Saturday, March 26, 2011

"Qu'ils mangent de la brioche!"


The earlier part of January was a tough month for me until I came to the conclusion that living each day with heartbreak is like eating layered cake.

I've tested out this analogy by sharing the idea with quite a few people. Sometimes I get a raised eyebrow, and sometimes my spiel elicits a snort. Once or twice, I've seen a slow smile creep onto my listener's face...a smile of recognition (atleast that's what I'd like to interpret it as). And when I see that happen...oh that moment is just sublime.


Here is the recipe:

Heartbreak - it hits the worst in the morning. You wake up with this heaviness in your chest. In the cake, this is the bottom layer. It is dense, bitter and rum soaked, and weighted down by the everyday normality that you have to maintain.

Then you open the door and you see that daylight is invigorating and the air that you deeply inhale is fresh...this positive impact on you is tremendous! But shortlived. Oh right, you remember again...you're heartbroken. This moment is a very stingy layer of sweet strawberry jam spread thinly over the bottom layer.

Then there is unremarkable sponge cake filling...the parts of the day where you are gladly distracted and kept busy.

But then at some point of the day, you will lift your head up and see the world in such a different way. For me sometimes, I see slow motion beauty out the window - birds taking flight, or sunlight rimmed clouds luxuriating across the sky...things I wouldn't have been able to appreciate if I hadn't seen the more painful end of the experience spectrum. This is rich butter-cream icing that fill your taste buds with bliss (made of real butter, no shortening bullshit).

I wouldn't want to eat dense, bitter and rum soaked cake all day, and it's inadvisable to leave the bottom layer behind to rot on your dish . At the same time, one wouldn't really want to consume a glob of butter-cream all by itself either. Cake is best eaten by spearing a fork through all the layers and taking in the complexity of all the varying tastes and textures. And when you're done eating this cake, you can order a chocolate lava cake, or maybe a mango pudding (feel free to come up with your own recipe/analogies for these delectable dishes).

Afterall, isn't this what life is all about? Calorie intake?