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I learn so much from my intergenerational friends. Looking forward, my quinquagenarian companion reminds me that life is too long to get lost and stressed in everyday minutia. After a long career with Chicago Public Schools, his eyes are squarely set on retirement to a bucolic Canadian hamlet. He has transcended petty workplace dramas and is confident enough in his familial ties to know that family troubles too shall pass.
In the other direction, this month marks the birthday of and my one-year friendiversary with the two-year-old-soon-to-be-three-year-old next door: Mr. George. He is precocious, curious, kind, raised by a rad dad and awesome mom, and keeps alive my childlike spirit of wonder that I so prize. He also loves dinosaurs, which forms the bedrock of our friendship if I’m being truly honest. So for his birthday this year, I’m donning my apron and baking the kiddo a Mesozoic masterpiece worthy of his imagination and acuity. Most so-called “Dino Dig” cakes you’ll see are *sniff* *adjusts spectacles* specious. Entire skeletons lounge atop a single layer of soil, insinuating that one merely trips over a T. rex and eliding MILLIONS OF YEARS of geological history. What are we teaching our children?! Will constructing an educational excavational entremets be easy? No. But our children deserve better. I cannot in good conscience let Mr. George be hoodwinked by the lies that an inferior cake would lead him to believe. I must bake him a geologically accurate “Dino Dig” cake.
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This is the first installment of BakeLife, wherein I dissect the creative processes behind my proudest hobby bakes. Let me take you back to the fall of 2017. #MeToo explodes the media landscape. Hurricanes ravage the southern states and territories. Taylor Swift is about to drop Reputation. Cassini-Huygens sends its last breathtaking photos as it swan dives into Saturn. But I think we can all agree that one phenomenon stands out – the sweet, sentimental sailboat to Spookytown: Stranger Things, Season 2. Such occasions demand recognition – nay, celebration. I present my humble offering. Marvel at my modern wonder. The main bake was a straight-up, no-frills vanilla pound cake. What dessert better embodies the security and monotony of pastoral farmland? Safe. Sure to satisfy. Runs no risks. However, our plain cake brushes against a grotesque veil, terrifying but tantalizing, a foreboding fascination – in my imagination, a thin layer of tart cherry jam and dark chocolate shavings. What lies beyond the verge? The Upside-Down. An Eggo, because, duh. All this is topped with a healthy dollop of cream, because in rural America we bury our problems beneath a mountain of Cool Whip. Plus, it goes with the waffle. But our confection holds yet more secrets. A hidden horror has been baked into the cake itself. When you finally make it through the last airy pillow of Midwestern politeness, the true face of our prosaic pud presents itself: bare, fleshy berries, invoking the Demogorgon’s body-horrorest aspects (and infecting our simple sweet with the fruity flavors of the Upside-Down) Season 3. July 4th. Holy god, I’m ready. |
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