"Let Them Eat Cake"

     In 1966 our family returned to Spain for a second tour of duty.  We were excited about returning.  It was familiar country to us, having been there from 1960 to 1962, and there was much of Spain that we loved.

Santa Clara Base Housing
 

     Shortly after our arrival we were assigned to a base housing unit.  Now in the Air Force when you move into base housing, it's quite different from moving into a civilian apartment.  In civilian rentals, along with the first months rent, you pay deposits which are refundable when you move out.  In the Air Force the housing office instructs you to save up your first months rent because after you have been there a month, you will owe for two months. At that time Ted was a lowly Staff Sergeant with a wife and three children and we lived from payday to payday on a very tight budget.  It had already been an expensive move with trips home to visit both of our families before we left the states, so there wasn't anything extra in our meager budget.
     We moved into our new home and dutifully stuck the rent money into the base Credit Union, in reserve for next month's double rent.  Little did we know that our budget along with our new
commitment to trust God with our lives, was about to be tested and stretched to the limit.
     Several days after the move our car broke down.  Ted car-pooled every day to Moron Air Force Base.  He made arrangements with the other guys in the pool to pay someone to drive for him until we could afford to get the car fixed.  Those arrangements were fine with the guys, however, following closely on the heels of this mishap was another.  One of the other riders began to have car trouble.  Ted announced one night at supper, "We're going to have to take a portion of our rent money out of the Credit Union and get the car fixed.  Maybe we can make it up in the next pay check."
     Of course the next paycheck was the small one, reserved for groceries and gasoline with very little left over.  We reluctantly took out our reserve money and fixed the car.  In the meantime, I went to work on a bare-bones grocery list that hopefully, would stretch out over the month.  I bought extra flour, a small can of coffee, dried beans, a large box of powdered milk, and a large jug of syrup for pancakes.  I stocked up on pasta and canned tomatoes which could be spiced up and pass for spaghetti sauce.  (If you add chunks of polish sausage to this you have a complete meal.)  I succeeded in cutting the grocery bill significantly and planned to stretch what I had as far as possible.  We filled the car with gasoline and oil and deposited the remainder back into the "rent reserve".  Then we hunkered down to pray and wait to see how it would all come out.  We agreed not to complain or tell anyone outside our family and we agreed also, not to borrow money.  We wanted to see the Lord provide for out needs.  Ted did save out $10.00 in cash for emergencies like taking his turn to pay for the coffee on the way to work.
     We sailed along well for the first week and started the second with trepidation.  Our supplies seemed to be dwindling faster than we had anticipated.  The gasoline was half gone by Tuesday of the second week and we were out of bread, milk and margarine.  I mixed a pitcher of powdered milk and made biscuits with oil every day.  The kids took peanut butter and jelly on biscuits in their school lunches and several times we had oatmeal and biscuits for supper.
     By the middle of that week Ted said, "I have a quarter tank of gasoline left,...I bought it with the reserve coffee money and I have to drive to work on Friday.  I think were going to have to borrow money from someone because we still have a week to go."
     Everyone was silent  and I could tell that the children were disappointed.  One of them said, "But that's not the way God provides, is it?  When we ask Him to help us He doesn't want us to borrow money, does He?"
     Ted and I looked at each other, each hoping that the other would answer the question.  Finally after a moment of silence I remembered an illustration that fit the situation.

Cat peeking in the kitchen window!

     I said, "Let me tell you a story.  There's an old cat that lives around here.  Someone moved away and abandoned her.  She makes the rounds every morning to all the units.  She jumps up onto the kitchen window sills and meows incessantly until someone either throws water on her or gives her a morsel of food."
     "Do you feed her, Mom?" came the question.
     "Yes, I always give her something...leftover cereal, bread or milk.  I've even seen her eat beans, peas and plain old, cold spaghetti...and you know what...she's fat!"  The kids smiled, pleased to hear it, and waited for me to continue.
     "Well, this morning I crumpled up a biscuit and poured milk over it for her, petted her while she ate, and listened to her grateful purring.  This started me thinking...if this abandoned old cat can survive on people's generosity, which is pitiful compared to God's, how much more should we be able to flourish on His?"
      "Yes!" shouted the kids in chorus.
     Ted shot me a withering glance but smiled and said,  "Well you guys can meow if you want to, but I'm going to pray and wait on the Lord!"  I called him a hypocrite under my breath but after that there was no more talk of borrowing money and payday was a week away, with most of it already promised to go for the rent.
     By Friday we were down to spaghetti and spiced up tomato topping.  The flour was almost gone and had to be reserved for pancakes.  Ted had driven to Moron and put two of his emergency dollars in the gas tank and returned home on fumes.  When he got home the car was on empty.  We had oatmeal for super but no one went to bed hungry.
     The next morning was Saturday.  Everyone slept late but me.  I awoke at 6:00 a.m. staring into space and wondering, Lord, what am I going to feed them today?  I laid there for sometime taking survey of what we had in the cupboard, then I heard the door bell ring.  I grabbed my robe and rushed downstairs.  When I opened the door there stood Judy Harrison, one of the ladies in our Baptist Fellowship. She was holding a cookie sheet in each hand, covered with aluminum foil.
     "Hi!" she said with a bright smile and a demeanor that said that arriving on our doorstep at 6:30 on a Saturday morning was nothing out of the ordinary. "You're probably going to think I'm crazy, but I made your kids some cupcakes."
     I was stunned.  Finally I managed to say, "Come on in".
     She came in and laid the trays on the dinning room table then she uncovered them to reveal four dozen brightly frosted cup cakes.  "Thank you!" I said, "...but why?"
     "I have a niece named Kelly and today is her birthday and I miss her terribly.  Yesterday I was feeling so homesick for her and thinking about her all day, so I decided to bake her a birthday cake so Jerry and I could eat it and celebrate her birthday.  As usual I overdid it and instead of mixing up one cake mix I whipped up two and ended up with five dozen cupcakes.  The two of us will never be able to eat that many so I said, "Lord, what am I going to do with all of these cupcakes?"  Immediately, your family came into my mind because you have a daughter named Kelly also, so I decided to bring them to your kids."
     "Well thank you so much!" I said again.  "I'm sure we'll get rid of them for you."

