I rarely go outside of my comfort zone to try new things unless I’m pretty sure I’m going to be naturally talented at them.
- I blame being labeled a “high achiever” in middle school for creating this monster.
I simply don’t like to pick up activities if I can’t excel at them, because I’m not accustomed to struggling or failing. That’s why I was pretty tentative to try my hand at baking and decorating an intricate birthday cake for a friend last summer. Her birthday party was coming up and no one had volunteered to provide the desert yet. Wanting to be a big help and figuring I could come up with a funny design, I offered to take on the cake. I slaved over every detail of the confectionary delight until my masterpiece was flawless. It took me a day and a half, but the end result was breathtaking. That is, until I ran out of the house to pick up birthday candles and my HVAC system failed. I returned home and upon opening the front door I felt a gust of hot air rush past me. The inside of the house was swelteringly hot and humid, and the temperature only increased with each step I took down the hallway. I ran over to the thermostat to find that the entire system had crashed, and our air conditioner had simply quit in the middle of the afternoon heat. I immediately called up our regular HVAC dealership for an emergency visit with the AC unit. They had the cooling system up and running again in no time; unfortunately, the HVAC technician couldn’t fix my totally melted cake.