Southern Legitimacy Statement: Born: Maryland. Schooled: South Carolina, Maryland, Pennsylvania, South Carolina again, Texas, South Carolina again, Tennessee.
Cake
This story tastes good with music. How about “Miss Poopie” by the Jimmy Herring Band?
See, guys never can get enough to eat in the cafeteria. Which is why, out of the goodness of their hearts, girls are always cooking up something in their dorm kitchen, sending it across campus. About once a week, fudge or brownies arrive for some guy and, since our noses are highly attuned to food, within seconds we’re all buddying up to him. And alakazam! End of brownies.
Well, things changed about a month ago, when a guy in North dorm got a Red Devil’s Food Cake with white icing. Must have been a special occasion because, in my experience, girls normally only make fudge or brownies. Now here’s the thing, there was something wrong with that cake. Because Jerry got sick—I mean, really disgusting sick. Made me shudder, watching him puke all over the place—his bed, his textbooks, his Bible Prophecy Chart. But I wondered how it could be from cake, because girls don’t make cakes from scratch, they use cake mixes and nobody gets sick from cake mixes. I mean, this is the ‘60s.
The problem is, it wasn’t just one guy puking—it was five more. In the same dorm. The same night. That’s when I concluded—Red Devil’s Food Cake. Well, it was enough to get the attention of the Dean of Men. He told the college nurse to give them all Pepto-Bismol. Which, unfortunately, didn’t help Jerry. I knew it was grave when the ambulance driver said Jerry wouldn’t be coming back.
A couple of days later, people prayed for the other five guys in Chapel—during Jerry’s Memorial Service. You know, it’s a good thing we’re at a Bible College because people are always willing to pray for you. Except, they missed a guy. Ray was over in South dorm, puking his way to the bathroom. And he hadn’t eaten any Red Devil’s Food Cake. Not that I know of. Somebody said his lips were blue. Pepto-Bismol doesn’t cure that. I wish I had told Ray how much his testimony meant to me—that’s what I was thinking the following Friday, all through his Memorial Service.
As for Pete and those guys in Central dorm, well, I have no idea what they ate. But that’s when the nurse ran out of Pepto-Bismol; consequently, Pete’s ongoing was somewhat protracted. I didn’t know he was planning to be a Foreign Missionary. Learned that during his service that next Monday.
What happened next really caught us off-guard. Ted and Mitch, Al and a couple of the other cake-eaters packed up and left in the middle of the night in Ted’s van. Word was they were transferring to a college without Bible in its name, 800 miles north of here. We figured Pepto-Bismol had gotten them back to regular, so, imagine our sorrow when we learned Ted succumbed near Cincinnati. He wasn’t driving, which was a blessing. Regrettably, Mitch slipped away at a gas station near Joliet, only thirty miles from that liberal college. We didn’t have a Memorial Service for either of them, probably because they had left campus without permission. To be on the safe side, the nurse ordered more bottles of Pepto-Bismol and hauled more beds into the infirmary.
The week after, there were very few guys in Old Testament class. Futile, really, sitting in a lecture hall with mostly girls, trying to concentrate on why the prophet Job had a bad habit of challenging God every time something went against him. One of the girls—Penny—was reading from the Book of Job out loud and she got to the verse that said, for the arrows of the Almighty are in me; they poison my spirit.
Poison! Now, I’m not a suspicious guy. After all, I’m preparing to serve the Almighty. But I had to wonder if there was something sinister going on. So after class, I went up to the girl and asked her, point blank, why she chose that particular verse. As I expected, she said the professor asked her to read it. Then she sort of huffed and walked off. I had my doubts about her. But, since no guys checked out the rest of the week from eating cake or anything, I let it go.
I shouldn’t have. It happened again, up on Steve’s floor. However, it couldn’t have been from Red Devil’s Food Cake. Unless someone made another one. Two guys carried away—Steve and his roommate. A double Memorial Service, which went overtime and made me late for World Missions class. I don’t think I mentioned that the nurse left our college and girls who are planning to be Missionary Nurses were dispensing the Pepto-Bismol.
