3-19-19 DOZEN

Kathryn came over Thursday morning, her guitar in one hand and a carton of eggs in the other. She joined the three dozen women who gather Thursday mornings in my family room to learn how to play guitar. She set down her instrument and handed me the recycled cardboard carton. “You won’t get them any fresher than this,” she said as I lifted the lid, revealing a dozen newly laid eggs in an earthy array of colors: pale blue, olive green, creamy yellow, chocolate milk brown and one solitary typical white. The Yerman’s have four boys, one sweet girl and anywhere from 6 to 15 chickens, depending on whether or not Tage forgets to lock them in at night and how active the raccoons have been.  The eggs were so lovely, like Mother Nature had painted them herself with her very best watercolors. “Oh man, thank you! They’re so beautiful I don’t think I could crack them,” I said, lifting each one to examine it. “Oh,” Kathryn said, “No worries there, we’ll have plenty more tomorrow.”

For a while now I have been a little curious about the fact that we arrange things in dozens. Eggs come in cartons of a dozen. Wooden school rulers, at least in America, have 12 inches. Every spring our kids purchase boxes of golf balls for their dad for his birthday and Father’s Day. The balls are sold in boxes of 12.  Don’t you think it odd that we measure by 12’s instead of 10’s? Tens are so much more round, so much easier to multiply.

Before there were such things as super markets, and long before super stores like Costco and Sam’s Club, humans who spent their waking hours doing jobs that took them away from the home-fires visited bakeries to buy their daily bread. For centuries, the staple of the civilized table was a loaf of bread. Over 1000 years ago laws were passed in England that demanded bread be sold in proportion to the wheat used to make it, and if a baker provided less than was paid for, he would be jailed or flogged, or have their arm amputated. That would make kneading difficult. Since bread carries the factor of yeast, and yeast makes for variety in bread sizes, bakers began giving one extra loaf to insure they were legal. This became known as a baker’s dozen, which basically means 13 instead of 12. 

When I was a kid, and we went to the bakery to get some rolls, or donuts, or cookies, you always received one extra when you bought a dozen. Aside from law and punishment, I think it’s just plain good business, because it encourages customers to buy twelve instead of six or eight or ten, knowing they are getting something for nothing. 

Now days, as far as I can see, businesses have let go of the extra measure. When you buy twelve, you get twelve. Except at Day’s Farm, where every late summer/early fall I aim my van west on Gentile Street in Layton at least once a week. Out west, toward the Great Salt Lake, where the Day family has held their ground, quite literally. Rows of houses have popped up in all the fields surrounding theirs, but they have preserved what their grandfathers had nurtured; a good old traditional American farm, with a variety of crops that rotate regularly. Their corn is always clean and crisp, the pale yellow and white kernels stacked in neat godly rows under luminous green husks and fair haired silk. Not only is it dependably good, they let you choose your own from a large waxy cardboard bin that holds a sign: 

“Fresh Corn $4/13 ear”

I know I am a bargain lover, and I have an unusually prominent bell somewhere between my head and my heart that starts to ring when I see a deal, but when I see someone indicate to me that they value me as a customer, and they really want me to be happy with my purchases, and just to be safe they are going to throw in an extra in case one of those ear I have chosen is deformed or has hosted a little party of worms under that pretty green casing; well, that makes me feel like we are friends. And I like to do business with friends.

The concept of a baker’s dozen is a good one. It fits with my Christian values. It says, without words, that I am aware that things are not always perfect, that I don’t have complete control over everything, even when I really try. If I grew corn, I know every ear of corn is not created the same. That’s part of the beauty of it. But if I am a merchant I will do all I can to represent the best of what I offer, and I will throw in some extra just to be safe, so you feel like you’ve been treated fairly.

I learned from the master  of over-doing herself, my mother. If you are going fishing for the day, you’d better take some crackers and some string cheese, and, here… you’d better take twelve string cheeses instead of two. And here’ take some apples, too. And you’ll need some chocolate, and better throw in a gallon of water, because any time you are going out into the Arco desert you’d better have a gallon of water. Too much is better than too little.

Here’s a challenge to someone out there who controls the merchandise in any of those big box stores we have turned our attention to these days; bring back the baker’s dozen. Then, when you eat a donut in the car on the way home, no one will be the wiser. 

(Heck, if you buy a dozen of my CD’s, I’ll throw in two extra.)