Illusion

While things are always busy here, the last two weeks have been particularly hectic. This week in particular has been very difficult for Mini Meerkat.

I have been trying to keep updating my blog each day during the week despite how busy we've been. I often pre-write (sometimes weeks in advance depending on the post) and have posts scheduled to come live on their own each morning. I've fallen behind on commenting on other blogs I enjoy reading and returning comments on my own blog, yet my blog keeps chugging along with daily updates. It falsely gives the illusion that I am here leisurely updating, but I'm not actually here.

(I've also found that my mobile versions of everything don't play well with blogger, so I've given up sending comments into the void when I'm not on a desktop computer. I promise that I'm not ignoring anyone, even if it seems like I am!)

Mini Meerkat and I were making cupcakes the other night, and the end result was pretty mixed. We made tiny cupcakes for the first time, but I don't have a tiny cupcake pan. I placed a bunch of them in a regular pan and hoped for the best...

I managed to take a couple quick pictures while they were cooling between other kitchen tasks. My cooling rack was not glamorous. My counter is cluttered and an odd color. The cupcakes themselves were a mix of passable and comically tragic.

I could pick out pretty dishes, set a picturesque scene, and pose the food. I enjoy looking at artistic pictures with recipes on other blogs, but I just haven't found the time to do it for my own blog.

I had the urge to either pick out the three surprisingly perfect tiny cupcakes and photograph them prettily. I could have had adorable tiny cupcake pictures and a glowing post on the joys of tiny cupcakes, which would have been another illusion. The experience of cooking them with Mini Meerkat was joyful. She helped every step of the way and was very proud of her cupcakes in the end. But they were messy and imperfect, just like life.

Alternatively, I wanted to pose the cupcakes in a surreal sinister scene of melting cupcakes. They were reminiscent of melting clocks or Calvin's monstrous snow creatures.

I didn't have time to do either. Writers and artists craft illusions in everything we do, but it takes time and energy for more elaborate creations.

With blogging there is a some sort of balance between storytelling and chronicling real life. I've seen the debate come up in both the autism and Down's Syndrome corner of the internet on whether special needs parent bloggers are doing a disservice by glossing over negatives or only venting. Life is always just somewhere in the middle.

Our cupcakes, perfect and imperfect.