Cupcakes galore!

     She started for the door, "I have to run.  Just bring the cookie sheets to church with you tomorrow."
     I was standing at the table pinching off bits of frosting when Ted and the children appeared.  I spread my arm over the trays of cupcakes and said dramatically, "Let them eat cake!"
     We had cupcakes for breakfast with hot chocolate made with powdered milk, cocoa and sugar,  oatmeal and cupcakes for lunch, then pancakes made without egg for supper with (you guessed it) cupcakes for dessert.  That night as we went to bed Ted said, "I'm sick of sugar!"
     "...but are you hungry?" I asked.
    "I don't think I'll ever want to eat again!" he replied.
     The next day,...Sunday, Ted put his last dollar in the gas tank and we went to church.  By then I was craving coffee like a junkie, so I prayed, Lord, please let them have coffee at Sunday School.  I was about to learn the many creative ways God has of answering prayer.  There was no coffee at Sunday School but after the Sunday School hour, Major Miller, our superintendent, announced to the teachers that we were having a planning meeting in the elementary school gym that afternoon at 2:00.
     After church and a lunch of red beans and...cupcakes.  I put the kids and Ted to bed for naps and drove to the school.
     When I entered the gym the smell of coffee filed my nose.  There was a thirty-six cup percolator sitting on a table across the room and I had to stop myself from running to it.  I deliberately stopped to greet the Major and another teacher before I went and poured myself a cup of coffee.
     No one else showed up for the meeting so it was very short.  At the end of it I went back to the pot and refiled my cup.  There was a plate of cookies sitting next to it, which held no appeal to me, the "queen of cupcakes", but I filed my pockets for the kids, then excused myself and started for the parking lot.  Before I reached the car, I heard the Major calling my name so I stopped and turned around.
     "Laura, would you like to take this coffee home?  I hate to pour it down the drain and you were the only one who drank any of it."
     "Sure!" I said.
     He came out with the coffee pot and put it on the floor of my car.  Tucked under his arm were the cookies in a sack.  "Here, you may as well take these too. My wife is on a diet and she told me not to bring them home."
     When Ted got up from his nap I was pouring coffee into jars and pitchers and storing it in the refrigerator.  I asked "Would you like a cup of coffee and a cookie?"
     "You'd think the Lord would have more of a sense of...well, nutrition, wouldn't you? Or at least variety..." he added.
     "Oh, I don't know, maybe He has some poor dentist out there that needs the work." I answered.
     Before the evening service one of the kids asked, "What are we having for supper tonight?"
     "I don't know." I said.  "Whatever the Lord provides but more than likely it will be cupcakes, cookies, and coffee."
     They looked at each other with curled lips and said something like "Oh boy!" One of them added, "I think I'll just fast and pray!"  To our surprise even the kids were full of sugar.
     Following the evening service, Louie Frobachino, a G.I. from Brooklyn and a real rabble rouser, called out to the congregation..."Hey, everybody! Let's go over to the Gehrke's and sing around the piano for a while!"
     As we moved toward the door Ted leaned close and said, "There goes your coffee!"
     "I just hope they don't mind drinking it with powdered milk." I replied.
     We rushed home and I poured the coffee back into the percolator and plugged it in.  While I was still in the kitchen the first couple to arrive brought in a can of powdered chocolate milk mix.  Then another couple came in with a tray full of tuna sandwiches cut in quarters.  Someone else threw a bag of potato chips on the counter.  I was putting cookies and cupcakes on a plate and fighting Ted and the kids away from the tuna sandwiches, when a lady came in and said, "Can you use some extra coffee?"  She handed me a three pound can of coffee.  I turned my eyes heavenward and prayed silently, Turn off the coffee, Lord!
     The following morning Ted said, "Wednesday is payday and I have to drive that morning.  If the Lord doesn't provide gasoline before then, I'm going to have to ask one of the other guys to drive for me."
     "OK." I replied and looked heavenward again and added..."Meow!"
     About 10:00, Tuesday morning there was a knock on my door.  When I answered it, I was surprised to see Linda Reed on my doorstep.  She and her husband, David also attended the fellowship.  She was expecting their first baby and due any day.  They lived in downtown Seville and hadn't yet bought a car so they took cabs and buses everywhere.
     "What are you doing here?" I asked.  "Are you in labor?"
     "No, I'm not in labor." she said.  "I came in a taxi and I have a proposition for you."
