An Ode to Cake

While watching "Most Ridiculous" with my preteen daughter recently they played a video of a small group of people singing "Happy Birthday" to a little boy. He didn't seem very enthused and casually flipped over his before they had a chance to finish their song. It looked like something that his poor mother probably stayed up all night baking. I identify with that on a deep spiritual level, because I know exactly how much effort it takes to bake a cake with love. It was a very funny video and I'm sure that it will be a fond memory when he gets older.

I love cake. I've always been a fat kid. Not only is it delicious  (think of all the different kinds of cake there are !)  but cake just makes me think of great celebrations. One of the most vivid memories I have from my tenth birthday party is that my mother dropped a slice of cake while handing it to a boy named Terry, and it landed on my foot, frosting side down. It's one of my favorite memories of that day, though I probably didn't find it funny at the time- I've always been a bit of an uptight bitch. I was so excited to finally be in the double digits that I sprang out of bed that morning. Nowadays it's more of a feebled roll and everything hurts.

I purposefully request a Dairy Queen ice cream cake for my birthday every year because my husband really isn't a fan of cake. I like to make sure that he gets to join in on the celebration, because cake just doesn't feel the same when you're not sharing it with your loved ones. I love the feeling of togetherness and have enjoyed birthday parties for as long as I can remember, though I didn't get invited to very many as I started to get older. I've decided to pay homage to a few of my favorite cakes.

• Every time I flipped through our family photo albums growing up, I would always stop at this particular photo of me with my grandmother at my first birthday party. She passed away just before my thirteenth birthday so I hold this close to my heart. We were very close. I would study every detail of this photo and commit it to memory. You can just feel the love that was baked into this cake. Believing that my grandmother had baked it, I called my mother to have her confirm. She proudly proclaimed that she herself had baked it with her friend Peggy. She deserves to be proud because she really isn't much of a baker yet managed to pull off this masterpiece.

• My parents bought me a customized book when I was around four years old, about me being whisked away to the land of the dinosaurs on the back of a magical unicorn. While there I'm introduced to all of her dinosaur friends, and we spend the day together. They love me so much that they throw me a farewell party where I'm presented with a marvellous cake. My unicorn friend leaves a separate cake behind for me to find in my room when she returns me safely home. This book is one of my most cherished possessions. I've included these cakes on this list because I've always dreamed of having them in real life.

• While we were busy planning our wedding back in 2017, I announced that I fully intended to bake our cake myself. Now, the last time I baked an elaborate cake from scratch was for our daughter's seventh birthday party the year prior. It was a total shitshow that left me feeling incredibly stressed out. I wanted to hurl it to the floor several times. Knowing this, my future mother-in-law decided to save me from myself and offered to pay for our cake as a wedding gift. She ordered this beautiful non-traditional cake, with matching cupcakes from a talented local baker that she's friends with. It was incredibly delicious and fit our theme perfectly. It was just as delicious when we thawed out a piece to share on our first anniversary. I'm so very thankful that she managed to talk me out of baking one myself, because we probably wouldn't have even had a cake otherwise.

• I also feel the need to pay homage to Miss Trunchbull's chocolate cake from the movie "Matilda" (1996). This has always been one of my favorite movies. I'd love to shove my face into this cake just like Bruce Bogtrotter. I've spent years scouring the internet for the perfect recipe so that I can bake my own recreation of this cake, and have bookmarked several of them. I've avoided attempting it because I'm still not fully over the debacle of my last cake baking experience. Maybe one of these days I'll stop being so neurotic and finally give it a shot. I'll definitely let you know if I do!