somehow trivial compared to a heap of boiled meat in broth, the smell of
saffron, garlic, fishbones and Pernod.
Though I've spent half my life watching people, guiding them, trying to
anticipate their moods, motivations and actions, running from them,
manipulating and being manipulated by them, they remain a mystery to
me. People confuse me.
Food doesn't. I know what I'm looking at when I see a perfect loin of
number one tuna. I can understand why millions of Japanese are driven
to near bloodlust by the firm, almost iridescent flesh. I get why my boss
grows teary-eyed when he sees a flawlessly executed choucroute garnie.
Color, flavor, texture, composition . . . and personal history. Who knows
what circumstances, what events in his long ago past so inspire this rare
display of emotion? And who needs to know? I just know what I see.
And I understand it. It makes perfect sense.
"Là voilà!" my old Tante Jeanne used to shout, as she limped out to the
garden picnic table bearing a rustic salade de tomates, a fresh baguette,
and that cheesy butter I had long since come to love. And every once in a
while, I'll remember, in my very spine, what those days felt like, smelled
like, even sounded like: the faraway neee-nawww, neee-nawww sounds
of a distant Black Maria, the rooster's call from the neighbor's yard, the
feel of sand between my toes, the draft up the leg of my too-short shorts.
All it takes, sometimes, is the sight of a sliced red tomato and some
rough-cut parsley. I might find myself humming "These Boots Were
Made for Walking" or "Whiter Shade of Pale", and thinking about those
canned chives on the Queen Mary, how they crunched between my teeth,
the blissful shock as I realized the soup was actually cold.
I've left a lot of destruction in my wake, and closed a hell of a lot of
restaurants. I don't know what happened to many of my early owners,
whether they're back pulling teeth for a living, or whether they still cling
to the dream, trying to get some other operation off the ground, trying to