My mom could not bake a cake to save her life. Even if she used a box cake mix the cake would fall, burn, crack, or find some other crazy way to self-destruct. She was flying around getting ready for my disco slumber party for my twelfth birthday, and she rushed into my room an hour before the party began and begged me to bake my own birthday cake. I laughed at her; she is always so last minute. I eagerly agreed to do it because I love chocolate, baking, and licking the beaters. I glanced at the clock and figured out that I would just be putting the cake in the oven when the girls would start to arrive. Perfect, I thought.
I rushed downstairs excited to bake my own cake. Then, I zoomed around the kitchen to quickly gather the eggs, water, vegetable oil, Betty Crocker Devils Food Cake Mix, bowl, measuring cup, spatula, cake pan (and butter to grease the pan), and beaters that I needed. My grandmother taught me that it was important to always gather all the ingredients, equipment, and dishes first before embarking on a baking or cooking adventure. I sang to myself as I poured all the ingredients into the big bowl, cracked the extra large eggs to watch the bright yellow yolks slither out of their shells to pop onto the mound of pale brown mix, and started the ancient beaters. They hummed along with me as I watched the contents of the bowl swirl together to form brown goo that oozed a sweet, chocolate aroma.
The kitchen door suddenly burst open, and I jumped involuntarily. I turned my head to see my mom stagger in with four Harvest pizzas and a bag of soda and snack food. Over the machine I shouted, “Wow, this party is going to be great!” I flipped my long golden mane back out of my face, and all of a sudden I felt a gentle tug. Mom’s big, brown eyes grew wide and her mouth opened. No words came out, and all I could hear was the gentle hum of the beaters.
I felt the tug again, and I looked down to see golden strands of hair mixed with brown chocolate. Then, I screamed! My mom’s nervous laugh began as she ran to set the pizzas and bag down. It was too late. Those beaters were fast little buggers, and they snatched my hair and wrapped it tightly around themselves. They kept on winding tighter and tighter, and it felt like someone was grabbing my hair in huge fistfuls and trying to rip it out of my head. Tears gushed down my face and dropped into the mess as I screamed for help. “Please help, help, help me! Ochies, ow, OWWWW!” My mom was laughing while I wailed, “It’s not funny mom, it’s not funny!”
Finally, she scrambled over and pulled the plug. Quiet filled my ears, and I began to cry and laugh nervously at the same time. The beaters were stuck tight against my head like two giant rollers that had wound up all of my waist-length, towhead tresses. I fumbled to disengage the beaters from the machine that was clunking against my skull. My mom’s forehead was creased with concern, and she wore her worried look. Then, we both began the messy task of slowly pulling my tangled chocolate hair out of the beaters. Boy, did it hurt! She knew that my long, blonde hair was a huge part of my identity and tried to reassure me, “Your hair will be okay. Nobody will be able to tell that this happened to you. I’m sorry I distracted you and then laughed.”
I replied, “It’s not your fault, Mom. Accidents happen, and I should have put my hair up in a ponytail.” We could share the blame equally. I shook my head but stopped immediately when I saw droplets of chocolate fly. I looked up to see globs of chocolate dripping from everywhere: the ceiling, cabinets, microwave, walls, window, faucet, and stove. I felt my slimy hair dripping too. “What a mess!” ” I yelled, “it’s a good thing the cabinets are dark wood.” She nodded.
I stood frozen looking like l had dipped my head in a mud pit, and at that moment we heard a knock at the door. Natalie, my best friend and writing partner, was the first to arrive at my party. When she came in and assessed the scene, she burst out laughing immediately. Her ash blonde hair and bright white teeth were quite the contrast to all of the brown coating me and the kitchen. It smelled like a chocolate bomb had exploded. Soon all three of us were holding our sides because they ached from our unrestrained laughter, which turned into painful laughing and coughing spasms for me. Undoubtedly, I had accidentally inhaled some of the powdered cake mix when the beaters went awry.
Suddenly, we all looked at the clock simultaneously and realized the rest of the girls would arrive any minute. “We’ll clean it up as fast as we can,” Mom remarked. Panic coursed through me in an icy wave, and I sprinted upstairs holding a towel over my head to catch the goo. I proceeded to take the most fragrant and bizarre shower of my entire life. It took three shampooings to get all that stuff out of my hair, probably because of the viscous nature of the eggs and cup of vegetable oil in the mix. It was painful to comb the conditioner through with the wide toothed comb I kept in the shower after all that pulling earlier, and I’m sure I lost even more hair mixed with chocolate down the drain.
Meanwhile, my mom called my dad at work and had him pick up an ice cream cake at Carvel on his way home, which would from that day on become a family tradition. He guffawed so loudly when she told him what happened that his boss asked if he was alright. Natalie and my mom sponged up the kitchen as fast as they could and chucked out the bowl of chocolate cake mix. I, the family cake maker, declared that I was out of business. We will never forget that failed birthday cake!