Journal #10

In this short story, Carver makes a connection between emotional well-being, as well as connections with others, and food. Initially, when Ann meets the baker, she knows that his life is likely unpleasant, due to the way he interacts while she tries to socialize with him. Though he makes a cake for her, there is a disconnect between them, a necessity to simply do business. There is no sharing of food, and no sharing of emotion. After Scotty gets hit by the car, neither Howard nor Ann can bring themselves to eat. They feel empty and drained, and paradoxically make themselves worse by refusing to eat. Their feelings, how distraught, anxious and sad they are, drive their feelings that eating is unnecessary. Meanwhile, the baker, unaware of how much pain they are feeling, begins to call them, angry about how they never came to pick up the cake he spent his time making. This builds anger between them, and after Scotty dies, Howard and Ann discover who the caller is, and go to the bakery filled with fury. However, once they arrive, Ann breaks down in front of the baker, and tells him why she is so angry. The baker responds with empathy, for the first time in the story, and gets them food. He explains to them the roots of his anger, and why he responded so irrationally to the cake not being picked up. The pain they experienced allowed them to connect on a deeper level than what would’ve been possible beforehand. The rich food, the diverse amounts of bread he brought them, is symbolic of the friendship that was built between them. Like the pain, the food was a shared experience, something that bonded them together. This is in stark contrast to the beginning of the story, where the baker treated the food as work, something emotionless and necessary, rather than something rich that should be shared.