Surgery Through Marina's Lens

From Our Friday Guest Blogger, Marina, Chef and Chief Rambler at Le Petit Cafe, Bloomington, IN.

This past week, I have been rambling about the consequences of my husband’s surgery: today, Patrick’s tonsils and uvula will go. I usually do not publicly ramble about my private life but this surgery might have a certain impact on Le Petit Café’s routine: his doctor said it might affect Patrick’s nasal sounds. Nasal sounds, as you know, even if you have not studied French, are very much part of the French language.

Yesterday, while I was serving my delicious, abundant and reasonably priced Sunday lunch, I was making mental lists of all the changes we might have to bring to make Patrick feel more comfortable. For instance, I thought tables un, cinq, onze and quinze might have to be replaced with zero, quatre bis, dix bis and quatorze bis. Not the most convenient thing during a busy shift when efficient communication is so important but we should all make a few sacrifices to minimize Patrick’s nasal self-consciousness.

Patrick and I only speak French in the kitchen and this part worries me a bit more. He will, many times during a shift, have to say Encore du pain (more bread). Would it be reasonable to expect our customers to understand we no longer serve refills of bread or that they have to switch to crackers so Patrick’s ego does not repeatedly get bruised?  True, our clientele has always risen to the occasion when asked to adapt to changes - and I have no doubt it would again- but perhaps the sensible thing to do would be to serve a huge basket of bread with the first course so they would not have to ask for more. This would actually be the ideal solution if it were not for my husband’s strong feelings against waste: he would not deal well with the potentially wasted rolls. Now, I could not possibly ask our clientele to accept Patrick’s unpleasantly nasal sounding nasty remarks about them not eating the 12 rolls of bread, could I? You see what I mean? Not easy to find a happy medium between Patrick’s ego and our clients’ priorities.

All these ideas, as smart as they are, do not seem very realistic. I then remembered we have a friend from Marseilles where nasal sounds seem to be different (it’s also possible this friend had his tonsils and uvula removed too). For instance, he does not pronounce the two consecutive nasal vowels in bonbon as in we do in Paris; it sounds more like bonne-bonne. To prevent ill-spirited clients (they are a few) from making fun of Patrick’s pronunciation, I thought I could tell them he is from Marseilles. I then imagined entire conversations about this:

-      Where is your husband from? would they ask with a smirk. You do not sound the same!
-      From Marseilles.

-          Marseilles? Really? Why don’t you serve Bouillabaisse then? they would insist with a knowing smile (some people do not give up)

I got this part covered though and would thrust forward my coup de grace:

-          We should but unfortunately we cannot find the right fish in Indiana for an authentic Bouillabaisse. (I showed them didn’t I?)

Not to end on an unpleasant note and to add an extra touch of credibility to my harmless fib, I would then conclude with a cheerful: “But try my aioli! That recipe has been in Patrick’s family for many generations.”

Now, this plan is not too unreasonable, is it?

After a while pondering over the difficulty of finding reasonably ethical solutions compatible with everybody’s well-being, I realized this nasal vowel unfriendly surgery might offer an interesting side (to me): Patrick may never be able to enunciate his too frequent and my less favorite answer: NON!

I then started to imagine new and wonderful dialogues:

- Patrick, can I buy a new car?

-          ...
-          Oui!?! Merci Cheri!
-          …! …! …!

I guess I worry too much: the French can do with a few less nasal sounds after all!