I stood there, holding a cake, staring at its now-extinguished candles as a tsunami of emotions washed over me. In the span of about 30 seconds, the President of the United States had blown out the candles on a cake that wasn’t his and had absolutely destroyed my up-’til-then flawless cake delivery.
But I am getting way ahead of myself. Let’s back up a bit.
If you haven’t been keeping track, so far I had been told repeatedly ‘Just Don’t Quit’, asked by the White House social secretary on behalf of the President what should be served for lunch and been called “Brian” at least twice. And I was barely an hour into my first day.
The Menu, But Not Friday’s
Completely non-plussed that the White House needed an answer about Friday’s lunch, Mrs. K. focused instead on the two events at the house that day: a 40th birthday lunch party for a good friend and a barbecue that evening for the staff of the RFK Foundation.
Lunch was to be chicken salad served on a specific pattern of china with the “everyday” silver place settings. For the barbecue, the menu was hot dogs and hamburgers on the grill with strawberry shortcake for dessert (“with biscuits young man, not that store-bought shortcake”) served on casual china with the other “everyday” silver. (My suggestion of paper plates and plasticware went over about as well as a fart in an elevator.) Also, when I say “everyday silver” and “china”, I don’t mean “flatware” and “ceramic dishes.” I mean actual silver utensils and actual bone china dishes. I was floored.
The Cook Quits
The entire time I was on the phone with God, everybody and the White House, the cook had been banging and crashing around the kitchen. I can only guess it was an effort to get my attention so that I’d address her salary concern. Apparently, though, all that banging and crashing was her quitting her job because when I went into the kitchen to discuss the menu, she told me she had quit. Past tense. As if it had already happened.
I stood there, thinking: “who the Hell did you tell?? There hasn’t been anybody here for the past 45 minutes except me and the maids.”
She had, though, stuck around long enough to make one final scene: her telling me (loud enough for Mrs. K. to hear) that she quit unless her salary was immediately increased. And even then she might not stay. She was smart. She knew “the new guy” (me) was starting, that I’d be overwhelmed and that there were two important events planned for that day and if she quit, I’d be stuck. Crafty. It was my turn to be non-plussed.
Fortunately, I knew a guy. He ran his own small restaurant. Knowing he’d probably be able to help me out, I told the cook that she was welcome to quit, but I would prefer that she didn’t. I wouldn’t be able to discuss her salary with her that day, but I was willing to discuss it the next day.
She quit.
I head to the phone, picked up the receiver and started dialing.
She un-quit.
The day—and the menu—was saved.
Walking the Grounds
As the cook shopped for groceries, I stood frozen in the middle of the dining room mentally going through the list of things that need to be done before the lunch:
- Figure out where the Motown CDs were kept (she liked Motown playing while she got ready for social events),
- Polish the brass fixtures (all the brass fixtures, including the doorsill, which Mrs. K. would specifically check),
- Polish the everyday silver (both sets),
- Wash the china (both sets), and…
I looked outside towards the pool and the pool house, thinking: “I need to go down there.”
Out of nowhere Mrs. K materialized seemingly reading my mind.
“Let’s go tour the grounds, Byron.”
While walking the grounds, Mrs. K. rattled off “to-do’s” like she’d committed them to memory, recited them repeatedly and practiced her delivery:
- At the end of the driveway in front of the dead pine tree: “Have this tree removed by lunch. It’s ugly.”
- Passing by the dogwood hedge that hugged the house: “Have all the dead flowers pulled off the dogwood by lunch. They’re ugly.” (Umm…pay someone to pull dead flowers off a bush??)
- At the (very shabby) tennis court: “We don’t use this much anymore, but it needs to be fixed.” (Surprisingly, her statement didn’t end with “by lunch.”)
The entire time, scribbling madly on an “official” notecard, I wondered: “How the Hell am I going to get this done by lunch??”
The Pool House
We left the tennis court and walked into the pool house—the ridiculously large pool house.
At the kitchen’s threshold the rapid-fire “to-do’s” continued:
- Looking at the pool house’s back door lying on the floor: “this needs to be fixed, but not today.” (Wait. You want dead flowers plucked from a bush, but the back door lying on the floor isn’t a priority?? Okaaaay…)
- Glaring at the dishwasher: “it is broken, we’ll have to serve lunch from the main house kitchen.”
Yep, the pool house had a full kitchen and men’s and women’s changing rooms, a projection room (a what?!??) and a large living room.
Walking through the living room towards the pool, she stopped briefly at the incredibly large doorway, pointed up and said, “The drapes are back from the cleaners and need to be hung before lunch. They are in the den.” (This doorway was probably 18 feet wide and 10 feet tall and when the doors were closed it looked like three gigantic plate glass windows. It was incredible.)
As she continued out of the pool, she muttered something about the projector in the projection room being broken, but it wasn’t important because it was easier to rent VHS tapes than it was to have the Motion Picture Association of America send films out to the house to watch. Uh…what?!??
Hanging the Drapes
It’s June in Washington. It’s hot. A humid, sticky hot.
I had been outside for about 40 minutes in a dress shirt and tie, dress pants and brand new dress shoes. I was hot and a sweaty. And I wasn’t sure where I’d go to cool off as the main house didn’t have central air. My downstairs office, I remembered, was pretty cool, so I headed back there.
