― Simone de Beauvoir,
The Ethics of Ambiguity
[The following is
presented in black and white]
Day 1: I feel the void.
What is the point of existence?
How shall we live? What meaning can there be if all ends in
darkness? Is there any way to stave off
the fear, the trembling? I purchase duck
legs. I cook them for hours in fat. The smell permeates the apartment. I feel the crisp skin crackling. Soon it will be confit.
Day 2: The beans, damn them, the beans! I wake up in the early hours, sweating,
clutching my night-things. I haven’t
soaked the beans! What can be done? Perfection is an abstract, unattainable. I accept my fate. The beans will soak for 24 hours, rather than
48. I sit on my perch by the window,
cigarette and red wine in hand, and think on lost love. Oh legumes, why must you mock me so?
[Solo cello]
Day 3: Forever shall I be a stranger to myself, but no
longer a stranger to the neighborhood butcher.
He senses my need, the need for obscure cuts of meat. We talk of Paris. He gives me pork belly. The essence of pork belly must not be
confused with that of pork stew meat. He
intuitively understands my requirements.
I add a portion of pancetta.
Day 4: Stews. Like
the stew of my soul. I am like Sisyphus
at the base of the mountain. Can I go
on? I can’t go on. I might go on. Should I go on? I musn't go on. But I will go on. I think. I drink. I blink. Shades
of Andre the Giant. And yet I am
free. Free to strive, free to fail, free
to stick my willing hands down into the depths of duck fat. Amanda discreetly vomits into her clutch
purse. And the red wine flows.
Day 5: My struggle has, as promised, turned into passion. I gently ladle heavy cream onto seductively
reclining potatoes. I scrape hard nutmeg
against unyielding metal. There is no
reality except in cooking (this I actually say in French). My spirit bubbles in the cleansing fire of
the oven. I am browned. I am whole.
[A woman of beauty and
grace throws a single rose into the Seine.
She understands pain.]
Day 6: I am the shepherd!
I am the herd! The breadcrumb
crust has been applied and we wait in a smoke filled room, wondering if
cassoulet will provide the answers we seek.
The crust is broken. Steam
escapes. We meet like new lovers. The silky beans. The rich meat. Duck caresses pork. We lean against walls; no, not like Jordan
Catalano. Or at least, not like Jordan
Catalano in high school. Perhaps Jordan
Catalano during his semester abroad when he LIVES. And EXPERIENCES. And LOVES.
DEEPLY. Yes. Meat.
I cover myself in fruit and syrup and realize that these moments are
fleeting and precious. Because it takes
seven days to make this shit and a lifetime to find people who will put up with
me and eat it.
I could never turn
back any more than a record can spin in reverse. And all that was leading me
where ? To this very moment...”
― Jean-Paul Sartre,
Nausea