1. The Great British Bake-Off
It feels like joy is a precious commodity today. It can be hard to remember good things when our TV screens and social media feeds are so overwhelmingly full of bad news. As a way of keeping ourselves from despair, we have tried cultivate a collection of things that give us joy. One of the most undiluted experiences of joy for both of us is sitting down on the couch, warm drinks in our hands, and hearing the upbeat strings of the opening to the Great British Bake-Off. We’ve watched nearly every episode that we can find; we’re just a few tantalizing episodes from the finale of Collection 6 on Netflix (Vlad has not been spoiled for the ending; for the moment, neither has Lorraine).
For the uninitiated: the Great British Bake-Off is a reality TV baking competition; judges Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith dissect the brilliant concoctions of twelve amateur bakers, each week granting one lucky competitor the title of Star Baker and eliminating another. Each episode has a theme that can range from the most everyday breads to the most obscure flaounas. Along the way, hosts Noel Fielding and Sandi Toksvig keep the atmosphere in the competition tent as light as a French meringue, poking gently at the stern judges and reminding the competitors that, despite all their sweat and tears (and in one particularly gruesome case, blood), ‘it’s only a cake’ — or ‘stroopwafel’, as the case may be.
2. Joy
This show has a unique characteristic that warms our hearts episode after episode: despite the fact that the Bake-Off is competitive, the contestants consistently put each other first and the competition second. Every person in the tent is incredibly skilled and has poured hundreds if not thousands of hours into perfecting their creations. Every person wants to be crowned Star Baker, to go home with the glory of victory. And yet, when things go wrong, when bakes teeter on the verge of collapse with minutes left on the clock, the contestants — who, on another show, might be cutting each other down! — help each other out without a second thought.
There is no single explanation for this remarkable demonstration of human kindness. It is possible that the casting selects for compassionate bakers. It is possible that there is something in the British that can’t abide culinary failure. It is possible that by sheer accident, the show’s early seasons featured unusually altruistic bakers, who then gave the Bake-Off a reputation for kindness over competition that subsequent seasons have felt bound to uphold.
3. Collaborative Creativity
The truth is, we do not need to know the true cause of Steven and Stacey leaving their stations behind to help fellow baker Tom put biscuits onto his presentation plate; or of the entire tent applauding Nadiya and Rahul’s masterful creations, filling them with confidence they so clearly lacked; or of the way that bakers in danger of being eliminated hold each others’ hands. These are the tiny moments that fill our hearts with joy and (at the risk of sounding absurd) encourage us to be better people.
The kindness of the bakers reminds us to be kinder to ourselves when we fail — or even when we simply fall short of the very high standards we set for ourselves (and that our competitive capitalist society encourages us to uphold). The collaborative creativity that we see on the Bake-Off inspires us to take bolder leaps of imagination in our own creative passions, knowing that we will help each other stick the landing. The subtle lessons the show teaches extend to caring for our friends as well. When we watch episode after episode of the Bake-Off, when we share the show with our friends and stay up late talking about it, we obsess over the squee-worthy times when bakers show us that humanity does not have to be ruthless or mean-spirited, rather than the winners’ successes after the show. The Bake-Off demonstrates, over and over, that being human can be about dropping what you are doing to make sure that your friend’s ridiculous, overly ambitious project can succeed, and growing closer in the process. When we connect with this incredible side of ourselves, we find the joy we need to live through these dark times.
Vlad Barash and Lorraine Fryer are writers, gamers, and (respectively) music lovers and musicians who have recently published Demon Mark: a Russian Saga, a choose your own adventure story set in the world of Russian fairy tales. Vlad loves writing and tabletop games, and is working on projects at the intersection of these two passions. Lorraine loves music, she leads two singing groups and participates in a third one in between her busy work life — and working on other creative projects! Speaking of which, Vlad and Lorraine’s first project made them realize how much they enjoy working together, and they are taking tentative steps into new gaming / writing adventures. When not busily working on one (or two, or three) of a dozen creative pursuits, Vlad and Lorraine read lots of blogs and books, play lots of games, and cuddle with their tiny dog Lando. They live in Somerville, MA.
