Sharp-eyed readers of a nautical sort may notice a small but significant change in this week’s newspaper. For what I think may be a first, the tide table, which usully appears in the sports section, no longer gives the times of the daily highs and lows at Promised Land. Instead, it lists the ups and downs for the Three Mile Harbor entrance.

    Our decision to do this reflects two things. The first is that government tide tables are easily available for Three Mile Harbor, and the second is that no one much knows where Promised Land is anymore.

    Time was, Promised Land, facing northwest on the shore of Gardiner’s Bay, was a port of some importance. The Smith Meal company ran a menhaden processing plant there, and the Edwards Brothers brought fish to their dock. A railroad spur off the L.I.R.R. main line once crossed what is now part of Napeague State Park to reach the area.

    Seasonal workers, most from the South, traveled there each year to work on the menhaden boats — bunker steamers in the local vernacular — or in the steaming, hulking factory. When the plant was in full operation, it was hard to miss. The overwhelming smell of thousands of pounds of menhaden being steamed down for their oil and fish byproducts was something one might never forget. Employment there meant money, good money, the story goes, making it a “promised land.”

    Our house, about a half-mile to the west along the Gardiner’s Bay shore, was the nearest to the fish factory, as we called it, until well after it closed in 1968. It was the last of a number of smaller fish-rendering plants that had operated in the area; remnants can be found along the eastern, interior shore of Napeague Harbor and on Hick’s Island.

    According to “The South Fork,” my father’s, Everett Rattray’s, book, the owners of the Hick’s Island factory ran a two-mile-long water pipe from a pump house at Fresh Pond, Montauk. Fresh water was essential to the steam-run operations. When I was out at Napeague recently I noticed what I suspected was a piece of the old pipe now exposed by the shifting sands.

    With the fish factories all but gone, so too is the sense of what was once promising about Promised Land. Boaters do not end up there very much now, except for occasional drifts for fluke or if blown over from the Devon Yacht Club. People who work or play on the waters here are far more likely to be familiar with Three Mile Harbor, and so the change to our tide chart.

    Promised Land remains a place name, however, at least for us locals, and if you really want to know what the tide will be doing there, you can just subtract about a half hour for an approximate time.

    As it neared 8:30 p.m. on a recent Sunday night, Mary and I, as is our wont these days, talked of the time that remains to us, and she wondered, in that connection, what places I might really like to see and what things I might really want to do.

    “What do I really want to do now? Or in the future?” I said.

    “Both,” she said, “but let’s begin with now.”

    “As for now, rather than look at the big picture, I’d really like to watch the Steelers game!” I said.

    I don’t think it was quite the answer she’d expected, but, without a moment’s hesitation, she said — cheerily, I might add — “Let’s watch the Steelers game then.”

    And so we did — she intermittently, I transfixedly — and it was wonderful. Before the first quarter was over, the Steelers led 21-0, if memory serves, the most points the Bengals had given up in a quarter since Ought 5, or something like that.

    Really, if it weren’t for a couple of plays gone awry this season, the Steelers would be in contention for the Super Bowl again, though perhaps it’s good not to get fat and happy fan-wise, immune to the vagaries of life, whether of the sporting or of the real variety.

    One should remain on one’s toes, on the edge of one’s seat, as a poet said recently on these pages. Pretty soon it’ll be over and you won’t have seen Paree. Not to mention Mastic.

    “Well, I would like to go to Florence and stay in the inn they’ve made of Guido Cavalcanti’s home up on the hill, the Tower of the Beautiful View,” I said.

    “And Mom always said I should see Venice,” said Mary.

    Mention of Venice got me to thinking of the  root canal I’d just undergone. And of life’s exigencies. And so I assured her we’d go to Venice soon, but added that for now the only place I really wanted to go — since it was halftime and I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer —  was to bed.

    Midnight was the first. He was a big, tough tom, jet-black with just a couple of white hairs on his throat, a “witches cat.”