Nolan. Nolan vowed he hated Red Devil’s Food Cake. Never ate it. I have no idea why he would kid me about that. Man, was his Memorial Service inspiring. The most thrilling part, “The Old Rugged Cross” played by the trumpet trio. How exciting to see Trustees from around the nation up on the platform with Nolan’s father in the center—he’s Chairman of the Board. Our President, in one of his rare appearances, preached an excellent sermon, although he kept saying Stanley instead of Nolan. Which is unfortunate because God had called Nolan to be President of a Bible College someday. And guess who his role model was.
By the way, Nolan was the one who told me that saltpeter was being sprinkled on food in the cafeteria. Of course, I didn’t believe him. Here’s the deal. No administrators of a Bible College would even think of monkeying around with sex drive. Talk about blasphemy! I mean, God in three persons! (Excuse me for cursing.) So, I asked the cafeteria manager and he assured me—no saltpeter on any food in our cafeteria, ever. In fact, he’s up to date on the subject, since, every once in a while, somebody wants to know. He gave me a tip—saltpeter is a white powder, so anyone would see it on top of food, except maybe food like rice or mashed potatoes.
You may be wondering why I’ve brought saltpeter up. Because that was the word Nolan whispered, through blue lips, as they loaded him into the ambulance. I knew right then he was delirious.
Well, Chapel was becoming kind of routine. Every few days, another service for a classmate or two who were no longer with us. It’s lamentable—I will graduate from Bible College, but they won’t.
Now, Amar’s departure was different. See, he was an international student with no family, so he had the distinction of being the first student buried on campus. Some guys made him a cross out of scrap wood at the maintenance shed. Wrote on it with a wood-burning tool, Amar has a family now.
The day after Amar’s service, I was sitting in Christian Psychology and our professor—we call him Dutch behind his back—said something that set off a chain reaction in my head. He was lecturing on evolutionary development a la Darwin: the strongest survive, the weakest die. Dutch was making the point that natural selection was an anti-Christian theory. I beg to differ, I wanted to say. Darwinism is not mere theory—it is being practiced on campus here and now. However, since differing isn’t encouraged at our Bible College, I wrote my line of reasoning in the back of my notebook:
1. Whereas, we are preparing for full-time Christian Service throughout the world (Mark 16:15);
2. Whereas, individuals in full-time Christian Service must be strong enough to face all manner of evil, persecution, even death (I Corinthians 15:31);
3. Whereas, our class is the largest in the history of our Bible college (Pres. Hart’s convocation sermon last semester, “Fit for Godly Service”);
4. Therefore, there will not be a sufficient number of positions as Missionaries, Pastors, Evangelists, etc.;
5. And, therefore, weak guys are being eliminated.
I had another therefore that I didn’t write down, in case someone found my notes:
6. There will be more than enough girls for the fittest to choose from.
I had to congratulate myself on figuring it out. And truth be told, I was relishing my status as one of the fittest. Although, I did have a shadow of a doubt—could the next Memorial Service be for me? I mean, I don’t want to think more highly of myself than I ought to think.
The next week was free of puking and ambulance sirens, thank God. And we did thank God every day in Chapel, with lively hymns and uplifting sermons. Evidently, Darwinism had been practiced at our college to the extent necessary. Or so I thought, until this morning, when Penny stopped me after Chapel and announced, “We’ve made you a cake.”
I tried not to sneer, but I was on to her immediately. “Is it Red Devil’s Food with white icing?”
“Why are ye fearful, oh ye of little faith? Of course it isn’t. Yours is chocolate with chocolate icing,” she said in that sing-songy voice of hers.
My heart rejoiced and I said, “Bless you! That’s my favorite cake. Send it on over to the dorm and I’ll share it with guys.”
See, I knew they wouldn’t be sprinkling white powder on top of chocolate icing.
As I watched her saunter away, I thanked God for the privilege—and responsibility—of being one of the fittest. Selected to graduate and enter full time Christian Service. I am truly humbled.
Penny isn’t bad looking, nice legs—might make a good wife.
~
