Noisy Neighbor Receives a Baked Cake

Noisy Neighbor Receives a Baked Cake

In the morning of December 15, Candice Marie Benbow, a Winston-Salem native, wanted to get some sleep in her apartment in New Jersey. However, loud music at 3 a.m from a neighbor she had never met, was keeping her awake.

What she did next has become legendary, as it has made an impact on social media - she baked a pound cake and left a note on her neighbor's doorstep. Because of her act of kindness, she received calls to make a Hallmark movie and tells her story on an episode of "Inside Edition" as well as news organizations in Europe.

Too kind to complain

Benbow had gotten used to her neighbor playing music since she moved into the apartment in September. She even commented she likes her neighbor's musical tastes, but that morning, it was too loud.

Instead of calling the police or knocking on the neighbor's door to complain, as most people would do, she baked the cake and wrote a note, leaving both at his door. The note was polite yet to the point: "When you get home every evening and blast your music, I've come to expect it...To be fair, you've helped me catch a vibe. But last night...Fam, you tried it. You really did. I don't know if you were hosting the official afterparty for our building's holiday social or singlehandedly determining this generation's R&B king. But 3 a.m. is just too late to be that loud.

Too loud to handle

"At 3:26 a.m. I couldn't tell if you were playing some uptempo hits from The Weeknd or you pushed the shuffle on some house/techno. Either way, I could have done without that set."

Twitter Tale

Twitter tale

Benbow has a large social media following. When she tweeted about her experience and then posted a picture days later of her first face to face with her neighbor, Tommy Amaro, the story went viral. Her tweets received comments from as far as Australia and have been retweeted a thousand times. Ava DuVernay, director of "A Wrinkle in Time" and "Selma," even joined in on Twitter.  --

Benbow and Amaro have been interviewed by Inside Edition and wanted to make a movie on their story to be featured in Hallmark channel. But for both of them, the whole experience has shown the power of kindness in a world often marked by hate. 

Where it is coming from

"It's easy for one thing to blow up and become the thing that sparks war for the next 15 years between two people," Benbow told the Journal Monday. "It's just goodness. It's good old-fashioned conflict resolution that two adults can say 'Hey, there's a problem,' and figure it out and find out that they come from vastly different worlds and have gone through the same things."

It turned out that they were both grieving the loss of a loved one. Benbow lost her mother, Debra Benbow, in November 2015.  Amaro's daughter, Loreal Amaro Maldanado, died in a car crash in March.

The first meeting

When they finally met, Amaro apologized, and they laughed. Benbow then went over to Amaro's apartment. She noticed he had two doves. They were from his daughter's funeral. The family tried to release the doves, but they wouldn't fly away. So Amaro decided to keep them.

The two started talking about grief and the process of coming to terms with the loss of a loved one.  Benbow said her love for baking came out of the process of grieving for her mother. "Baking for me has become therapy," she said. "It was how I was moving through the loss of Mama."

Is the cake edible?

Amaro asked if he could eat the pound cake when he first saw it. He wasn't sure he should eat it, considering the reason behind it. But Amaro read the note and ate the cake. And it was delicious, he said. 

He also felt bad about the loud music because he didn't even know anyone was living next door. Amaro said that, on the night of Dec. 14, the apartment complex had thrown a holiday party. There was plenty of food left over, and he wanted to throw a celebration in honor of both Loreal and his youngest daughter, Kaylin Amaro, who is a singer.

Benbow's gesture was the icing on the cake

Benbow's gesture was the icing on the cake.

Amaro said it was the sweetest thing ever. It isn't usual that a person would give a cake rather than complain. The pound cake also helped with his hangover, he said. 

He was also shocked by the outpouring of support and interest in the "cake incident." "I'm going bonkers," he said. "This is new to me."

Once strangers, now friends.

Benbow, who is a contributing writer for Essence magazine and has written for other publications, said her literary agent had given offers to turn the story into a movie. 

"It would be a cool Christmas movie," she said. "Hopefully in the next season, this will be a possibility for something we can see on TV."

But for now, Amaro and Benbow, once strangers, have become friends. "Now we're good," Amaro said. "And now, I'm going to invite her to all my parties."

“Do your little bit of good where you are; it's those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world.”

- Desmond Tutu