The Power of Chocolate Cupcakes

There’s nothing like being robbed on Christmas Eve to get you in the holiday spirit!

I was in a nearby shoe shop buying some last minute gifts for my two oldest girls. (Is it just me, or do all mothers feel like their kids won’t get enough for Christmas?) I was the only customer in the store, so I decided it was okay to set my purse down while I shopped. A few minutes later, an attractive young woman joined me. She distracted me with questions about shoes while her friend, who I never saw, lifted my wallet.

Both girls ran out of the store before I even realized what had happened. They were out of sight by the time I did.

The responses to this unfortunate event ran the gambit with every personality of the DISC model represented.

One of the officers said, “It’s a good thing it was just your wallet, and not your keys.” I agreed that that wouldn’t have been good at all.

The other officer said, “It’s a good thing they didn’t hold a gun to her head is more like it.” He was looking at his partner, so I didn’t respond.

My husband arrived and stayed just long enough to inquire about my state of mind before taking to the streets in search of the thieves.

The storeowner kept offering me the box of cookies she found consolation in, insisting they would make me feel better. To tell her that baking, not eating, cookies was what I needed right then would have probably left her as perplexed as the second officer was by the first’s comment.

Everything was in my wallet. My license, credit cards, checks, membership cards, and, things I couldn’t remember I had (but would miss when I did), were all gone. But, like the wallet itself, these things could all be replaced. The $400 cash I had just gone to the bank for was more regrettable. If only I had used that cash at Sam’s just minutes earlier. Then only $160 would be gone. If only I had been satisfied with the gifts I had already gotten for the girls. Then nothing would be gone.

Except for a nail technician from a nearby shop who said the pair went in for manicures but refused to wait, my husband’s search was unrevealing. Upon hearing this, I thought: “I can’t even remember when I last had a manicure!”

I wanted to get on my computer right then and write out my anger and bitterness, but my son made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.

“Let’s make chocolate cupcakes, mom.”

Well, yes!!!

Okay, being robbed on Christmas Eve might not be just the thing to get you into the holiday spirit, but it certainly wasn’t going to ruin mine.

In fact, I was determined to somehow make sense of what had happened. And what I realized was this:

We process more cautiously after getting robbed, and feel dutiful in telling everyone the details of what happened, “so it doesn’t happen to you”. But reality is, the feelings of upset, regret, anger, and fear subside before your new checks arrive in the mail. Thieves continue to steal with the same tenacity you expressed trying to find the perfect replacement wallet to hold all the replacement junk you’ve accumulated. The cycle continues. And why wouldn’t it?

Nothing really changes because we accept the same. We hide behind words like “victim” and “underprivileged” when “powerful” is what we really are. Within us all is the power to change what is wrong, whether we know it or not. Only when the burden of sharing positive behavior is stronger than acceptance of negative behavior can we realize “powerful”.

I can’t help but think my realizations were influenced by the comment of someone close to me. Of my unfortunate Christmas Eve saga, she said, “I would feel like I was wasting my time trying to help all those kids if I were in your shoes.”

This response is the classic personality trait for a word that begins with the letter "I", only this "I" has nothing to do with the DISC model.

There’s nothing like baking chocolate cupcakes on Christmas Eve to get your mind right!

Pride and Punishment

Here in New Orleans, many of us parents whose kids go to school together have taken to having dual or group birthday parties (much to the chagrin of the kiddy party establishments). In the olden days, the domino effect of one child beginning the school year with a birthday party at The Monkey Room would have you schlepping kids there every weekend until school let out for summer. Figure my 4 kids times 2-3 classes of 12-16 kids in each's grade times 1 gift per child times 2 weekend days times 4 weekends a month.

Phew! I'm horrible at math but even I know that that computes to far more juice boxes than cocktails.

Wine, o, wine, where art thou?!

(I promise I am getting around to the RsD2 cake!)

This year my son agreed to have a dual birthday party with another boy in his grade. I was thrilled, but a little apprehensive since the other boy's mom suggested it. Last year, we scheduled each our son's birthday parties on the same day, at the same time, but at different places.

It was totally my fault. She'd left a message on my answering machine months before placing dibs on the date. I simply forgot. I felt remiss, of course, and did my best to convey my regret. I even offered to change my date. She refused but maintained her discontentment with me all the same.

And, now after a year she was... what?

Reaching out, I decided. So, I threw out the "apprehensive" and doubled the "thrilled." Party on!

She was to handle most of the party preparations, including the invitations, party favors, and food. I was to host the party, get the drinks and balloons, and supply the cake.

The cake! Alas, the creation of R2D2!

R2D2 was well beyond my level of expertise, but I just couldn't resist the challenge. I knew this cake would make my son happy. Very happy! And it would make up for the birthday party quagmire I'd convinced myself I needed to make up for.

Hour after hour, after hour... and more hours went by, and I was still making the cake. Sometime between hour 12 and 13 my once perceived therapeutic cake-making time turned into something else.

Around midnight the telephone rang. It was the other boy's mom. She couldn't remember if she'd told me that she'd extended the invitation to the other classes. Including siblings. She was sorry, of course, for calling so late the night before, oops! the day of, the party with the news, but she'd simply forgotten.

I'm even more horrible at math at midnight the night before, oops! the day of, the party after 16 hours of what I'd conceded was no more than self-induced punishment, but I knew that that news computed to far more kids than R2D2 could feed. I mean, we're talking Catholics here!

I was out of energy, out of ideas, and out of fondant! But I have a reputation to protect. And now my pride was wounded. I couldn't stop now, right? Hell to the no!

I made a "satellite cake", The Light Saber, just as the other boy's mom graciously suggested, but maintained my discontentment with her all the same.

When the cakes were brought out everyone drew closer. The longer they sat on the table the more the warm sun softened the icing over them both. The huge smile on my son's face as he stood behind R2D2 for pictures, and all the kids oooing and ahhhing over it was humbling. I couldn't cut and distribute pieces fast enough.

After all that time and effort, there was nothing left of either one of those cakes to keep for later, and I was thrilled! I felt so lucky to get rid of it all.