. No matter the circumstances, no matter if she KNEW that she was going to suffer in eternal damnation. No matter the struggles, the pains she had to endure, even her brutal death. She would do it again.

So, this song's premise is about an eternal pain and also eternal love. I saw Hozier live a few months ago, and when this song came on- I had a sort of epiphany that I'd never felt before. It wasn't about the story, since Hozier's lyricism is inspired by these stories, but never just about the one. Looking over the lyrics, and the phrasing of such, I'd realized that I heavily valued the level of commitment emanating from Francesca de Rimini's story. I promised to myself, if I ever valued anyone and committed to someone in the way that Francesca does in Hozier's rendition, then I would communicate that. I looked at all of my relationships as well, asking myself if I would suffer the consequences and still do it all again. "Though I know that my heart would break- I'd tell them to put me back in it." POETIC, magical, never ending love and commitment. Eternal. If I were to sit on my deathbed and think that I didn't want to do everything I chose to do all again, then I would not have lived a fulfilling life.

"Heaven is not fit to house a love like you and I."
Oh my god, the ending of this song! To love someone so much that it is beyond heaven... I would sacrifice everything I valued to have a love like that. And that's greed, talking. For someone to write those words, and hit me like a car going 60 miles per hour, is something that I'd never thought I would experience. I don't just love this song, I value every word coming out of that man's mouth. I would do anything to be able to house love greater than heaven. Not only that, but I am religious, and I never thought that I would even think of a lyric as such. The possibility of love being that abundant and fulfilling, I want that. I want to achieve that. But I know that I can't just take that. I'd have to earn that amount of love from someone, and for someone. I can't wait to experience that. But I've always said this phrase, "when in desperation, we get a poor result." I'll most likely mention this more in this thread, but that is just something that I've always stuck by, and it always works out for me.