WHY I TEACH-Part 11: Let Them Eat Cake

Devin bound into my classroom—the happiest I’d seen him in weeks. I pulled my roster of birthdays and noticed today was Sarah’s.

“Happy Birthday, Sarah!” I said. The class copied my well wishes.

I noticed Devin’s face fall and I made my way back to his table.

“What’s up, Devin?”

“You know, if it was my birthday, my parents would celebrate it, but today,” he paused, “today, I get my one month chip, and no one will celebrate it.”

“Devin, I’ll celebrate your sobriety, I’ll bake you a cake. Chocolate with sprinkles?”

Devin nodded.

“I’ll bring it in tomorrow and before class, we can all celebrate.”

Devin’s smile returned.

“You can’t do that,” the devil, Ms. Keen said as she stopped me in the hallway the following morning.

“Do what?” I asked.

She pointed to the cake in my hands. “You can’t make them cake for their birthdays.”

“Luckily, it isn’t for a birthday,” I said dismissively and pushed past her to enter my classroom. I set the cake on one of the tables and removed the plates and spoons from the bag I was carrying.

An email notification from Mr. Myers flashed on my computer monitor.

“It is generally frowned upon to bring food items to school to celebrate birthdays. In the future, please refrain from doing so,” the email said.

Mental note to self: bring the cake in the back door.

Exactly one month later, Devin announced his second month of sobriety and I, of course, baked him a cake.

This time, however, I brought it through the back door, the night before and informed anyone who wanted cake to arrive as quickly as they could and meet me out the back door.

In the five minutes between classes, I’d set up a small folding table and decorated it with a plastic smiley face emoji table covering. I dished out pieces of cake onto individual plates. I was amazed that almost all 24 of my students showed up. They stood outside, shoveling cake into their mouths, laughing, and congratulating Devin on another month.

When the bell rang, I ushered them back into the classroom and was met by a very out of breath Mr. Myers. It seems he’d run all the way to my classroom.

“You can’t have cake in the classroom,” he huffed and wheezed.

“There isn’t any cake in the classroom,” I replied as I closed the outside door.

“I told you not to bring in birthday cake,” he said.

“I didn’t,” I replied.

Mr. Myers looked around at the kids seated at the tables, all of whom were busy doing something.

He walked past me and opened the back door. I sucked in my breath. The table, however, was gone.

“Ms. Keen said she saw kids eating cake in your classroom,” he said wearily.

I just nodded and looked around the classroom.

“Ugh,” Mr. Myers shook his head and walked out of the classroom.

A moment later, I heard a tap at the back door. I opened it to find Terrance holding the folding table in one hand and the package of unused paper plates in the other.

“I chucked the rest of the cake in the trash,” he said, an enormous grin on his face.

“You did well, Terrance,” I said.

The next morning, I noticed a white circular thing with a blinking light on my ceiling. I wasn’t really sure if it had always been there or if I’d just now noticed it. Kind of like how you never notice a smoke detector unless the battery is low and it starts to beep.

I pulled a table close to the thing on my wall and grabbed a stool. I was able to get up close to it and to be honest, I had no idea what it was. I took several pictures of it and did a quick internet search. It appeared the thing was a wifi booster of some sort, though I wasn’t able to find the exact model I had on my ceiling.

I shrugged it off, maybe now the wifi would actually work.

After school I headed up to Mr. Myers’ office. He didn’t even look up from his computer when I walked in. I stood and waited. Finally, after what seemed like five minutes, he looked up.

“I like to bake,” I began. “It’s kind of something I love to do for others. I’d like to bake something for my students once a month. Not to celebrate anything, just because. I can make sure we don’t eat in the classroom or during class time. But it’s something I want to do for my students.”

Mr. Myers looked me up and down. “Fine,” he said dismissively. “Just try to be discreet.”

“I will!” I beamed. “Thank you, sir.”

He waved me away with the flick of his wrist.