Crime and Punishment (and pizza dough)

So JaT is in trouble. There have been one or two small hiccups on the path to sub-liness. The hard balance for me is that outside of who I am with Sir, I am Mistress.

Generally speaking Mistress does not ask permission from anyone for pretty much anything and when I do it is just cursory. Perhaps a more polite way of telling people what they are doing. Interestingly both recent transgressions have been brought to Sir's attention by me. As always he strikes the worst blow possible. He tells me he is disappointed. He does not get angry, does not say anything else, just that he is disappointed. I can deal with a mob of angry people, talk down a screaming banshee, brush off the silent treatment or a snide remark. Disappointment strikes harder than anything else.

So as I sent Sir my latest confessional (why I even felt compelled to tell him I do not know) I pulled out my trusty old faithful coping techniques.

I heat a bowl, measure out the warm water, throw in some sugar, mix it with my hands, sprinkle some yeast ontop and send the message. I wait while the yeast foams, mobile in hand. I pull out the 00 flour and throw it haphazard into the bowl. I don't know why I measured the water. I rarely measure anything when making pasta or bread. Grinding salt and pouring over the olive oil I keep glancing at my phone. I put my hands through the flour and into the warm water underneath and pull it through on itself. My phone beeps. My stomach drops. With one hand I mix while with the other I pull the message up. Tears sting my eyes, I kneed the dough and it comes together. I add just a little more flour and pound into it, folding it back on itself, pushing, pulling until I am done. Cleaning the bowl, oiling it, rolling the dough in oil and leaving it to proof, I wonder at whether I should reply.

I always wait like a kid at Christmas for dough to proof. There is a kind of magic about it going in a tightly bound ball and coming out a light fluffy mass of bubbly something. This time I am just wrapped up in my head. I could try to explain myself. I could apologize again. I could tell him it was no big deal or none of his business. The truth of it is that he was clear and my disregard of that cannot be explained away so I decide to say nothing.

I will have pizza tonight and hopefully in the process eat some of my guilt.