As I walked into the den, I saw the freshly cleaned drapes piled onto the sofa with a maid staring at them with such intense focus it looked like she was trying to use her Jedi mind powers to get them to float. After a few steps into the room, she snapped her head up to look at me, gesticulated wildly at the drapes then wildly towards the pool house (or, more accurately, the back wall of the den, through which dozens of yards away sat the pool house).
In halting English, she said that she’d hang the drapes if I carried them down to the pool house. They were too heavy for her to carry. I grabbed a pile of them and headed for the pool house. After a few trips, they were down there and I was sitting at my desk in the den fanning my dripping, sweaty body with a folder.
Decimating the Dress Code
As I fanned myself wildly and cursed the 150-year-old house for its lack of central air conditioning, the other maid appeared pointing to my shirt and gesturing like she’s ironing.
“I hate this language barrier,” I thought to myself while looking perplexed. “What other man is here who needs shirts ironed?”
The pantomiming continued.
The perplexed look continued.
Then my light bulb went off.
I looked down at my shirt and saw an absolute disaster. What had been a white, heavily starched shirt 20 minutes ago was now a smudged (how’d that happen?) and wrinkled mess. It looked like someone had pulled it from the washer, wrung it as tight as possible and left it to dry.
Crap.
Panic set in.
Then, in a role reversal bested only by Freaky Friday, I pointed to my shirt and gestured like I was ironing and the maid looked perplexed.
Clearly we were not communicating.
Panic turned to abject terror as I realized can’t be seen like this, especially not in front of guests. (Mental note: bring a spare, cleaned, starched dress shirt for emergencies.)
Suddenly we were both pointing to my shirt and gesturing like we were ironing. Language: 0; Charades: 1.
I took my shirt off, handed it to her, collapsed back into my chair and yanked off my shoes. My dogs were already barking. Loudly. Wearing brand new dress shoes the first day of a new job was such a rookie mistake.
Spinning around in my swivel chair (as all consummate professionals do after being stripped of their disgusting dress shirt), I took in the den for the first time. It looked like an FAO Schwarz had blown up. Cleaning it was the perfect project to keep me unseen while my shirt was washed and pressed.
Thirty minutes later my shirt returned bright white and starched.
Relief.
The Cake (Yes, That Cake)
At some point between the cook quitting and me carrying the drapes to the pool house Mrs. K. informed me she was several drafts into the wording for the lunchtime birthday cake.
“You can write in icing on a cake, can’t you Bart?” she had asked.
“Of course!” I lied.
How hard can it be?
It’s hard.
I don’t remember exactly what her final draft was, but it led to a tense negotiation for a significant revision. She had basically written War and Peace whereas a cake can really only handle a haiku.
She also provided specific instructions that the cake was to be a surprise, that she would do a very dramatic “surprise” once the cake reached the table and that it needed to arrive at the table with all 40 candles lit. “None of them should be blown out young man!”
With the cake writing done, I grabbed the candles, the cake and a lighter and headed for the pool house. I had (quite cleverly, I thought) decided that keeping the cake in the pool house and lighting the candles there, then walking out to the table would guarantee that all 40 candles would remain lit.
Marine One
Doing my best to hover over the lunch table yet keep my distance, I finally got the signal to ignite the cake. Earlier I managed to cram 40 candles onto the cake without messing up or covering any of the writing. I fired up the lighter, quickly lit the 40 candles, slid the lighter in my pocket and, in order to hide the cake, walked out of the pool house twisted backwards like I thought I’d left something behind.
“Don’t fall in the pool. Walk slowly. Don’t let any candles blow out.” I repeated to myself while my eyes remained glued to the inferno that was the cake.
Traversing the patio in what can only be described as a “near seizure”, I’d scoot quickly then as the candle flames flickered, I’d stop suddenly to let them recover. (Rinse, repeat.)
“This is going so well!” I thought to myself. “Only ten more feet!”
Ready for The Big Reveal, I began my dramatic turn to expose the cake. Mid-swivel several things happened so quickly, I’m sure only my face was capable of registering my continuum of emotions:
- Confused: suddenly all 40 of the candle flames dramatically leaned sideways in unison.
- Horrified: one third of the candles blew out
- Terrified: one third of the candles just blew out!
- Discombobulated: I suddenly recognized the loud “whoomp-whoomp” of a helicopter overhead
Dumbfounded: I glanced skyward and my jaw dropped. Marine One—the President’s helicopter—hovered overhead.- Petrified: another third of the candles blew out;
- Infuriated: the damn helicopter wasn’t moving. It stayed in place for an eternity (about ten seconds), did a forward dip that lasted another eternity (about an additional ten seconds) and then flew away.
- Panicked: back in the pool house kitchen, I re-ignited all 40 candles, gave them all my best, most withering “don’t you dare even think about blowing out” look.
- Unruffled: I delivered the cake as planned. (“Unruffled” my ass. I do not have a poker face. I’m sure I looked pissed off.)
Man, I wish I had a video of this happening.
I mean, who does this actually happen to?
Honoring RFK
After the cake was delivered, extinguished and “happy birthday” had been sung, I heard Mrs. K. begin to say, “So Marine One does that…”
I stayed within earshot because I needed to know why this happened. She explained that whenever a Democratic president is in office and flies over Hickory Hill in his helicopter, the pilot stops, hovers and dips to honor the memory of her late husband, Robert F. Kennedy.
Hearing that, my anger fizzled as fast as the candles had blown out. I smiled, looked at my watch and thought, “What else could possibly happen today?”
It was only 1 p.m.