The next two cakes I was lucky enough to make are two of my favorites. Not because I thought they were overly spectacular or amazing, but because of why I made them. One of my favorite quotes has been attributed to British Prime Minister Tony Blair, but snopes.com says it was the work of an 'unknown forwarder' at some point in email history. Regardless of who said it, it's still true: Throughout history only two defining forces have been willing to die for you. Jesus Christ, and the American GI - one died for your soul, the other for your freedom. Have truer words ever been spoken? I think a lot of times we get wrapped up in the politics of military activity. Everywhere you go someone seems to have an opinion about it vastly different from your own. Which is good - this is a free country, after all. What really bothers me, though, is the blatant disregard for the men and women who continually fight for our freedom to express the opinions we have. So when I was asked by my neighbors, Wes and Kate, to make a cake for a close friend who was deploying, I jumped on the opportunity. I did have a bad case of 'baker's block' when I was planning the cake, but after playing around a little - and spending some time in the toy aisle at Walmart - I came up with the desert theme cake complete with a Rice Krispie camouflage tent and some Army men. Again, I never thought it was spectacular, but I was proud, and honored to make it.
The next deployment cake hit a little closer to home for me. This past Thanksgiving was a great day, but bittersweet due to the fact that we all knew that the next morning my nephew, Buddy, was flying back to El Paso to get ready to deploy to Iraq. How was this even possible? He was just a baby yesterday, and now he's a grown man putting himself in harm's way for the safety and freedom of people he doesn't know. Because this time this soldier was so close to me, I was lost for ideas. When I had asked him for his help with ideas for Wes and Kate's cake he made the comment that a unit patch on a cake would be a cool idea - so that's what I did for him. It was a pretty big cake and a relatively small patch so that's where the US Army logo came in. Every dot of icing I put on that cake broke my heart a little more, know what it represented. And to see my nephew choked up and with tears in his eyes when he saw it nearly brought me to my knees. Gladly, he'll be home for leave in just two more weeks and then home 'for good' eight weeks after that. I'm hoping for 'for good' anyway - he's already planning his next tour in 2012.
So for now, for anyone reading this, please take a moment and pray for the safety of our troops - whether or not you agree with their being where they are - they still need prayers for safety and prayers of gratitude. Another favorite quote of mine is: If you can't stand behind our troops, feel free to stand in front of them. And I think I'll just leave it at that.
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