BenTwig Bakes a Cake...

Hello everyone! I would like to take this opportunity to pass along a very heart-felt Happy Holidays to all that may come to visit. No matter your religion, nor matter of your beliefs, nor matter in which you celebrate this most spiritual of times within our year, I hope it finds you all well with the embrace and warmth of good tidings! May peace be within you and may blessings of love fall upon your heart!

That being said, I am so happy that you have come to visit this day as I am so happy to be amongst the words and memories of my friends. The holidays are always a time a year for me that brings a little bit of every emotion to my minds eye. From the sadness of loved ones and friends that I can no longer share in their company to the absolute joy of remembering a time's past where the laughters and joys flush my face warm to think amongst family and friends sharing their own view and voice. I hope this blog will be a place of peace and joy and a wonder to behold, that though we face hard times our hearts are full, our souls remember and our eyes see that there is always and forever, more hope and love in this world than can ever be taken away. ...and so, BenTwig bakes a cake...

The Spices of Life

Life is nothing more than a vision of hope upon which rests an intangible feeling, dreadful or euphoric once touched. Grandma always had a way with words that would make a young boy of five cringe, but now later in my life and Grandma passed, I look back and remember. I always thought, then, that dreadful and euphoric were spices in her spice closet and I find truth in that while I have never found a spice so named, I certainly found them there.

The spice closet, gently tucked into a wall adjacent the refrigerator, was more than just shelves of enhanced flavor or a place for the cast iron skillets hide, hanging from there brass captures alerting all to an entry; it was an escape. Whether it was from reality or just a scalding summer day, it always had a welcoming glow to my eye, while almost any visitor could overlook it as just a door to nothing. Its ordinary wooden facade with forty years of peeling varnish stained, as if breaking out of a cocoon gave no sign of the vibrant life that lay within it. Only the brass doorknob shining brightly, seemingly always beaconing my gaze, worn around its edges gave any notice that the closet what used at all. It would be on may occasions when neighbors would stop my Grandma's house, where I could be found sitting in the spice closet's doorway, in one or two feet of shadow, rearranging the little shakers of life.

The shakers themselves, being of no mountainous importance to anyone else, found such excitement in my mind. It was if peering out from a rainbow, all other things skewed by its colorful aroma to my eyes and sniffs-a-plenty. There was cinnamon, in its glass bottle, seemingly towering over all the others. Its red cap atop an emerald green wrapper, as if a rose on a stem without thorns would always find it way into my hands and a place amongst the shelves worthy of a king's pedestal. Perched idly by may lay peppermint, which was my favorite, my clown to the king's gaze. Not for its sweet taste, but that it was the smallest shaker and I could hide it anywhere amongst the rest. The candy treats it brought to mind made finding it on my next visit, as if it were the punch line to every joke, for it was always well met with a giggle. Then there was the apple pie spice with its label of brilliant red and cap of brown crust. When opened it would overtake all my senses and cause a case of drooling any hungry dog would have to appreciate and if found with the ginger, just slightly taller in stature whose color reminded me of the tail of our collie glistening in the sun, heaven would find me well, within these moments of my youth. These spices were to my child's eye all that was good within the world, they were my euphoria.

Spices of another sort, neither so pleasurable nor alluring, could be found, well placed, tucked lower on the shelves than the rest. Not that they be weak of flavor, only that their scent brought no happiness to my nose and mind. It was in these bottle that I found my dreadful. From Cumin, with its odor that brought visions of stuffing a skunk into such a small container, to basil which no matter that argument my Grandmother would present, my opinion was firmly placed in that basil should be completely absent from anything edible. The texture alone was as if chewing peeled paint taken from the side of a chicken coop. Finding the basil meant finding all things bad to me and at times, mistaking it for peppermint for they sharing the same alluring colored bottles, I would grab the basil only to have it shatter my expectations with one sniff of the pungent weed. Thus I learned that sometimes, the label has nothing to do with what is on the inside. How true this has been to my life from leftovers in the fridge to people that have crossed my path.

So in closing and in remembrance of a time that brings sweet memories to my mind I wish you all the very best of spices of life, which ever ones that may be to you. Life is a series of difficulties, victories and triumphs. As in all spices they give our lives flavor and meaning. Organizing the spices in Grandma's spice closet taught me to keep the sweet and pleasurable ones closest to my heart. Let Cumin and Basil handle reality, while one only needs to close their eyes and reach, to find peppermint and apple pie!

Merry Christmas, Bless the Winter Solstice, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa, Peace on Earth and Good Will 2008,

Benjamin Twig