About 3-4 days ago, I started seeing "cake" references all over Twitter. 

I can't say it did anything other than serving a reminder, I had to order a cake for my grandfather's birthday. 

If you know me, you'd know, I'm a fucking deviant when it comes to cake and cake picking. I think, the anxiety for picking a cake and placing an order is far more than what it is when I go for a job interview or I don't know, minutes before you start kissing someone. It's fucking real, the palpitation and the pulse that races. 

Could this be recreated in buttercream? No wait, this colour won't work cause baker would use a golden board and that would be a disaster. 

Point being, I love cakes. I dig cakes. I am obsessed with the perfect cake. 

Perfect cake has components, if they come together like improvisation in jazz, it truly does make the world's difference. It is divine. If it doesn't, well, you're fucked. 

Thankfully, India has reached that point where bakers can make their cakes taste just as good as they can make it look. There's no shame in saying I've probably once had a cake abroad and despite all the fancy looks, it was quite mediocre. I will obviously withhold the fact that the cake was store-bought and purchased minutes before my birthday cause the guy who was baking the cake, fell ill and ate the whole cake by himself at home.

Then people ask about my trust issues. 

Imagine my surprise, when I started seeing "cake" tweets for days together. 

Did this happen when I was sedated for a day and a half in between on anti-histamines? No, can't be. I can't miss such a big reference that literally everyone's talking about it. My own friends, I saw memes, tweets.

What on earth is the cake reference? 

I think the anxiety peaked as I spent close to four hours yesterday looking up a cake for my grandfather's birthday. Just keywords of what I think he would like. Man's grown up without his parents and worked hard all his life. He deserves a ridiculously good looking cake to mark all his achievements. 

You see, the cake isn't just any dessert. 

The cake is a marker, of how far you've come and how much you've grown. It is symbolic of the person you are. If the cake is representative of the year you're going to have or the life you will lead, would you or would you not pay attention to it? 

That's the thing about birthdays. Why do we celebrate them? If it is to mark the years gone and celebrate the growth, then the cake has to be in tandem with the sentiment and if it is to mark some superstition of how the year ought to be, then it has to be even better, perhaps. 

I think my family or friends don't quite understand or know the extent of my cake mania. Perhaps, the only people who truly do are the fine folks at the bakery where I order my custom cakes from. I've had the pleasure to work in the organization where the baker's daughter was interning and that's how I learned about their venture. 

In the last one year and half a dozen cakes for family later, they know my mania in entirety. Any cake order will take close to a day cause that's how many times I'll go back and forth on details, image references, colours, frosting, shape, size, toppers, base details and flavour. 

You may think these are words but for me, these are all blocks in putting a combination so wonderful that it makes a cake come together. 

I used to take pride in recommending people food places. Now, my pride and my perfection is down to placing a cake order and believe me, the anxiety is real. 

Last month, for Exhibit B's birthday, it took over 10 days for the cake to be confirmed and then 3 days of complete anxiety and anti-histamines until the cake was picked and dropped by a third party vendor. 

This time, I waited until the last 4 days and did everything last minute to avoid my cake anxiety from peaking. 

If you were to text and ask what did I do today, I'd have to tell you that I spent all my time planning and placing the order for the cake. 

Anyway, while prepping my dinner today, I thought about the cake Twitter and how embarrassing would it be to ask someone. 

Everyone who ever said, "Ask and you shall receive" they clearly meant embarrassment by the gallon. 

I thought of who I could ask. 

May? No. She'd tell me but it possibly will lack details cause of her internet connection. 

T? Perhaps, he knows Twitter like I used to know things when I was young and he'd give me all the background info, but, he'd also judge me cause how do I not know anything. 

That's true, I've hit T up more than a few times on checking on trending topics cause I've been so out of it. He's been helpful but I don't want him to not have a crush on me and if I keep asking dumb questions, the crush can only last as much. 

Until ofcourse, I hit Twitter an hour ago and found a prominent writer/influencer ask "What's Cake Twitter". Lo, and behold. 

I think I wasted my wish on a cake. Could have asked for something else. 

(Reference of the day.)