BUNNY CAKE

"The great gift of Easter is hope..." -Basil Hume

Day before Good Friday dawned  dull and boring. At least that’s how it started. My mother was working a half day. Making uniforms  for the Hotel. I won’t be gone long , she said, as she packed a thermos full of tea.

The tv blared away with Bugs Bunny running around like a mad thing, tormenting Elmer Fudd. I was only half watching. The rest of the time I watched the clock. Three hours to myself, I thought.

I was home with a cold  ( sort of).   She waggled her finger at me. “Don’t get into things,” she said. I grinned. I was 1O, I think. Something like that. I never got into things. Things  just kind of happened…..

  I was going to bake a Bunny cake, I had decided. For Easter. For Mrs. Bliss  from across the street. She was coming over later.

But first I was going to play.  So I took down the sheer curtains from the living room and fastened them  all around me like a huge wedding dress. I had done this on numerous occasions.  The sheers trailed behind me about 10 feet, as I paraded up and down the living room singing the bridal march, at the top of my voice.

I got bored of that. Time to teach school. I loved teaching school.

Then I set up my barbies and stuffed animals in rows, as if they were my students. Told them they were all in detention and they would have to learn their ABC’s. 

Then I  yelled at them that a storm was coming . They had to put on  toques and parkas. I yelled that it was now a tornado. Then I knocked them all over.

A knock . Tap tap tap. It came again. Tap tap tap.The living room looked like a tornado hit , my  curtains trailing behind me, I did something I had been told never to do. Open the door.

It was Mrs. Bliss from across the road. She saw me, saw the curtains, saw my dolls all over the floor. She asked after me.  Mrs. Bliss said my mother asked her to check up on me. 

“Just about to slay dragons, “ I chirped. “Ahhhh,” said Mrs. Bliss. “Slay away.  I will be back later.” She toddled back across the street.

I was bored again. So I got another idea. I would make the Bunny Cake this year.  

I got mixing bowls, a big spoon, flour, water and the bunny cake pan from my Easy Bake Oven. I loved that thing. Didn’t work. But I loved it.

I dutifully mixed flour and water, beating it till it was the consistency of pudding. Had to tuck up the train of my dress as it was sort of in the way when I walked over to the oven. Again, something else I had been told not to touch.

I turned on the inside light,  just like my Easy bake Oven. I plopped in the dough into my Bunny Pan and shoved it into the  oven.

Then I watched it.  I guess you had to turn on the oven. 

But no time for that now. My mother would be home soon. She was only gone a half day, before Easter weekend. The house was a mess, the Bunny Cake  looked like goo. I retrieved it, and the bowls of extra flour-pudding. Couldn’t decided what to do with them. I got an idea.I dumped all of the  flour dough down the toilet and flushed. It burped like a hippo  in the mud

I washed  bowls and the Bunny pan. Cleaned up my dolls, managed to get the curtains back up where they were supposed to be; had done it many times before. I just stood on the back of the antique chaise lounge and threaded them thru the curtain rod. Easy Peasy.

Then I sat down in front of the tv to watch the Young and the Restless. My mother came home right about then.

She noticed right away that the toilet was  goopy. She called a plumber. He said he’d be over within the hour. (Those were the days). My mother  pulled back the sheer curtains, ready  for Mrs. Bliss. My mother found goo on the curtains.  She yanked them down. I had to take them down to the laundry. The plumber came and fixed the toilet for $50. 

When Mrs. Bliss arrived, I let her in. It was tea time. It was Easter. It was as it always was . She would stay for a good long while and visit. She  handed me  a cake shaped like a Bunny.

 Then she winked at me, and asked  if maybe next time I could slay some dragons for her……

Photographs 2022