      She came in and explained.  "David told me to go to the commissary and buy enough groceries so he wouldn't have to shop when I have the baby, so I thought that if you would loan me your car I could do my shopping and take the groceries home.  I wouldn't have to take a cab and have him wait with the meter running while I made two or three trips up to my apartment with all those groceries."
     "Linda, I'd love to loan you my car but there's just barely enough gas to get to the base and I'm broke." I said.
     "No problem." she replied.  "I intended to put gas in it anyway."
     "All right." I answered.  "Come back and get me before you go home and I'll help you unload the groceries, then I can bring the car back home."
     She left and returned a couple of hours later with the back seat filled with groceries and she had filled the gas tank.
     "You didn't have to fill the tank." I protested, weakly.
     "It was the least I could do." she said with a dismissive wave of her hand.  I drove home later thanking the Lord for Linda's generous heart and a full tank of gasoline.
     Ted got home about five-thirty and came into the kitchen where I was whipping up the latest dish of "manna".
     He leaned against the cabinet with his arms crossed and a look on his face and twinkle in his eye that said, Brace yourself, I'm up to something!
     "You'd better put on a little extra, were having company for dinner."
     I gasped, felt the blood drain from my face and practically screamed..."What?"
     Seeing my panic he quickly went on to explain, "I invited David and Linda Reed to eat with us tonight.  They are kinda scared about the arrival of their baby.  They don't have a car and they live downtown.  David's a little worried about Linda going into labor in the middle of the night and him not being able to make himself understood to a taxi driver.  I just felt like they needed encouragement, so I invited them to dinner.  They'll be here in about an hour.
     "Ted!" I screamed again.  "We're having rubbery pancakes made without eggs, with no margarine to put on them.  They'll just be tasteless, flat things with syrup poured over them.  I don't even know if I can get the kids to eat them any more!  What were you thinking?"
     "Calm down. They're Texans! They'll eat anything." He dismissed me with his Yankee nose stuck up in the air.
     I yelled after him, "I'm a Texan too, but what we're about to pass off as pancakes we couldn't even get a self respecting Texas hog to eat!"
     Notwithstanding, they arrived promptly within the hour.  I had the table set with the syrup poured into a pitcher and some jelly ladled prettily into a small dish with a spoon. A glass of ice water sat by each plate with a cup for coffee by the adults.  A heaping platter of rubbery pancakes were keeping warm in the oven.  Everyone took their seats at the table and I brought out "dinner".
     "I hope your guys like pancakes!" said Ted and I shot him a look that should have fried him.
     "I love pancakes!" said David, "but can I have a glass of milk with mine?"
     "Do you mind if it's powered milk?" I asked nonchalantly.
     "Uh...never mind.  I'll just drink water."
     We passed around the platter of pancakes and Linda asked, "Do you have any butter?"
     "No, I'm sorry, we're out of it." I stammered.
     David put his fork down and looked at Ted. "Ted, you folks are out of food, aren't you?"
     Everyone was silent for a moment as we sat and waited for Ted to answer. I'm sure our faces were red a we looked at him.
     "Well, I guess "the cat's out of the bag" so to speak." he said.
     For some reason that was the funniest thing we'd heard in two weeks, or perhaps we were all a little hysterical.  We all started laughing. Joel laughed so hard he fell off his chair and I think I was laughing and crying at the same time.  I was embarrassed, relieved and still a little angry with Ted.
     Then Ted started at the beginning and told them the whole story of how we had been praying and trusting the Lord for food and gasoline for over two weeks, how we had saved up our double rent then had to spend it on the car.  He told them my story about the cat, Judy's cupcakes, Major Miller's coffee and cookies,  and Linda's full tank of gasoline.  They were sympathetic, amazed and amused at the same time.  But when it was all over, something even more amazing happened.  During the conversation someone got the idea to have them move in with us until the baby was born.  They would bring their clothes and their supply of groceries and be close to the base hospital with a car at their disposal.  It was a perfect plan and one we began to execute immediately.
     That evening after they were all moved in David said, "Who wants a ham sandwich before they go to bed?"  Amid cheers, Linda and I went to the kitchen to make sandwiches.
     She carried the untouched tray of pancakes from the dinning room to the kitchen and asked, "Do you want me to throw these away?"
     I looked at them for a moment and said, "No, I think I know a cat who will appreciate them for breakfast in the morning."




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