A memoir, if that’s the right word for this body of text, is an unusual undertaking for someone in her mid-thirties. But then,the word
memoir isn’t quite the right fit anyway; it suggests something far more comprehensive and, perhaps, chronological, than what follows. This is a collection of stories and remembrances, some less or more fleshed out, some more or less narrative, but no matter their subject or length, their protagonist, their reason for being, is my mother.
My mother has been “famous” for as long as I can remember, though I measured fame not by the visibility of her face in the media or her recognizability on a given city street—or even by the very occasional request for an autograph when we were traveling—so much as by her capacity to instantly materialize a table for four at the best, most overbooked restaurants. By all accounts, she was in fact not that well known, and certainly not outside the innermost circle of the food world. This has of course changed in the last twenty-odd years: she’s since been the subject of a biography, a MasterClass, hundreds of articles, and several television shows; and the recipient of more honorary doctorates than I can count, including a National Endowment for the Humanities medal bestowed by President Obama (she was the first chef to receive the honor), as well as copious awards (which far outnumber the trophies I amassed over a lengthy soccer career), a couple of knighthoods (France, Italy), and so forth. She is still not someone who gets mobbed out in the open or ever snapped by professional paparazzi, but she is loved by many across the globe.
No matter the country, however, one thing that distinguishes her notoriety is that she is admired, above all else, for her altruism. Which is to say, she is adored not as an actor might be, for a tour de force in which she plays a character, but for being emphatically, truly herself. And with such a degree of determination that even her moral inflexibility has become one of the defining features of her fame. This must be the best type of celebrity to have attained: invisibility to all but those who worship you for your actions (and the occasional detractor who feels compelled to join the small chorus of contrarians).
Still, I didn’t think to write this book because my mother is famous. Rather I wanted to write it in spite of her fame. Even though there is considerable parity between her public and private personas, there still is a part of her more private self—which is to say, her family self—that makes the picture bigger, that amplifies the image. I don’t have an expository story to tell, but I have had the experience of being the only person on this planet who is her child.
Copyright © 2020 by Fanny Singer. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
