(Originally published 3 months after Anthony's passing. Today marks 5 long years since we lost him.)
I didn't write about Anthony Bourdain's death back in June. Mainly because I wasn't spending much time blogging then, and more importantly, I didn't think I could. Besides, his passing was talked to death on the news and in social media. During the same week, Kate Spade also committed suicide. If you put those together with Chester Bennington, Robin Williams and Chris Cornell from the last few years, it felt as if the brightest of our stars were blinking out everywhere.
Now with a few months in perspective, I can think on it and offer one more tearful tribute. And I can imagine Chef Bourdain saying something like "great, Becky....the world really fucking needs that!" But here is it anyway, Tony.
The announcement of Anthony's death came to us on June 8th. That was a Friday and my 16 year-old son's last day of school. But my son missed school that day for an early-morning seizure. We were home and we were treating ourselves very delicately but for different reasons. My first thought when I heard of Tony's untimely death was simple based on what I knew of him and his history and what I knew of the history of those around me: I assumed he had a heart attack. When my assumption proved wrong, I felt as sad as anyone. It was so hard to believe and worse to process.
I sat down with one of his books.....my husband and I own them all. And I found myself reading with his voice in my head. His voice was wonderful, and I hope I never forget the rich sound of it. Reading his words in that voice made me feel strangely comforted, like finding an old garment of someone who's passed and realizing their familiar fragrance still lingers on it. What a gift that can be to those who remain.
I also remember later in the weekend that my husband and I decreed it to be a WWAD weekend: What Would Anthony Do? Would he drink a cocktail at 10 am? Would he eat the best food? Live the largest life? Do all the things? Why yes, yes he would. Yes to all of the above!
Obviously, my husband and I didn't know Anthony Bourdain, never even met him or even came close. But my husband being a kitchen "lifer" and me having served my time as a younger woman in the restaurants, we felt we understood him. And like all people who've ever held any of those roles, we definitely respected him. Because he respected us.
In his later years, Bourdain became known as a traveling Bacchus of sorts. A poet of food and culture and knowledge. He was envied and loved by fans the world over. But to many of us, he was still that college drop-out who made his bones in the best and worst kitchens of America.....and taught us all something once he picked up a pen and started telling us all about it. He was a kitchen hero....a pirate in a pristine white chef's jacket.
I think I'll always think of Anthony Bourdain as the cool uncle I never had or the too-old-for-me boy that I worked with who flirted with me in a kid-sister sort of way. He was as real to me as any person I knew in real life and I was as sad as that when he died.
I'm not the person to talk about suicide or depression or mental illness. There are professionals out there for that, and I truly hope those in need will reach out. But I think I do understand loneliness and isolation.....even for one of the most beloved and famous men in the world. Something just made us all see it with an a-ha moment the second we heard he was gone. And then it was too late.
I just wish he had seen it too.
RIP Anthony Bourdain: the chef I never crossed, the traveler I never rode with, the cook who never winked at me across the line. But you could have. I know it in my heart.