The Cake Is Not a Lie.

Ladies and gentlemen, I am aware that many of you may be under the impression that the cake is a lie. But I am here to tell you with near certainty that the cake is, in fact, the truth.

Well, there's this computer game. In it, there are lies. There are empty promises of cake. There are calculated intentions of murder. That's not really what I'm talking about.

But perhaps it is not a bad way to represent more weighty things, things that pertain to life. The kind of life that happens outside of computer games. Anyhow, most games are a commentary on if not an outright metaphor for (if not a blatant simulation of) life. The game is one wherein the player is supposedly taking an aptitude test for some manner of scientific research company. At least that was the impression I got. You see, I haven't actually played the game. I have merely spent some time watching someone else play it while making (senseless, thoughtless) applications to actual human interaction.

In the game, you are told that there will be cake. In real life, you are told something similar (for now, we will disregard the fact that in real life you are often told so many things at once that they might in fact seem to cancel each other out), but of course in both simulation and reality there is disappointment. But never mind all that. I want to get on to the good part.

However, I feel I can't get to the good part without at least mentioning that eventually, expectations can shift toward the disappointed end of the disappointment spectrum, and they often do. We expect the cake to be a lie most of the time. Maybe this is wise, but I am not wise so I have no way of knowing if it is or it isn't.

In high school, I used to work at a stable. It was owned by an older couple who were the kindest people I would ever expect to meet (in the spirit of this post, they were kinder than any person I would expect to meet,) and I don't doubt that I will be much older indeed by the time I will have liked a job half as much as I liked that one. Since they are so sweet, I usually visit them when I am home from school and listen to them talk about things. (An aside: listening to people talk who have lived longer than I have is one of my favorite things. If you haven't tried it, you should.) The last two or three times I came home, though, I was unable to visit them, and hadn't seen them for some time.

On Christmas eve, I got a phone call from Gail. She said, "Hi! I just wanted to call and wish you a merry Christmas!" Needless to say, I was happy to receive the call. Also, I had not been expecting it. I expressed these sentiments as well as returning her greeting. And then she said, "And I baked you a cake!"

I really didn't know what to do with this information, but on the most explicable level of discourse, I'd say it pretty much made my life.

That's really all I wanted to say. There are times when you don't even expect a phone call and you get a cake. The cake is not a lie.