lobsters was to lie around and wait for their being killed for the $87.99 boiled lobster dish ($127.99 with a side of her own eggs), or the $167.99 baked and stuffed lobster (with crab meat, bread crumbs, butter, and herbs), a little attention from Nate may not be the worst possible thing.
“WE HAVE A WINNER!” called Nate, suddenly hoisting one of the lobsters in the air. Luckily for him, he had risen at the very moment John had crouched down to polish the base of the Hobart machine, and so this declaration of victory was out of both eye and earshot.
“This,” thought Jessica, “is going to be a long night.” She sighed to herself. “But that’s fine,” she continued. “Better to be killed with humor than with glumness.”
This was indeed true. In spite of the past, and future, of her own world and the worlds of those around her, and despite all of the strangeness of this restaurant, the city of New York, the country, the planet, the entire universe, right now, for whatever else, was okay. She was at Fabergé Restaurant, undertaking culinary tasks that she’d rehearsed and performed to the satisfaction of John and of multitudes of clients for years, to the palate-ial delight of all concerned. And so her life had meaning, and she brought to this place the genius of her maternal warmth, the generosity of her flesh, the calm of her touch.
This is not to say that Jessica hadn’t enjoyed working as a clothing designer, in that little atelier called “Stitched,” not six streets from where she now stood. Like the rekindled relationship she’d had with Tina during much of that era, a relationship that had resulted in lines of clothing well-suited to exceptionally tiny girls, Stitched felt like it was from another lifetime. After five years of stitching creations from fabulous materials, and five more designing gastronomic treasures from earth’s ovulary creations, Jessica felt as though she had lived forever in the bowels of places that make expensive goods for wealthy, ungrateful, dissatisfied, and unsatisfiable consumers, clients, customers. True, there were the occasional gourmets, or passers-by, like that kid today doing experiments in the dining room, but they were the exception. The general atmosphere of ingratitude, complacency, and entitlement amongst those who enjoy the fruits of places like Stitched or Fabergé Restaurant not only helped her understand the odd relationship between workers and consumers in such rarified places, but also gave her an appreciation for the odd characters who recognize the amazing quality of beautiful products, and the even odder characters who think about what it means to work in such settings. Nate was one such character, someone who constantly measured his relationship to the customer, the product, and the means of production.
In those early days working at Fabergé Restaurant, Nate had provided Jessica with adequate descriptions of her experiences. Encouraged by her interest, he began to build a philosophy that he simply referred to as resentment . “Resentment!” he would say. “In French? Ressentiment ! In Italian? Risentimento ! In Spanish? Um, fuck, I’m not really sure!” He would elaborate upon this philosophy during the many hours they spent sitting together in the back alley of Fabergé Restaurant. This dark, urban alleyway was a place that he referred to as “his own little pastoral farm.”
“Pastoral farm?” she had asked, during one of the first times she’d ever sat with him there in that dark, dingy, smelly, asphalted space.
“It’s a retreat, Jess. I think about it when I’m not at work, because it’s where I can actually brood.”
“Over what?”
“Everything, Jess. That kitchen where we work is a microcosm for the whole damned thing, for this city of servants and served. It’s a factory that favors all the eating and drinking and preparing, and then it’s a reservoir for all of the resulting pissing and shitting, and then it’s a
“WE HAVE A WINNER!” called Nate, suddenly hoisting one of the lobsters in the air. Luckily for him, he had risen at the very moment John had crouched down to polish the base of the Hobart machine, and so this declaration of victory was out of both eye and earshot.
“This,” thought Jessica, “is going to be a long night.” She sighed to herself. “But that’s fine,” she continued. “Better to be killed with humor than with glumness.”
This was indeed true. In spite of the past, and future, of her own world and the worlds of those around her, and despite all of the strangeness of this restaurant, the city of New York, the country, the planet, the entire universe, right now, for whatever else, was okay. She was at Fabergé Restaurant, undertaking culinary tasks that she’d rehearsed and performed to the satisfaction of John and of multitudes of clients for years, to the palate-ial delight of all concerned. And so her life had meaning, and she brought to this place the genius of her maternal warmth, the generosity of her flesh, the calm of her touch.
This is not to say that Jessica hadn’t enjoyed working as a clothing designer, in that little atelier called “Stitched,” not six streets from where she now stood. Like the rekindled relationship she’d had with Tina during much of that era, a relationship that had resulted in lines of clothing well-suited to exceptionally tiny girls, Stitched felt like it was from another lifetime. After five years of stitching creations from fabulous materials, and five more designing gastronomic treasures from earth’s ovulary creations, Jessica felt as though she had lived forever in the bowels of places that make expensive goods for wealthy, ungrateful, dissatisfied, and unsatisfiable consumers, clients, customers. True, there were the occasional gourmets, or passers-by, like that kid today doing experiments in the dining room, but they were the exception. The general atmosphere of ingratitude, complacency, and entitlement amongst those who enjoy the fruits of places like Stitched or Fabergé Restaurant not only helped her understand the odd relationship between workers and consumers in such rarified places, but also gave her an appreciation for the odd characters who recognize the amazing quality of beautiful products, and the even odder characters who think about what it means to work in such settings. Nate was one such character, someone who constantly measured his relationship to the customer, the product, and the means of production.
In those early days working at Fabergé Restaurant, Nate had provided Jessica with adequate descriptions of her experiences. Encouraged by her interest, he began to build a philosophy that he simply referred to as resentment . “Resentment!” he would say. “In French? Ressentiment ! In Italian? Risentimento ! In Spanish? Um, fuck, I’m not really sure!” He would elaborate upon this philosophy during the many hours they spent sitting together in the back alley of Fabergé Restaurant. This dark, urban alleyway was a place that he referred to as “his own little pastoral farm.”
“Pastoral farm?” she had asked, during one of the first times she’d ever sat with him there in that dark, dingy, smelly, asphalted space.
“It’s a retreat, Jess. I think about it when I’m not at work, because it’s where I can actually brood.”
“Over what?”
“Everything, Jess. That kitchen where we work is a microcosm for the whole damned thing, for this city of servants and served. It’s a factory that favors all the eating and drinking and preparing, and then it’s a reservoir for all of the resulting pissing and shitting, and then it’s a
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