How About Something Sweet –

For your Valentine’s Weekend!

Something strange happened to me yesterday. I accidentally landed on a Substack site that belongs to a proponent of the new Secretary of Health and Human Services, the guy with a worm in his brain who dumped a dead bear in Central Park, and who drove around with a cut-off whale’s head tied to the top of the family’s minivan. And who has absolutely no medical credentials but lots of bizarre ideas about health. Almost all of that Substack’s readers’ comments were ecstatic; many of them thanked God profusely; actually, they had been praying for such an outcome for days on end.

I felt as if I was living in a parallel universe: we had all lived through the same recent history, but unlike me, they were sure that Trump won the 2020 election, there was no January 6 insurrection, and that during the last four years the U.S. of A. had seriously deteriorated. People like me, who think that the previous administration did a decent job fighting inflation and the climate crisis, are thought to be stupid idiots. Exactly what I think of “them”.

And then it struck me: I’m living in a bubble! Theoretically, I detest “Us versus Them” as one of the roots of evil, tribal thinking, group thinking, where “Us” is everything acceptable and decent and good, while “They” are the opposite, the enemy. Fostering this kind of thinking ultimately causes wars, to the delight of the multi-national military-industrial complex, as Eisenhower so precisely described. And “thinking” isn’t correct either, it’s more a subconscious feeling.

So, how did I end up in a bubble? I’m convinced that my assessment of the current political climate is accurate, namely, that it is horrifying, ghastly, threatening our democracy, dangerously close to Nazi fascism which I grew up to reject and abhor with every fiber of my being. After all, I was born in Germany in 1946. How can I reconcile this with the fact that about one third of my fellow Americans think/believe the exact opposite? How can I not see them as the Enemy, as the cause for all the horror currently unfolding?

Actually, after I read the comments of people who were happy about RFK Jr.’s confirmation they became more real. They’re just normal people, not monsters. Misguided – yes; probably not very bright – well, that could be a matter of debate. Wouldn’t it be nice if they could realize that the real Enemy is the group of oligarchs, the few that are insanely rich who want to get richer, no matter all the pain this causes? And right away, I have another “Them”. I’m back at the impossible conundrum, back at Martin Luther King’s “Here we rise to the position of loving the person who does the evil deed while hating the deed that the person does.” How does he get there? “We love men not because we like them, not because their attitudes and ways appeal to us, but we love them because God loves them,”¹ he said. I don’t believe in God, but I can substitute “Consciousness” and then it makes sense what he says. But I can’t DO it.

I came a bit closer recently when I realized that somebody like Trump probably never enjoyed looking at a butterfly. Never walked through a forest and delighted in all the majestic tree-beings all around him. Never had a doggie-friend! What a miserable, impoverished existence. One can only feel sorry for the fact that all the selfish greed, all the craving for ego-gratification won’t get him what he really seeks. It’s all over his angry, unhappy face.

Well! I had meant to forego a rant and present you with a delicious, sweet, and easy to make treat, a mixture between cake and pudding, with lots of gooey, creamy syrupiness between chunks of cake. Serve it with some vegan ice cream or whipped topping. And my apologies about the rant.

Chocolate Pudding Cake

Ingredients:

For the bottom layer:

• 1 cup flour

• ½ cup organic sugar

• 2 teaspoons baking powder

• ½ teaspoon salt

• 6 tablespoons cocoa powder

• ¾ cup plant milk, unsweetened

• 2 teaspoons vanilla

• ¼ cup oil

For the chocolate pudding layer:

• ¾ cup organic brown sugar

• ¼ cup cocoa powder

• ¼ cup vegan chocolate chips

• 1 ½ cups hot water

Instructions:

Lightly grease an 8 x 8 baking pan and dust it with flour.

Preheat the oven to 350°F.

Mix the dry ingredients in a medium bowl. Whisk the milk, oil, and vanilla together in a smaller bowl, pour into the flour mixture and stir to combine, but don’t overmix. Pour the batter into the baking pan.

In another small bowl, mix sugar, cocoa powder, and chocolate chips.

Sprinkle evenly over the batter in the pan. Do not stir! Shake the pan a little, so the layer is even.

Gently pour the hot water onto the powder layer. Don’t mix.

Gently put the pan into the oven and bake for 30 - 35 minutes.

Let it cool for 10 - 15 minutes, then serve with vegan whipped cream or vegan vanilla ice cream.

Variation:

Use hot coffee instead of water.

Enjoy!

1. M.L.King, Agape