Nancy Drew and the Pate Au Choux Caper

There's usually a point between the fourth and fifth egg when I start praying the rosary. Hail Mary, full of grace, please let this pate au choux come together. It's a demoralizing thing to be defeated by a pastry and it doesn't happen until the very end. After you've weighed out the ingredients, after you've stood over a burner turning the dough so that it cooks, after you brave the spiral staircase of death and hoard the bowl that fits onto the mixer that you feel might work better, after all this it only takes putting an egg in too quickly to see it all unravel. Our kitchen worked well today, everyone in their places and working together to put food on the table. Mind you that this is perfectly crafted, perfectly balanced, perfect tasting food on a perfect table. But a table and food all the same. And three times tonight I made a pate au choux that resembled french eclair casing and not balloon weights or lead biscuits. I started ruining it a couple weeks ago after a fight with an old friend. Each time I watched as the dough separated into oily confetti and I'd hold my face in my hands over the mixer. I readjusted the scale and only used the coldest butter in the reach in. I stopped using the machine on the left because of it's apparent bad juju. And it felt as though with every trip down the stairs with the copper pot, a trip up the stairs without a pastry bag was the inevitable outcome. I lost the job after the third day and was remanded to parsley chopping duty. But after a couple weeks and a significantly stronger tricep from cutting leafy herbs down to powder, I was ready to try again. Because I'll be god damned if I get beat by that pasty yellow dough. It's not the first thing I've failed at. I have a hard time understanding why the person that knew me best has no desire to know me at all. That I've been erased from a life that I was sure I was a part of. But I relax and find myself outside on a warm day with the sun on my back and my friends around a wooden table. There's a baby on my lap with dark curls and soft blue eyes and a burger on my plate with cupcakes to come. Fabian is sipping a beer and Chris Spencer is reading his new book, a present for his going away to start a new chapter in his life. And this is mine. This is my adventures to come. It's easier to see that with the pate au choux in the piping bag and not in the garbage can.