"Be in love with whatever is happening around you. YOU cause your own happiness. Happiness is an emotional thing, not physical. Define what it is you want." -Chef O'Malley.
I'm trying to remember how pumped up I was last night after his long spiel of "profound shit" he fed to us whilst sitting here right now feeling like a snot bomb exploded in my cranium. I was so pumped up, I was up til 4am just thinking about everything. The above concept is something I've been searching to grasp my entire life. I let every little thing going on in the metaphysical universe affect me. I worry. In fact, I waste precious time worrying about elements I can't control. Not to be repetitive, but it's exactly why I couldn't take the pressure of being a performance musician. And I hope it isn't the demise to my culinary journey as well because I am continually seeing similarities in everything. They are both a form of art. But even if they do have the same elements, just because those things crushed me and made me falter when I was 18, doesn't mean they can conquer me now. I need to learn to get over it or else I'll continue living my life working a job doing something I'm completely unsatisfied with. And the prospect of that is well worth the uncomfortable moments of facing my fears.
Anyway, I swear that class goes by faster than a bag of cheetos at a weight-loss convention.
Right now, I realize that I suck. I suck BIG TIME. But I do my homework, and I am on time, and I wear black socks, and I press my white coat the night before class, and I consciously practice "mise en place" throughout every moment of my daily living, and I have no problem doing what I'm told, or living like a robot for 2 years if it means that these Chefs will pass on to me a fraction of their "badassery".
So many people were thrown off when told to say goodbye to the person sitting next to them because more than likely either you or they won't make it to the end.Chef O'Donnell told us at the beginning of foundations that he wasn't going to bother learning any names yet since he knew half the class would be gone by the 3rd week. Well, he was right. Honestly, I think it shows students that Metro ICA is not a dumb, sub par, easy-breezy cooking school that anyone can have the priveledge of graduating from. Its program is designed to produce great culinarians, and if you don't cut it, you're hosed. Why should you have your degree handed to you? That's not how anything in life is. Sadly, that means you could possibly spend 2 full years time and money on school, but if you burn your cheeseburger(a poor example) at that last moment, the one moment that matters, you walk out empty handed. Why? Because that's what this business/art/craft is all about. You're only as good as your last dish.
So for now, I'm fine with sleeping 2 hours a night so I can be prepared for the next day, traipsing through an 8 hour foundations class when my head is full of cotton, cutting carrots until my fingers turn permanently orange, doing what someone else tells me to do just because they tell me to do it. I'll wear black socks, I'll press my white coat. I'll take off my nail polish and make up. And I'll cook. I'll keep cooking until I don't suck anymore.
I'm probably going to leave a comment trail as I go through here! Just warning you now.
ReplyDeleteArt is pressure, pressure is art. Grace under pressure is the defining characteristic of the artist. Public pressure, pressure to perform, pressure to please yourself- these are the obstacles that burn out so many artists. I've been through that- I backed away from a writing career because the pressure to write took the joy from it. You've been through it with music.
But the important thing is that you *kept going*. What you wrote up there? That's determination, and grace under pressure. It means you're an artist already. The rest is just bookkeeping.