Valentine

You should make some pasta tonight. It's really not that hard, all you need is:

Flour 

(two cups)

Eggs

(three)

Salt

(pinch)

Water

(splash)

Let the flour form a little mound on a large, clean surface. Sprinkle a bit of salt on top. Now plunge your fingertips into the flour. It will be cool and soft and velvety. If you try to pinch it between your fingers, you will find that it's wily and elusive and capable of escaping your grasp. Pinch it anyway.

Once you've satisfied your tactile compulsions, crack each egg one by one into the mound of flour (you might want to form a little bowl shape in the top of the mound first).  Take a moment to admire the yolks - golden orange - suspended in the flour's powdery whiteness. They will be gorgeous. You'll almost hate to pop each one with your forefinger, but you will do it, and you will feel an inexplicable satisfaction at the release, as all of that egginess tries to flee its new nest. (Don't let it.)

Now you must work quickly to marry these two substances, which initially will seem a poor fit for each other. They will resist: the egg will be self conscious and will clumsily gloop itself all around the flour. The flour will panic, and in its partially transformed state will cling to your fingers, pleading for you too reconsider. Don't worry, this phase will quickly pass (and it's too late to go back now anyway). For your part, you must remain calm and persistent - this apprehensive pair will sense your confidence, and they will soon relax and give into the process. In your hands a metamorphosis is taking place. Work very hard, pressing and kneading. If you've ever made bread or worked with clay, you'll see that the blending flour and egg for pasta is done the same way. You can do this.

Soon you will realize that you are holding a remarkable dough - it will be smooth and rounded and cool and tinged with yellow. It should be neither too sticky nor too dry. If it is either, you will amend it with modest sprinklings of water or dustings of flour. You will know.

Hold the dough still for a moment. It has worked hard, it needs to rest. After the pause, slice the dough into thirds.

Lightly flour your surface, select one of the three, and with a reliable rolling implement (say the red-handled wooden pin your grandmother used to roll pastry dough for pies), begin to flatten and shape. Lean into it. Your arms are strong, funnel all of that strength into the rolling of this dough.

The dough should be accommodating, compliant, it should do just as you ask. When it starts to fuss and resist, you'll know it needs a rest. Don't try to force it, rather put this piece aside and pick up another. Talk quietly to the dough, be tender and firm, but never aggressive. Tell it about the small things you noticed on your way home from work. Tell it what you would do this weekend, if the whole weekend was yours to do with as you wished. Talk to it about the song that's playing on the radio and what it takes you back to every time you hear it, even after all these years.

Continue rolling each third of dough, putting each one aside when you feel it resisting the pressure. After a brief respite, it will be ready to charge ahead again. You have guided it gently through this experience, and it wants to make you happy. As you proceed, pushing and resting and repeating, you will see the thirds growing thinner and also larger. It's amazing! The dough will be resilient and strong. You will roll it quite thin and it will not break. It will be smooth and cool as the rounded dough, but a different form altogether. You will imagine wrapping it around yourself like a blanket. It would soothe your skin.

When it seems you've reached the right thickness for pasta (you will know), you'll lightly flour the surface of one of the thirds and carefully roll it in on itself, as though forming a telescope. With a sharp and steady blade, you will slice the dough into sections a half inch wide. If you listen closely, you will hear a small hissing as the blade passes through, and a contrasting thunk when it hits the hard surface below. You will repeat this a second and a third time.

You will toss those freshly cut sections with your fingers, and they will begin to resemble something - maybe a tangle of ribbon or yarn, or seagrass washed up on the  sand. Something familiar, but you won't know quite what. The tendrils of pasta will feel sublime. Resist the urge to toss them in the air, or drape them over your bare arms.

You will drop the newborn pasta into a large pot of boiling salted water. It will cook quickly; keep a close eye on it. You are wise enough to know that this pasta should be served with a light sauce, some fresh herbs, some friendly vegetables.

You'll sit down to a plate while its still steaming, and give a second (or third or fourth) plateful to someone you love. Or you will sit and savor it alone, with a glass of something you enjoy and music playing in the next room. You'll look out the window while you eat. The leaves on the trees will still be just a sleeping promise tucked away for the coming months. You will see the neighbors silhouettes silently pass by their windows.  You will feel glad that you made this pasta - the texture and cleanness and rightness of it all. You'll wrap your left hand around your right arm and feel the work that you put into this meal. You will know.