A Seussian Embrace of the Imperfect

Happy 121st Birthday to Dr. Seuss

Sometimes, it’s way more important to just do a thing than it is to do it well. 

The proof is in the cake pictured above. Here’s the story:

Sam is 22. He’s my youngest son and a born artist who delights in creation. He gave me notice a few months ago that this year, we needed to celebrate Dr. Suess’ birthday. I even put it on my calendar. Then my heart sank a little when I realized his birthday was this Monday, at the beginning of a very busy week. 

Sam said not to worry. He had it in hand. He’d invited a bunch of friends to a Dr. Seuss birthday tea party, where he intended to serve a 20-layer cake. Yes, 20 layers. I imagined pancake-flat layers, but he wanted the real deal. He called his veteran-cake-decorator sister from the grocery store for advice on how to hold the layers together (bamboo skewers). She sent her best frosting recipe. And he came home with 10 boxes of cake mix, four new cake pans, and most of the rest of the ingredients he would need. 

He got right to work and quickly became aware that he was going to need more time. So he called his guests and delayed the start of the party from 2pm to 4pm. Having just completed my most urgent tasks of the day, I passed through the kitchen about 2. He was hoping to be frosting the cake by now, but he was still baking, and asked if I could help him at all. 

So we worked together for the next two hours. I tried to get him to adjust his goal. A 20-layer cake wasn’t going to happen. We didn’t have enough frosting or filling for all that, nor did we have the necessary skill to balance them. Already, our 8 layers looked a lot like the Leaning tower of Pisa. But Sam had a dream and the dream was not an 8-layer cake. He told me to have faith, and offset the next four layers onto the base to try and balance things out. Then added a bunch of skewers to keep them there. 

Only now, the bottom layers started to compress under all that weight. Sam shoved some wooden coasters underneath to prop up one side. And kept adding layers. 

The guests (12 in all) started arriving a little before 4 and got invested in the project. About 4:45, the last two layers were carefully placed on top of a not-quite-20-layer cake. Then we had to add on 121 candles. We ran out at 120, so we took off two candles and replaced them with a candle shaped like a 3. Guests who were judged to be trustworthy with fire gathered in a circle so their matches could all be lit at once. Then we started singing while the candles were being lit; and blew them out at the end of the song, even though we were still lighting. Then we started digging into delicious. Yes, this cake lived up to the family tradition that the worse it looks, the better it tastes. 

It was supposed to be a Pinterest-perfect party, where we were all dressed like Seuss characters, sipping herbal tea and conversing in rhymes, with an awe-inspiring cake in the center of a well-set table in a pristine dining room. 

It was not. Instead, it was something truly Seussian. And we did still speak in rhymes. 

I’m so glad I didn’t miss that memory, and I wanted to share it with you, because I’m taking some lessons from it and applying them to my understanding of building beloved community through musicals.

I’ve been pondering on my earlier post about the importance of a cake being both tasty and beautifully frosted, and how that applies to Summit Stages: our musicals need to combine excellent artistry with messages that lift and unite. I still believe that, as far as publishing full musicals goes. But I’ve also been listening to The Artist’ Way by Julia Cameron, who says, “Serious art is born from serious play.” I’ve been remembering that art is at least as much about the joy of creating as it is about producing a masterpiece. And you’ll never get to what the critics define as a masterpiece without creating a bunch of Seussian cakes along the way. 

The beautiful thing is that there is magic in doing art together, even when it’s a little messy. I learned more about that yesterday evening, when my decision to prioritize the Seuss cake prevented me from having a song ready for an online seminar on media literacy. But that’s a story for next week. In the meantime, here’s to joyously embracing the process of art and letting it bring us into connection.