Guilt Leads to Cake

“Fear is the path to the Dark Side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”—Yoda

 

Most of us are familiar with this quote. What we’re less familiar with, though it’s equally important, is this: guilt leads to cake.

Well, at least in my family it does.

 

Let me explain.

 

I learned guilt from my mother. Being the over-achiever that I am, I have surpassed her teaching and can pretty much feel guilty about anything. And in times like these, my guilt is in overdrive.

 

The Princess studied abroad last semester—well, for part of the semester, at least. Since she was leaving before her birthday, we celebrated it early at home. Normally, that’s perfectly fine. This year was an exception, though, because she turned twenty-one. And celebrating it early is all well and good, except that since she wasn’t twenty-one, we couldn’t take her anywhere for a toast. I consoled myself with the promise to do so when she returned to the States.

 

Her gift from us was a trip during her semester abroad, so she could see other countries and have fun with her new friends.

 

And then Covid arrived. The semester was cut short. The trip was cancelled. The bars were closed. We told her we’d give her a trip somewhere when Covid ended. But my guilt started to grow and overflowed the other day. I felt bad that her gift is being postponed for God knows how long (she’d rather an experience than an item, so we’re not changing our idea). I felt bad that I couldn’t take her out to celebrate her first legal drink (even though at this point it wouldn’t be her first). And I didn’t want her to think we were ignoring the milestone.

 

Ha.

 

I’m the only one in my family who likes to make a big deal of birthdays. She really didn’t care. She understood the situation and is fine with postponement. However, seeing how upset I was, she suggested we celebrate her half birthday, with a “fun 21^st birthday cake.”

 

The “fun 21^st birthday cake” is actually a “thing.” If you Google images for that term, you’ll see some mighty creative ideas. Most of them are really not appropriate for a parent to give to their child. Especially when that parent is me. I’m the mom who refused to host parties if alcohol was going to be present. I’m not the “fun mom.” Not by any means. So when she asked for the cake, I laughed at the irony.

 

But it was a good way to assuage my guilt, so I made one.