...I bake.

It's true.  That's how I deal with stress.  I bake cakes, big fancy gateaus, loaded with frosing and cream.

It all started when I was 15.  I woke up in the middle of the night to hear my dad groaning in his bedroom next to mine.  At first I was grossed out because I thought...well, y'know.  Then I heard my mom say that she was going to call the doctor, and I knew that something was up.  I got up and went to see what was going on.

Dad was flat on his back in bed, his lips and nail beds a blueish color.  Mum ran downstairs to ring the doctor, and I reached down and helped dad sit up.  She came back and said that the doc was on his way, and we spent the next 15 minutes trying to keep dad coherent and with us.

The doctor came with his bag of tricks, which included a portable EKG machine, and within 30 seconds of hooking dad up to it told mum to ring for an ambulance and tell them he said to make it damn quick.  He gave dad a shot of epinephrine, and we waited for the ambulance.

It came, they loaded dad and mum up and they went off with lights and sirens to the John Radcliffe hospital 15 miles away. 

I was left at home with my little brother.  It was almost 3am, and there was nothing on TV - England only had 4 channels then, and they all quit transmitting after about 1am.  I paced for a while, then decided I was going to bake and frost a cake.  It seemed like the thing to do at the time....

By the time mum came home with the news that dad had indeed had a heart attack, it was 8am and the cake was cooked, cooled, frosted and me and my brother were eating a slice for breakfast.

Since then, it's been my 'thing' to bake when I'm stressed.  I baked after dad's 4 other heart attacks, and during his 2 bypass surgeries. I baked the night before I had a hysterectomy.  I baked daily for almost a week after 9/11. I baked the night before D went to Greenland for a year, and when we got denied orders to England last year I baked and cried an entire weekend away.

On Thursday, I baked.  I made a Black Forest gateau.  Three german chocolate sponges, with cherries and whipped cream between the layers, a pool of cherries on the top and whipped cream piped all over the outside, then covered with chocolate shavings and sprinkles.   When I was done, it looked almost too pretty to eat. 

When I get stressed, I bake. 

What do you do?