Whipped!

I used to be amused by stories of (mostly rich, pampered, white) people who checked into hospitals suffering from exhaustion. But honestly, if I had it like that, that would be a wonderful vacation right about now.

Friday night I completed a long journey that began with an idea more than a decade ago. I finally completed my culinary school externship requirement, all 210 hours of it, when we closed the kitchen at 11:00 pm.

Officially, I did 212 hours, that started on August 17, done 16 hours a week at three nights a week. This in addition to my 9-5 job during the day. The externship came after 11 months of going to school full-time while also working full-time. The job was Monday through Friday, culinary arts all day Saturday and Sunday, culinary management, Monday, Wednesday and Thursday nights after work. That started in August 2004 and ended in June of this year.

I spent the remainder of June, July and part of August relaxing by just doing my day gig before school reminded me, none too subtly, that if I didn’t start the externship soon, I would be dropped without receiving my diploma. I took the hint and found a location and have been at it ever since, up until Friday night.

I wish I had decided to do this, oh, maybe 20 years ago, when I had more stamina, but all the same, I am surprised at how fast the time flew and proud of myself for getting through it. About 10 years ago, when my acting career was starting to plateau, I asked myself what else would I like to do that would be creative but perhaps more in demand than a show business career. I’ve always enjoyed cooking and began exploring culinary schools way back then, but for various reasons (mostly financial) never acted on it until now.

My day job afforded me the means to make it happen, but I still had a psychological barrier to overcome. Could I work and go to school and not kill myself? Well, the answer is a qualified yes.

I am a mental and physical wreck right now. I crave about a month of uninterrupted sleep. I’ve lost weight largely from only eating one good meal a day. I’ve got achy knees, strained muscles in my back that have enabled my chiropractor to purchase a home through the regular visits, and a perpetually dazed look in my eyes that won’t go away easily.

The past two weeks have been particularly stressful. I could see the light at the end of the tunnel and decided nothing was gonna stop me from completing this task, not even illness. And this was my two weeks to get sick. The late fall temperature change left congestion in my chest and a raw throat I haven’t been able to shake. This past Wednesday, I had to conduct a training at work and was talking for the better part of four hours. By Thursday, I had no voice at all. For a guy who used to make a good living doing voiceovers, to not be able to speak can be pretty disturbing. I’ve got a little of it back now however. Just imagine if Kathleen Turner and Harvey Fierstein had a love child, that’s about the way I sound.

And while I’m physically banged up, the rest of my life is in somewhat of a shambles as well. My apartment is a fucking mess. A_fucking_mess! I just haven’t had time. Haven’t paid bills in a while either. I’ve got plenty of money in the bank. I just haven’t had the brain power to sit down and see who is owed what. And for the remaining few people who still consider me a friend, I really owe them phone calls and visits. I’ll need to spend time reconnecting.

I also have to reconnect with my love for cooking. Truth be told, if you ever want to hate cooking, do it professionally. There is a certain assembly line nature to the work that cuts out the creativity for the sake of expediency. The executive chef gets to be creative. Those of us who execute his vision just follow the recipes. I need to get away from it for awhile, then go back in a kitchen and just experiment.

While I won’t miss the long hours, I will miss my co-workers at the restaurant. There are some fine, very hard working men and women working in the kitchen and among the wait staff. Most in the kitchen are immigrants from Latin and Caribbean countries. I was surprised at how easily my high school Spanish came back to me and how useful it was. The world-reknowned New York restaurant scene would cease to exist were it not for immigrant labor, many of whom are undocumented. For relatively low wages, they easily work ten times harder than most native born Americans. I have much love for those guys and will genuinely miss them. Now, if only they had ownership and management that truly supported their efforts and knew how to run a restaurant.

I’ll close now, but to show you how tired I am, it took me all day to write this entry. I had fleeting moments of energy and clear thinking and couldn’t have done it any faster. I’m off to rest.