The Cupcake Gospel

Holiday time = pressure time.

At least it is to me. It's self-imposed pressure, I know. I just really, REALLY want the day to go well. For everyone in the family to feel loved. This world can be so harsh and hard and cruel—we're always bumping into pain and getting our hearts hurt—so I feel like there should be one place that's safe and soft for each of us . . . one place on the planet that's home.

And despite all of our dysfunction, I love each of my family members very much. I want them not just to know that, but to feel that from me. If I could box up my love for them and hand it to them like a present, I totally would. But I guess love isn't that catch-able. It's not that put-your-hands-on-it-able. Love shows up on its own watch. It's communicated and received and felt in its own time. It's lived, not manufactured. It can't be scheduled. It's the butterfly that flits through our nets if we try to catch it. I guess that's why it's so beautiful—and why it's so priceless when it shows up.

But even though I know all of that, every holiday I try to create places for love to show up. A place where it can come in and prop its feet up and be comfortable and stay awhile.

This year at Easter the "let's-make-some-memories-as-a-family" method of choice was cupcake making. My brother and his cutie girlfriend were coming home and I knew it would bring Mom so much joy to have the bustle of baking going on in her kitchen. (Mom is sick, and these days she rarely leaves her bed.) Plus, Stephanie (Ben's cutie girlfriend) is a fantastic baker, so I figured she'd enjoy cupcake-baking. I love learning new recipes—plus I'd get to learn from Steph the Chef's mad cooking skills—so I knew I'd enjoy it too. And Ben, well, he loves to eat, so it was a no-brainer. :o) And, to top it off, after we were finished, we could leave Mom with a slew of cupcakes, give some to Stephanie's family, and we'd each have a cute little perfectly-decorated, totally-scrumptious cupcake ourselves. In my mind, it was the perfect recipe for memory-making.

Everything started out really, really well. Steph the Chef was teaching me all of these new cooking tricks and the theory behind why ingredients react the way they do when they bake. We made the batter with only a few minor hiccups (a small event I like to refer to as the "Butter Massacre of 2010"), plopped the batter in their cutie Easter-colored paper holders, and then popped them in the oven for their 35-minute sauna.

After we put the cupcakes in the oven we realized that all of this baking was making us hungry. So, Steph and I decided to go grab some food, while Ben, the super-handy carpenter, took over the cupcake-sitting.

Steph the Chef and I happily drove to paradise (read: Chick-fil-a) and got our lunch. When we came back, Ben the Carpenter had done his job perfectly. He had gotten the cupcakes out of the oven right on time. It's just that our yellow-cake cupcakes looked more like they were chocolate.

They were burnt.

Badly.

It really wasn't Ben the Carpenter's fault. Steph the Chef said that sometimes old ovens cook hot, and obviously the cupcakes agreed.

I was bummed. Really bummed. Deep-sigh-and-heavy-heart bummed. I tried to play it off like it didn't matter, but I was disappointed. I wanted to make a great family memory and burnt cupcakes aren't exactly family-photo-album worthy. But, I guess I faked it okay, and we carried on. Some homemade frosting and some sprinkles later, our cupcakes almost looked normal. Except for the little detail that they were indented where they should have puffed up and out like mushrooms. And except for the other little detail that they were yellow cake but they looked more like chocolate cake. And except for that other tiny detail that they didn't taste quite so good.

Oh well.

(BTW, Ben the Carpenter is a minimalist when it comes to sprinkles. I never knew this about him.)

Because the cupcakes were pretty much unedible, we only left four of them unfrosted for Mom. Mom loves chocolate, but chocolate doesn't love her, so we had to leave the frosting out on the ones that she would eat. What was sad was because of that, Mom got the saddest cupcakes. Hers were the ugliest because they didn't have the all-concealing chocolate or the party-inducing sprinkles on them. They were burnt, they were brown, and they were concave.

And that made me sad. Really sad. Deep-sigh-and-heavy-heart sad. Tried-and-failed sad. Since Mom is sick, I just want everything to be perfect for her. Since she's dying, there are only so many minutes left to make memories. There's just no time for burnt cupcakes.

I guess the smell of cupcakes woke Mom up and she got out of bed and teetered behind her walker down the hall. When she got to the kitchen I went into a long explanation about the oven burning hot and going to get lunch and how we had accidently burnt the cupcakes. I had unpeeled four of them for her and put them in a bowl on the counter. I showed them to her in all of their hideousness and told her that she didn't have to eat any. That I understood why she'd want to skip out on them. I was ashamed of them, and sad that I didn't have anything prettier or tastier or better to give her. I was close to tears as I saw her look them over . . . they were just so ugly . . .

Then, love flew in like a butterfly and stayed awhile.

In the middle of my apologetic explanation, Mom steadied herself at the counter with one hand. Then she reached out with the other, her arm shaking as she grabbed a cupcake. It shook as she carried it to her mouth, burnt crumbs flying onto the counter. I thought she'd stop eating after she took the first bite. But she didn't. I almost sobbed as I stood beside her and watched as bite after shaky bite, she ate all four of our burnt cupcakes.

All four of them. As if they were the most delicious things she had ever tasted.

It was a symbolic picture of who my Mom has been all of my life. My mom has always supported me no matter what—even when my best efforts are burnt. Not only that, my mom treats my burnt efforts as if they're beautiful. She's complete acceptance and unconditional support—no matter what. It's both humbling and freeing to be loved like that.

As I watched my Mom I realized that while I had wanted to set up a memory-making fest for my family, God had set one up for me. And I think I will remember it for the rest of my life.

Thanks for loving me like Jesus, Mama. I am able to see Him clearly because I see His love in you.