Still, when asked, all of a sudden we're all goose eggs and blank stares, minds full of empty old western-style towns and tumbleweeds rolling softly down the main streets amid little tornadoes of dust.
After much deliberation, we then come up with a short list and email it. We then promptly forget about the whole thing. Which is why when I opened this next present, I was surprised. Pleased, but surprised.
Heavy box. I tore into it and saw 5 or 6 boxes of cake mix. I do love cake. It was still a strange thing for my mother to get me.
I said, "We have all special occasions covered for the next year!" Then, I turned to my husband and said, "We're going to have to look up random celebrity birthdays and National Day ofs and make our own celebrations to use up all this cake."
Opened a few more presents... Another weighty box. Low and behold...
My mother had given me TWELVE boxes of cake mix
by the time all the presents were opened.
Ignore the fiber cereal in my cupboard and shut it because I like that cereal and stop judging me right now.
The take away from the photo is that every box of cake mix in there was wrapped up for me for Christmas by my mother. My health conscious, calorie aware, brushes her teeth at 6 pm and doesn't take another bite of anything until the next morning mother. My thin, "let me chop you up an apple" mother. This is a woman who has never had to have "eat salads" as her yearly New Year's resolution. She's always encouraged me to be healthier, which is great, to a point. This is the antithesis of the mom who eagerly bought me diet pills at 16.
Now, I know I'm not the thinnest girl. However, I did lose 75-85 pounds a couple years before I met my husband. Granted, it sort of happened by accident, but I have kept most of it off.
Another box and I found 2 cake pans, one filled with more mixes. I pulled a couple out and there was something in the bottom of the pan, under all the mixes. Which is when I found something that made it all make sense.
"Oh, that's right! I did ask for the Cake Doctor books!"
Then, we finished unwrapping all our presents, and my mom said my aunt had sent a box this year. Now, we don't normally exchange presents. The last time we saw her was at my grandad's funeral a couple years ago.
Which was when my hubby finally got to meet the extended family.
It was in Kentucky.
Welcome, Happy Wife's non-white, non-southern husband.
It sort of went "Happy Wife is married? Wow!"
"Where is her husband? WOW!"
Nothing like a surprise at a funeral!
It actually went pretty well considering but it was a tad strange. That is another story for another day. A day when I am looking to be disowned, I guess.
Anyway, not only do we not see my extended family often, we don't talk on the phone or even email. So, let's say distant relations. Let it be known that my aunt and uncle are very nice. Eclectic. She went to clown college at one point. When I was 16, she let me bring my best friend on a plane to Lexington, Kentucky, for a vacation, and we had a wonderful time. She was a tour guide back then. Very fond memories. My only 2 cousins are her sons, who are older than me and who I've never been very close to. Don't even get me started. They're kind of nuts. They were already grown up and living elsewhere the time when my friend and I came to visit. To my knowledge, we've never shared a Christmas with my aunt and her family.
So, my aunt just sent a box out of the blue to my folks' house with a couple things for everyone. It was a nice surprise. She sent one box of Bulgarian chocolates to my husband and one to me. One of her sons and his wife are living in Bulgaria, so it made sense. I opened up the couple other presents for me. Some pink socks and some Bulgarian rose perfume in a pretty little bottle. Wait until you see what she sent my husband... I nearly peed my pants. But that is for the next post.
Right now, you have to keep in mind ALL THE CAKE that is happening from my mother as I opened the stuff from my aunt. Wowzers.
I...
With the...
Wha...
Really?
Ouch.
My cake mixes would like to duel you to the death, Aunt's Christmas Present.
Now.
And it will be a bloody, violent, images-to-scar-your-retinas duel.
Oh, yes, those are indeed Weight Watchers books.
Um (long pause), thank (longer pause) you (elaborate sigh)?
Is this supposed to start a fight? Okay, sure. I'll play.
I'll hit your spot, all right!
Then I'm gonna comfort the classic right off of you!
I'm going to take these vegetables and -
I have nothing against Weight Watchers. Good for anyone who can lose weight that way!
I also have never been in Weight Watchers. Not even close.
Not that I've never tried to lose weight. Sure, I have. I'm human. A pudgy human at that. I never made it very far. I remember very clearly one time, I was attempting to diet in my early 20s. I was about 3 days in and I was living with my grandmother at the time. I was standing in the kitchen, counting the number of blueberries as I put them on my plate, since there was a specific number I was allowed to have with supper.
Grams begged me to stop. I forged on for probably another couple hours or something. Then, I fell of the diet pretty fast, and there was a noticeable change in the house and in my grandmother. Colors were brighter, jaws no longer clenched, the world was new.
My grandma said, "Please promise you you'll never go without cake again. It's not right. You're just not you without cake."
She was right, of course. Besides, what is life without cake once in a while? Sad is what it is.
It really says something that I did not take this gift from my aunt personally. There were definitely some years when this would have really hurt my feelings.
I haven't felt thin since before the 6th grade, when a gym class physical revealed to me and the class that I weighed 130 pounds. I was also tiny - no meat on my bones at all, but I remember it very clearly. It being how horrified I was throughout my entire itty bitty being. Even at my thinnest as an adult, I have never felt thin and I doubt I ever will. I could be 80 pounds and I would still see a fat person in the mirror.
I guess being married has changed me more than I realized. All I did when I opened this was crack up laughing. No matter what imperfections I have, my hubby loves me, and he also loves the way I look. It's hard for me to even type that but I know that it is true. Even during my ugliest moments, he looks at me and I can tell that he really does love me. Somehow, this in turn makes me a lot easier on myself and a lot more comfortable in my own skin.
The Weight Watchers books were so strange, so random yet so specific, that I didn't have time to calculate a reaction or to put on some type of face. And yet all that came out was real laughter. I could not have found the spectrum of Christmas books more completely insane and hilarious and awesome! HOLY SH*TMAS!
*Note: I made a cake after we got the hubby's biopsy results. The cake and frosting were my first attempt with the Cake Doctor Returns and it was possibly the best cake I have ever made.
*Second Note: We have not opened the non-Cake Doctor books yet. Sorry, health. My bad.
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