Cake Mastery

My black Volkswagen lost all traction as I hydroplaned around an S corner on a back road, the mud taking me wherever it wanted. I made a mental note to apologize to the Hunter for ever nagging him about the way he drives my car, as at that very moment I was rallying my poor car down the telegraph road, desperately trying to keep up to my friend’s roaring Nissan because without her I was totally lost on the back roads. The woman drove as energetically as her personality screamed; I can recognize her vibrant laugh down the hallway whenever she walked into the office.

My adrenaline had yet to come down when I entered her house. I was still asking myself how I was going to get my car back up the mud pit I drove down when a blond haired flash of pink surged past the entrance hall. Overshooting her destination, Necia circled back towards me. “Hi Kirstin!” The tiny ball of fiery sunshine greeted me. After showing off her pink sequin dress with an energetic spin I walked up the stairs and entered her mother’s kitchen. Centered on the island were two nine inch cake circles. My friend, Elaine, owner of Sugarbug Creations, promised to show me how to make a bitchin’ cake – just in time for the Hunter’s birthday.

We were combining an astonishing amount of butter, sugar and heavy cream together to make the icing, which would soon become snow, for this masterpiece of a B-Day Cake. Elaine explained that while on maternity leave she took a cake decorating course with some girlfriends. She had hoped to find a skill that would allow her to forget her current job at the Sawmill and work from home while raising her daughter, Necia. I added a splash vanilla to the kitchen-aid (as if I knew what the hell I was doing)  and a splash more wine to her glass when she admitted that things hadn’t turned out as wished, as she returned to work even earlier than anticipated when her husband lost his job to the local mine shutting down. Elaine slowly climbed the latter at work and her cake business took off. She’s previously made me a cake replica of my yellow sunfire as well as my most favorite cake: a Hot Mess Wine cake (an original, I’m sure).

Elaine sympathetically took the spatula from my hand. I had no hope of covering the two tiered almond cake with thick white icing without getting pink everywhere. The goal was to make sure there were no traces of the center: syrupy raspberry goodness and I was struggling hard on that front. It turned out I was more suited for tree creation. Her husband, Jeremy and her are now business partners in the cake biz, as he specializes in the details, like making chocolate blades for a chainsaw cake and giving me advise on my fondant tree pruning. They’ve been married a little under a year, and have an epic love story of being roommates who fell into a friendship tangled with jagermeister turned into a river-front house and three kids.

Elaine, who is from the Fort Fraser area, once crinkle eye laughed with me as she told me how she knew the Hunter over the years and escapades of crazy girlfriends and was quite happy that he finally found me (crazy or not, here I am). Him and I drank twisted tea’s sitting next to each other as we watched Elaine’s and Jeremy’s wedding ceremony. Every woman in the audience, myself included, teared up as Jeremy cried during his vows and Elaine grinned and laughed and that same, wonderful laugh.

I make indents in blue fondant and show the finished product to Elaine who approves of the toque, and I take pride in her acceptance. Cake decorating, never mind the baking, is so much harder than I had ever anticipated. And that’s sort of the thing about Elaine, during appetizers and passion parties she’ll provide you with uncensored details of her life struggles and accept all of your flaws in return. I keep joking that with all of Jeremy’s beautiful carpentry work, he should build her an industrial kitchen. If I’m being honest, I’m quite thankful her cake biz didn’t take off right at the start because I would have never have gotten to know her. And Elaine really is that strong women you know you’re so lucky to have in your life.

Truly,

One humbled cake master.

Eat the cake. It's somebodies birthday somewhere.

Cancellation Policy

“Now,” I look up from the questions on the paper before me “we’ve talked about all of the great things about you. You’ve shared your attributes and qualities, but what would be your greatest weakness?” I brush a lose stand of hair behind me hear “Some would say this was an area of improvement”. I smile nicely after the last word improvement and make direct eye contact with the person seated at the front of the table; we call that chair the hot seat. It’s actually not the most difficult interview question we ask, but certainly one of the most interesting. And the three of us on the interview panel listen to the response while gently taking notes during the interview for entry level production position.

My standard response during an interview is that I’m not great at setting boundaries in my work-life. Simply said, I have a problem saying no. In fact my boss just pointed this out to me on Friday. When people come to me for help, help with a question, a favor, a task, an extra project, it is just so dang hard to tell them no, regardless of how busy I am. My plate gets fuller, my days longer and in turn my wine glass gets emptier and my work dreams crazier.

The complete answer to this interview question is to not only admit your weakness, but discuss how you’ve been working on it. With my assertiveness issues, I tell them that I’ll ask my colleague or boss when this needs to be done by and calculate if I truly have the ability to get it done. I’ll explain to my colleague what is on my plate of work chores and tell them when I’ll have time to help them with theirs.

Boom. Interview question answered.

So, professionally, I know my weaknesses and it seems very possible to tackle them, but from my personal life, this is so much messier.

...

It’s the end of the workday and my fingers wrap around the doorknob to our new[ly]-to-use purchased house. I’ve been working my full time job and coming home to my second job: renovations. Hugo bounds to the door ready to go for a walk. I’ve got an hour and fifteen minutes before I go to yoga because I must go to yoga. I need go to yoga; I’ve already missed three of our weekly classes. Last week my yoga instructor Nicole kindly Facebook messaged me asking if I was planning on attending her class and I admitted that I was not. And I felt incredibly guilt ridden. When I was asked if I was going to sign up for a six week Active Flow Class I said yes, when I should have said no. And I think we all know where this is going. My greatest weakness is that I am an incredibly flakey person.

I’ll agree to going driving into the city with my girlfriends, I’ll sign up for a $75 yoga course, I’ll commit to a night out dancing, only to fake out and cancel at the last minute. I’ll have legit reasons, truly. At the time I made the commitment I really did want to go. Or perhaps I have a hard time saying no to the person asking and then when the time comes, I can’t keep my promise. My life is in chaos right now with doing home reno’s in a time crunch and having a full-time job. But, is that really an excuse? I mean, I haven’t been doing renovations my whole life. And it seems this fault has been going on for as long as I can remember. Some days, I’m feeling incredibly introverted and I just don’t want to be all people-ey. But, I don’t bail guilt free. I feel awful about it for days, it's like the cancellation hangover. With that last Active Flow class, I walked into that yoga studio fearful that I was going to be shamed right back out the same way I came into those doors*.

And here’s the real problem. I’m not sure how hard I have been trying to change. The Hunter and I had a pretty solid argument about it a few months ago, before we were even living together. This wasn’t even the argument, but somewhere in the middle I was left speechless “You’re indecisive and you can’t commit to anything.” He spat, “Well unless it’s travelling” he sneered. And there it was. All of my ugly. I don’t know if he actually sneered, but did it ever hit home.

 So, I get it. It’s time to work on my weakness. Very slowly, I’ve begun truly thinking about what I’m agreeing before I say yes and think about the repercussion of bailing, because that's what it all comes down to. I want to be a good person and a good friend and I know how this effects my reputation when I change my mind last minuet. Accountability helps, although it makes me nearly cry, please feel free to call me out on it, when you make plans with me, you can confirm that I will follow thru. When I cancel at previously arranged plans I know I’m perhaps losing friendships that I’m not prepared to have happen. Acceptable or not, the impression I leave behind when I act like a flaky person makes me out to be someone I don’t want to be: unreliable, undependable. And that’s not who I am.

Admittedly,

A girl working on her flaws.

In terms of like, instant relief, cancelling plans is like heroine. - John Mulanie

*Nicole was lovely ask ever, but kicked my ass for an hour – Karma at its finest