The right food at the right time can give you nearly everything you need. In my case, I was back at the Beer Bus and had just pounded a tuna burrito from Saint Burrito. The balled-up tinfoil and a stained napkin were being held down by what remains of my beer.
I had just come out of the gym and needed a late lunch/ refuel. Protein, carbs, a bit less fat than your normal burrito, and 5% alcohol to help soothe the muscles. Beer doesn’t get enough credit as a post-workout beverage if it’s consumed within reason. John L. Sullivan, the legendary “knock out king” of 19th Century Boston, had an equally legendary drinking problem. All his work and fighting couldn’t keep his daily Kidney Pickling from turning his muscles slack and flabby. “Moderation in everything, including Moderation,” says verbal knock-out king Oscar Wilde.
Ever since I was old enough to actually appreciate hot “adult” beverages, I preferred tea to coffee. In fact, there’s only one coffee drink I really like. It’s a cappuccino with cinnamon and honey that I was introduced to at my favorite West Side writing cafe as a cafe con miel, but I’ve since understood is easier to explain to baristas just as “cappuccino with honey and cinnamon at the bottom.”
I’m drinking that coffee drink right now at Taborspace- the cozy social hall of a church on Mount Tabor where the base of the bell tower was rented out to a series of cafe and fast-eats ventures. Most recently, and popularly, it became the third satellite location of the cafe I worked at nearly a decade ago. I talked briefly with the new faces about the old faces (and recipes, and wall notes, and procedures most likely) still around the main kitchen that used to be my world. Then I took my scone and Only Coffee Drink I Actually Like into the sunny, raftered, cozy hall with Christian-themed stained glass windows that only adds to the vibes.
“[…]and I have filled him with the spirit of God, in wisdom, and in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship […]”
– Exodus 31:3
Despite all my writing about The Way of the Floured Hand, the happy moments in the bakeshop, and how fulfilling it is to work with my hands (I’m pretty sure I would self-mummify at a full-time desk job), the fact is this shit is WORK.
As much as I may like the work, and as good as I am at it, at a certain point in especially busy weeks I find myself saying “I wanted to be a pastry chef… and for my sins, they let me become one.” Whether it’s persnickety chefs, crowded kitchens, or cooks that regularly seem too dazed and bewildered to understand what “hustle” means and manage to be underfoot even while I’m standing still, this calling of mine is good at reminding me that I’m doing it for pay, and they’re gonna make me earn that pay.
“Deep roots are not touched by the frost.” – J. R. R. Tolkein. Photo by Daniel Watson on Pexels.com
Old habits die hard. I wake up in the morning, and my gut instinct is to scroll.
America is back to being weird and scary as fuck and the urge to preserve my mental health is in constant tension with my wish to stay “informed.” I thought that getting rid of the social media apps on my phone would mitigate this- you can’t obsess over what isn’t there. The muscle memory remains, though. The habit. The “wake and bake” of the 21rst Century where our first instinct on resuming consciousness is “Shit, better fix that” and roasting our minds to a blackened husk on information before we go about our day.
When it comes to human nature and the various manifestations of it, I have the same opinion that I do about aliens- namely, “It’s a big world/universe and anything’s possible.” My cordial introductions to abnormal psychology, through my own experience and in my college years, bear this out well. The idea that anyone could enjoy being sick makes a lot more sense once it’s dressed up in words like “Munchausen syndrome,””factitious disorder,” or “Ferris Beuller’s Day Off.”
Yes, some people can enjoy being sick- but I am avowedly not one of them.
I’m at my desk with some jazz playing, a candle burning, my slippers on, and I’m feeling just about human again at (hopefully) the tail end of the worst flu I’ve had in my life. This is the first time in five days that I’ve felt the capacity to work on or do anything besides sleep, cough up green gunk, hobble around and chug liquids. The coaster on my right which would normally have a nice beer or a little whiskey on it is currently occupied by a large, sea-foam green bottle of Gatorade. Hydrating has been the priority for the last few days, and when I’m finally well enough to rejoin the world, I think I’ll be ready to throw every sports drink bottle I see into the sun.
What is it about being sick I hate so much? More than just the actual symptoms- hacking up gunk, every hole in my body leaking assorted fluids, and the various aches and pains aren’t something I think even the most ardent sympathy seeker really enjoys. It’s the loss of focus, the loss of energy, and arguably the loss of agency for methat makes being sick so miserable. The inescapable feeling of being locked in your own body, and that body being out of order.
What do you want to do? What do you feel like doing? Doesn’t matter- you aren’t calling the shots. “Sorry boss, body’s out.”
The Black Hat Baker 