Sushi

"We sat in a blood-red booth. Orest gripped the tasseled menu with his chunky hands. His shoulders seemed broader than ever, the serious head partly submerged between them.

'How's the training going?' I said.

'I'm slowing it down a little. I don't want to peak too soon. I know how to take care of my body.'

'Heinrich told me you sleep sitting up, to prepare for the cage.'

'I perfected that. I'm doing different stuff now.'

'Like what?'

'Loading up on carbohydrates.'

'That's why we came here,' Heinrich said.

'I load up a little more each day.'

'It's because of the huge energy he'll be burning up in the cage, being alert, tensing himself when a mamba approaches, whatever.'

We ordered pasta and water."

-- Don DeLillo, White Noise


--

Prior to today, I could have counted the number of sushi rolls I'd ever eaten on one hand. The last time was in Seattle, with my sisters, and it was bought in a grocery store but also delicious. I remember the one with the salmon meat wrapped around the rice because I liked it the most. Up to that point, I thought sushi referred to the seaweed wrap and how it was rolled and sliced.

Today, I had an outrageous amount of sushi. Something like twelve samples, and this after trying more than a dozen of the restaurant's "American" dishes.

I am bursting and my stomach is making massage noises.

--

We've been training for almost a week. The first few sessions were mainly lectures and (embellished) readings from packets we received. We were given CDs with menu items and photos, told to study everything. We were given another set of CDs which contain daily quizzes, reviews to be completed before moving on. We are given gold coins for answering questions and volunteering to do odd jobs like picking up hole-punched paper circles from the carpet with chopsticks. These coins can be redeemed later for all kinds of "expensive" prizes.

We are told this training is very cutting-edge, experimental, intuitive, effective.

This morning after a break, my table's discussion turned to note-taking and typing, the latency of abandoning college habits. Someone mentioned finding herself unable to take notes by hand during classes. I contributed that my baby sister is allowed to use laptops during her high-school classes, that her teacher gathered email addresses from each student on the first day of school and created a website for literary discussions, that she is allowed to email her teacher until midnight with any questions about homework.

I remember being in tenth grade and having my CD player confiscated during biology. I think that might have been around the same time I heard a pop-music ringtone for the first time.

--

One of the sushi samples dropped from my pinching chopsticks into my square soy sauce bowl. Sushi chefs, we were told, cringe when people dunk their rolls into soy sauce because it overwhelms any other flavor. It's true.

We were also told that sushi refers to the rice, not the fish. So you can prepare sushi rice and eat it with beef or chicken and it would still be a sushi dish. Sticky rice is not sushi rice. Wasabi is almost always made from paste before it is made into a condiment, because fresh wasabi is extremely potent and pricey.

I'm proud to say that I learned a lot and tried everything (except the sliced ginger). I have a lot of studying to do.

--

Last night, I had this idea for a short story:

A young man moves back to the Midwestern suburban home of his adolescence. There is a neighborhood association that regulates things like weekly lawn trimming and property lines in a democratic fashion. The residents realize--with satisfaction--that no one on the block smokes anymore. One night, the young man has a cigarette and flicks the butt onto the sidewalk, where it is discovered the next day.

A Girardian sacrificial crisis results.

--

There are training sessions during the day and in the evenings. Yesterday, I went in the evening. A completely different vibe. Fewer coffee mugs. Only half of the trainees smoke. More arms tucked over the backs of chairs, more wisecracks, more Yes's than nods.

This morning, I downed three cups of coffee by the end of the first hour.

Three more days of food tasting, followed by some mock service sessions (I think of them as improv rehearsals) and then a simulated business day with invited guests. We are warned constantly about Secret Shoppers. More people arrive every day and they have stopped introducing themselves. The kitchen clanks and wafts, the construction sectors grind and sputter and ratchet, the lighting fixtures get fancier and fancier.

Faces are getting familiar. The restaurant is opening soon.

Bread

"INTERVIEWER

Mr. Wilder, why do you write?

WILDER

I think I write in order to discover on my shelf a new book that I would enjoy reading, or to see a new play that would engross me.

INTERVIEWER

Do your books and plays fulfill this expectation?

WILDER

No."

