“I hate my fans, too. I hate being famous. I hate my job.”
“I am lonely and living in constant uncertainty.”
--Anthony Bourdain
The problem with life, if you are truly going to live it, is that you must give a damn. You must get out of bed, run the comb across your head, find your way downstairs, and drink a cup. You must make the bus in seconds flat.
If you don’t, you must worry about other arrangements. If you still don’t make it to work, you will have to worry about where you will work next. If you do make it, in order to thrive, you will make alliances with and sometimes feel forced to compromise with those who you do not wish to do either with.
While you’re supporting the life for which you give a damn, things in that life will inevitably unravel in some way or another that you have not foreseen.
There are rewards along the way, but they are almost always earned as a result of participating in this exhaustive and iterative process.
As Yoda said: Do or do not. There is no try.
And yet, Saint Anthony Bourdain comes along, a diety who seemingly DNGAF. He sacrifices all the sacred food gods. The unimpeachable Alice Waters is “Pol Pot in a muumuu”. Den-mom Ina Garten and her friends are “creepy”. Beloved Emeril is “ewok-like” and “unwatchable”.
Saint Anthony straps on the armor of his Rolex Oyster Perpetual and a pair of Persol sunglasses, chain smokes his way through the world, gnashing cobra heart, various eyeballs, and the most mysterious of meats.
He lazes in the hot springs of Scandinavia and the deco poolyards of Miami. No one outside of a century of Lemans-participating race car teams has exhausted so many Michelin products. His of course are not tires, but starred luxury palaces.
Saint Anthony is no languorous dilettante. He will show you. He disembowels himself regularly with the hottest of chilis, endures a burgeoning war in Beirut, and courts the barbaric joint-rending “massage” of an Uzbekistani torturer. As an old man, Saint Anthony slays the line like an Adderall-hopped twenty-year-old cook, revisiting his former pre-sainthood restaurant job at Les Halles.
Saint Anthony does not really care of any of this or anything except maybe takeout from Pastrami Queen. He is unfettered. His body and his life is not a temple he tells us, but a fun house. Even when he burns it all down, we worship beneath the blaze.
Tony the man, a former junkie knows the shadow of desperation chasing him. He tries to tell us that he is not who we think. He quietly quits smoking, devotes himself to family life and jujitsu. Face to face with those he once aggrieved, there is a dinner of atonement with Emeril. But, in Tony, we do not trust.
We only heed the example of Saint Anthony to intercede and relieve us of the daily trespasses against us. We wish only to fuck and fight and fuck again. Throw in some chemicals, a mountain of carbs, full fury and vitriol for those who aggrieve us. If life must be iterative, then Saint Anthony’s example tells us, we can and we must only repeat the best parts.
Tony however knows that a life of best parts only is not real. Tony knows without forty-plus years of iteration, overnight success does not happen. Tony knows that vitriol for others is hatred of self. Tony regards loyalty as his greatest asset.
Tony hates you because you do not hear this. But in Saint Anthony, there is so much Tony. Saint Anthony too believes in devotion. He does not hate you. He is grateful that you have rescued him from the repetition. He believes that he owes you.
Though it is the Saint’s obligation, it is Tony who unravels in repayment of the debt. Tony too now believes the lie of Saint Anthony. Tony, who taught us that the dinner table is the universal thread, can no longer find a seat. He believes that if he can’t be Saint Anthony, that he is nothing, forgetting the saint only existed because the man did first. Tony is dead. Saint Anthony lives on.
If you read this far, you’re probably all like, Mike, are you ok? I am, but this is the only way I could process this New York Times article.
While this is a free post available to all, I too don’t want to worry about where I’ll work next, but the only way that happens is if you become a paid subscriber!
The Agony of Tony and the Ecstasy of Saint Anthony
I'm going to be thinking about this for awhile. It's truly bizarre, but I was just wondering the other day, in the scary garden that is my mind, if we'll ever know about his issues later in life. That NYTimes article at once answered my demonic summons and mortified me at the same time. I interviewed the man 3 times. He was a hero for a myriad of reasons, but it was his pursuit of.. well everything and his honesty that I found the most mesmerizing. I, an anxiety ridden, people avoiding, stunted life having fool lived, to some degree, through his adventures. But if I had a say, I would have told him: "This isn't healthy for you. Go fuck off to Vietnam for a year or two and come back refreshed." I didn't know him like that, however. And he didn't choose his health. He chose to end it all. I know that pain. I know that place he was at. My life is an utter fucking disaster. If his life scaled the mountaintops, what hope was there for me, I thought when he left. Last year, after Roadrunner came out, I put Tony away. It felt like the right time to end my own grief over him. I miss him as much as I miss family that have passed. I miss that honesty. There's a HUGE whole in terms of his point of view being put out. Food TV, food writing, travel guides...There's no one that can fill it. The man was one in a million. The world is less without him.
I have no end to this. I know I'm rambling now. I'm keeping this to read again. If there's something after this life, I hope he's at peace.
The most telling quote in Kim’s piece was Bourdain writing “I hate my fans. I hate my job. I hate my life.” Reading this post, I can see why.