From the outside, I guess it looks like I have it all. I’m a highly sought-after defense attorney on track to make partner in a few years. I dine at some of the hottest, most expensive restaurants in the city. And I own four Chanel skirt suits. Four. Not many other 28-year-olds can say that. I’m frequently approached by aspiring young female professionals for Lean In-type advice. People would be shocked if I told them what it’s actually like to be trapped in this golden cage, but it’s time to come clean:
I haven’t eaten anything delicious since law school.
The pressure to consume expensive shit at every meal may seem small, but it’s real and it hurts. Just last week, my banker boyfriend Trent and I were lucky enough to get a table at one of downtown’s hottest new dining spots, Grille, where everything is cooked over the engine of a running car. They use ingredients you’ve probably never heard of, like shisho and rooibos. And the service was impressive and sharp. The one problem though—every course tasted like exhaust fumes. You know, a “smoky” flavor. I stared longingly at the Outback Steakhouse across the way, leaving the table to furiously masturbate in the unisex bathrooms to the idea of a Bloomin’ Onion.
Why not just cross the street and eat something edible, you ask? Of course someone with only one or two Chanel skirt suits would ask that. We’re talking a $200-a-plate meal from one of the most celebrated chefs in the city. This is where my skills at suppression work their magic. When you’re eating an expensive meal that reminds you of an STD you once contracted on your tongue in Brazil, all you have to do is say, “Mmmmm,” and roll your eyes up in fake ecstasy.
I’ve worked too hard to get where I am, and make the money I do. So it doesn’t matter if I drink $50 cocktails that taste like citrus-tinged antifreeze, or $70 entrées that taste like an exquisite turd. I’ve become the metropolitan young professional I’ve always wanted to be because I’ve learned to suppress everything about myself that might make me look poor.
So tonight, Trent and I plan to check out Veal Estrada, where everything on the menu is made exclusively from tired baby cows. And I know it’s going to disgust me on some level, and I’m probably going to want to wish for the sweet taste of vomit to wash away the flavor of all that fancy food. But no one will ever know that. The poor can marry for love and eat for taste.
If anyone needs me, I’ll be snorting $800 veal foam through a $1000 bill.