-- from an interview with Thornton Wilder, "The Art of Fiction No. 16," The Paris Review

--

Been a while, blog, been a while. I intended to document my roadtrip from Cincinnati to Omaha, on a daily or even semi-daily basis, and even made a thing of telling friends and family to check the travel blog regularly for updates. I ended up only posting once or twice during the first half of the trip. I guess I gave it up once I realized that after driving through the night, meeting and remeeting dozens of people, walking a city or two, drinking, laughing, eating burger after burger, remarking and observing and perceiving--that after all that, the last thing one wants to do is sit down at a computer and type. Much less when you're borrowing internet from the friend waiting to take you somewhere. Better to check Facebook and email and give the laptop a rest.

So now, here I am, and here we are. It is raining: strange raindrops falling in crosshatch because of confused wind. They seem to tickle the trees, which squirm and jerk. My Panera lunch (I've budgeted one meal out per week) is finished. Nearby, a group of seniors sip soup, and to my immediate right, a trio of business lunchers stab at Romaine cuts. When the third luncher arrived, she showed her shoes in a kind of shuffle, saying, "This one's a seven, this one's a six," which got a laugh of familiarity (Oh, Karen, you never change). Earlier today, in a Wal-Mart parking lot, I saw a woman who looked exactly like Kathy Bates driving a big red pickup.

I am back in Nebraska.

--

With things to show for it, I am proud to say. After sending dozens of job inquiry emails, creating and recreating ten versions of my work resume (Office-Admin, Publishing, Coordinator, Childcare, etc.), dressing up for five interviews and making it to four auditions--all within a fortnight--I arrive at today, a bleary Thursday, all set with a job and a show.

The Job. Tonight, I start training at a new restaurant opening in Omaha next month. I have signed a release in which I promise not to mention the company name in any website or blog, but I will say that the prospective clientèle are affluent travelers in the city on business (TIP$). It's not catering, thank God, but it is food. I interviewed this morning with a law firm for a position as a legal assistant, too, and will hear back sometime next week.

The Show. I'm cast as Slightly Soiled in The Rose's Peter Pan, which opens this fall. This is great news because The Rose is a professional children's theatre, meaning I will be paid. Also, their scope provides opportunities for growth. In other words, I can continue being a professional actor while staying close to home. (At home for the moment, but more on that later.)

I met with my high-school drama teacher a few days ago. She owns the local dance academy and has asked me to help teach some musical theatre classes, perhaps to grow a separate program out of it. There's the 2011 summer camp, too, and we're thinking about possibly collaborating on writing a new adaptation of a popular kid's book. I'm just glad for honest and creative work.

--

Other achievements from the past week and a half include helping my baby sister to beat the Super Mario Bros. Wii game, taking my grandma out for a spin in my classy gold Dodge Neon, running around with Ajax, and attending two Antiochian Orthodox services (so far). I plan to attend a Greek one this Sunday, but the one I went to last week is very beautiful, very swanky.

Readingwise, I have run into a bit of a snag, but it may help me resist what a friend has diagnosed as "book polygamy." I still have The Brothers K and White Noise to finish, and at the base library I picked up Lolita and Let the Great World Spin. But when I went to the local library to get a card, I was informed that our house is in a "no man's land as far as libraries go," and as a result I was considered a nonlocal. See, Nebraska has a library system based on townships, not counties, meaning that your house has to be located within city limits in order for your membership to be free. However, the zoning is based on county. The long and short is that while the post office believes we live in Bellevue, the library does not.

So I'm without free library privileges for a while. Quite a switch from Cincinnati, where at one point I had cards for libraries in four counties.

--

Other switches from Cincy:

There are fewer Starbuckses here. I chauffeur my baby sister after school. Uniformed folks are everywhere, as are men in button-up shirts without ties and short-haired women in pantsuits. Nights are quieter. Gas is a quarter cheaper, but there's corn in it.

--

This weekend is my sister's Homecoming. She's going. Nebraska plays on Saturday, and after job training an old friend and I are going to hang out. He owns two gas stations, I think. He wants to move to LA and get into movies. Someday soon some former teachers and I are going to have lunch and catch up. I am going to spend that time getting used to calling them by their first names.

It's good to be home.