Why I Should Be Banned From the Kitchen
Excerpt from an actual conversation I had with my husband this morning:
Me: Do you want to grill something tonight?
Him: Yeah, how about steak since we had chicken last time.
Me: Ok, what kind?
Him: How about skirt?
Me: No, isn’t that the chewy one?
Him: Ok, whatever, just don’t get a London broil. You know, London broil is the big long one.
Me: No, I’ll get the one with the bone, the one that looks like a steak.
Him: Yeah, a t-bone.
Me: No, isn’t it a New York something. A strip?
Him: Uh… no, strip doesn’t have the bone. That’s why it’s called a “strip.”
Me: Ok, yeah, I’ll get the one with the bone.
Him: Only Porterhouse and T-bone have the bone.
Me: Ok, I’ll get the one you get when you call central casting and ask for a steak.
Have I told you how much I hate to cook. Let me be very clear on this - I HATE to cook. It is the absolute worst part of my day when I remember that I have two people who will need to be fed (cats notwithstanding since all I have to do there is open a can, halle-freakin-lujah!) and now I have to stop what I'm doing and think of what to make. Since I've put no thought into it, it usually involves a trip to the supermarket which only serves to fuel my hatefire. Then there's the God damn bloody salad spinner, and the awkward-ass vegetable peeler, and the epic losing battle of trying to "clean" the strainer - guess what, you lose. Maybe I hate it so much because I'm not much of an eater. In fact, the joke is that I will be the best old person in the world because it will be the happiest day of my life when I can have all of my meals through a straw. That and adult diapers so I don't have to get up to pee anymore (but that's a story for another time). The irony is, it's not that I can't cook, it's simply that I hate it. In truth, I've done many Thanksgiving dinners, and I put out a huge spread every Christmas, but it usually involves a three-day, head-banging, immersion-style kitchen boot camp leading up to it, and at least a two-day detox in a flotation chamber when it's over. In other words, not easy, and not pretty.
The truth is, in the immortal words of Kenny Rogers (for you fellow fossils who know who THAT is) you have to know when to fold 'em. And I fold 'em in the kitchen, that's for shit sure. I mean, I'm smart, and I can figure a lot of stuff out, and I've been blessed with a creative spirit and a sharp tongue, so I can even make art and turn a phrase here and there, but I was not put on this earth to be anywhere near a kitchen. It's a fact. And I say this to inspire us all to be brave enough to know when to fold 'em, and not to apologize. We are who we are, and whatever we are, I promise you, it's enough. And since enough is my mantra, I'm sticking with it. Besides, what we're not good at, someone else is. So today, celebrate your gifts ferociously and don't dwell on what you're not good at. Be relentlessly you, and the rest will take care of itself. Remember, there's always take-out.