“More often than not, are hotter than hot, in a lot of good ways…”

            The quote, from the opening song of Aladdin (that’s right, I have taken to quoting Disney movies from the late 1980s), refers to the thermal and salacious characteristics of Arabian Nights.  That is not the topic of this particular discourse.  Though the arid climates around the globe are often harsh and foreboding, the culinary gems they produce have become delicious additions to my gastronomic preferences.  I love heat, whether it be the vinegar and spice of a curry vindaloo at the local Indian restaurant, the meaty, egg-filled poblano of chile relleno at Mexican establishments, the soy, ginger, and garlic delight of chicken Szechuan popular in American Chinese cuisine, or just some good, old-fashioned red-pepper flakes on my pasta or pizza.  Some like it hot, and I am one of them.

            Warren Zevon, fully aware of his impending death from pleural mesothelioma, was asked by David Letterman during an interview if he had gained any wisdom or perspective on life after receiving his grim prognosis.  He remarked simply, “enjoy every sandwich.”  I follow this advice daily, by adding to my pastrami or turkey & provolone on rye, various hot sauces ranging from sweet & spicy to the type of incendiary concoctions that convert one’s tongue to the type of inferno that would make Dante cringe.  Indeed, it is one of the highlights of my day, to which I eagerly look forward as noon approaches. 

            Recently, my future father-in-law has taken to growing all manner of hot peppers in his backyard.  As one of the few members of his circle who fully appreciates the beauty of the world’s more fiery delicacies, he was so kind as to pick several for me during my most recent visit, sending me on my way with a Ziploc baggie with a half-dozen explosive beauties.  When I returned home, during my next lunch, I set out to construct a sandwich whose heat level would ignite my senses.

            It is generally known that the majority of the capsacin, the chemical responsible for the burning sensation in one’s mouth, is found in the seeds of spicy peppers.  When I have consumed jalapenos in other contexts, I may choose not to disregard the seeds so as to maximize the spice to which to wanting taste buds are privy.  Thinking this similar line of thinking would be equally savvy, I made a similar decision, sliced the peppers, placed them beneath my carefully laid deli meats and cheese upon the rye bread.  The result was atypical, for these were atypical peppers.  I have consumed specialty hot sauces bearing an “XXXXX” label and warnings detailing the truly unimaginable heat.  This was worse.  The flames filled my mouth with acidic, caustic burning that brought tears to my eyes and cleared my nostrils and sinuses more rapidly than any antihistamine or decongestant.  Worse, the heat was inexorable and unrelenting.  Neither milk, nor bread, nor cool liquids accomplished anything to regulate the fury upon my palate.  I was bested, with nothing to do but simply wait for the seething pain to subside.

            Once I had reached a level of tolerable pain, I promptly sliced and de-seeded another pepper, and constructed a second sandwich.  Never has such a potent pepper ever tasted so feeble and tame.  Perhaps this experience is the purpose of excruciating training regimens, after which any circumstance appears manageable by comparison.  While I do appreciate the bolstered tolerance for heat, the battle’s end was declared prematurely.  The following morning’s effects were harrowing at best, but need no further description. 

The Phases of the Son

            The celestial orbs, seen on clear nights are objects of great beauty and mystery.  Yet, their behavior is clock-like in its repetitive precision.  Javert, in one of his soliloquies in Les Miserables describes the stars eloquently, “You know your place in the skies, you hold your course and your aim / and each in your season returns and returns, and is always the same.”  These suns are much like the sons who walk this earth.  We all traverse, if we are fortunate, a pre-scripted list of phases.  Though less elegantly modeled through the equations of mechanics, they are nonetheless well-measured, well-defined, and infinite in their cyclical repetition.

            Initially, boys revere their fathers.  Any attempts to emulate them are acts of insecurity, not genuine belief that true mimicry is possible.  After all, father holds certain advantages of his longer stay upon the earth, most notably his physical size and strength.  In this stage, father is deified by his ability to throw a ball a manner we cannot ever hope to match and answer questions with an intellect we can never hope to attain.

            Next, as children, while we still lack the physical fortitude and knowledge repository of our fathers, we grasp the fundamental fact that his advantages are age-dependent, and that we too, one day, shall gain that which time has already bestowed upon him.  Now the boyish attempts at emulation are more fervent; impatiently, we wish for the years to speed along and deliver with them the cognition and athletic capacities for which we so desperately yearn.

            This phase continues, but its sentiments are short lived.  Frustration is inevitable, as the urge to compete is born.  Much as the young lion covets his rightful place as the king of the plains, we want our throne long before we are ripe to receive it.  We note our first pangs of resentment, after all, our father has no more control over the passage of time than any other man, woman, or child.  Why should his temporal advantages bestow upon him such authority and superiority?  If the gap is to be closed inevitably, why not right now?  Such is the reasoning of the embittered teenager…wedged firmly between video games and surreptitious observation of the newly-grown bosoms of neighboring classmates.

            Soon we decide that we fully grasp the zeitgeist of our age.  Our fathers are superfluous providers of food, shelter, and other necessities.  What viable contribution can come from someone whose generation’s defining cultural experiences centered around protest songs and enough hallucinogens to ensure that Lucy wasn’t the only girl with kaleidoscope eyes?  Now, the only wisdom we wish to take is the certainty that if it was suggested by our fathers, the wisest course of action was to do the opposite. 

            A period of transition ensures.  We recognize that our father’s traits, both desirable and deplorable lurk within us.  Interactions are a mix of appreciation and acrimony, conversations span the range of friendly to fierce, from collegial to confrontational.  We struggle to decide how we are like our father, and how we will choose to deviate from his path.  After all, to deny our similarities would be beneath our obvious intellect and savvy (wink-wink) at this point.  However, to follow him directly would be to deny ourselves the individuality we’ve coveted all along.

            As we settle into our adult experiences, professionally, romantically, we rediscover the emotions of the very first phase, albeit in a decidedly different context.  Now, it is no longer father’s ability to throw a baseball or his uncanny ability to know the answer to any and every question on the tip of our tongue we covet.  It is contentedness, stability, the knowledge that we have, finally, established ourselves in the world.  Our fathers are flawed, like everyone else, they are not unlimited in their aptitudes as we once believed.  However, we appreciate this fact, as it gives us hope that perfection is neither required nor expected.

            We recognize our father’s skill sets, their wisdom, and their flaws.  By this point, the athletic torch has long since changed hands, unceremoniously, many years previously.  The intellectual torch is passed too in its time, and yet, wisdom remains a different beast.  We realize that their temporal advantage, which yielded such advantages in our eyes as children now has sapped them of much of it.  We realize that our time sharing the planet with our parents is inherently finite, and that one day, we must play the role for another that our father has played for us.

            And so it goes…if we are extremely fortunate.