    We did not adopt him; he adopted us. I was 3 or 4. We were living in West Hempstead. My mother went into my parents’ bedroom. There was a black sweater on the bed that began moving. My mother screamed. Knowing Midnight, he probably didn’t even blink.

    My parents put him outside; he came back in. He quickly became a McMorrow.

    With me being about 4, and my sister Beth being 6, there was a certain amount of teasing that took place, but only a certain amount. Midnight had claws, and he knew how to use them. If he was particularly unhappy with something you did, he would chase you.

    He was always an outdoor cat, even when we moved into an apartment in Forest Hills Gardens. He was a terror for the birds, particularly in his younger, West Hempstead days. A neighbor complained to my parents about his killing birds, as if there was anything they could do about it.

    He lived a long life. I was a teenager when he died. He just fell down one day and went into convulsions. My friend gave me a lift in his Camaro to the vet, who told me the animal had to be put to sleep. I watched him stick the needle in. The animal’s quivering stopped. He was dead.

    The body wrapped in a blanket, we got into the Camaro, and went back to the apartment. It was dead of winter. The ground in the backyard was frozen, except by the window to the boiler room. I dug a hole, lined it with pine branches, and placed Midnight inside.

    At the vet clinic, they had made a plastic identity card for Midnight. They card said that he was a female. Since it was a one-time visit, I didn’t care, until I buried him.

    I looked at the card. It said female, but it also said his name, all caps, raised plastic letters. “MIDNIGHT.” The card went into the ground with the cat.

    Before Midnight died, I’d gotten into the habit of bringing strays home. Usually kittens others didn’t want.

    Two were males, Skeezix and Camilo. Both of them died the same death. My parents had them put to sleep because they both suffered from blockages of the urethra. It happens sometimes to male cats. After neutering, crystals in the urine clog up the canal. It can be treated, but it also can become chronic, as it did in both cats.

    Since then, I have always delayed castrating male cats, as long as possible. I don’t know if it is scientifically true, but I’d rather err on the side of caution.

    Skeezix and Camilo were not buried. They just never came back from the hospital.

    Layla was the runt of a litter. Jet black, and tiny. As with all our other cats in Forest Hills, she would go outside. We had a first-floor apartment, and the cats would get to the backyard by jumping out onto a small roof that led to stairs to the yard.

    One day, Layla came back pregnant. She had one kitten. It was born blind. It was put to sleep and Layla was spayed. She ended up living first with Beth, then with my other sister, Cathy.

    Pooh, an orange cat in a tabby pattern, was next. He followed me home one night, and ended up with Cathy in her 91st Street apartment in the city, until she moved to Arizona, when Pooh moved in with me in my apartment on 19th Street.

    He was the exact opposite of Midnight. Exceedingly docile, he loved to be handled. I could pick him up and drape him around my neck like a collar and he would purr.

    When my wife, Carole, moved in with me, she was an actress, working steadily in musicals. She would put a show tune on the stereo and begin to sing. Pooh would race around the apartment in a kind of gleeful frenzy.

    He lived a long life. The end came in about 1989. I was working as a manager at Bouley. Carole went home to Michigan to visit her family. Pooh suddenly became ill. I took him to the vet. It was a sort of overall organ failure. He still was functioning, but barely. They gave me drugs to give him, which I did.

    The animal was barely moving, except to occasionally drink from a water bowl I’d placed next to him.

    He would stare at me with that peaceful, dopey stare cats have.

    Bouley was a tough job, long hours. I gave the cat his drugs in the morning, and went to work. In the evening, I would come home. The cat hadn’t moved. A couple of days of that and I decided, after leaving the cat alone one morning, that I was going to take him to the vet that evening and have him put to sleep.

    I never made that trip. Pooh was dead when I came home. I put his body in a towel, at the bottom of a canvas tote bag, along with a trowel and his toys. I took the subway to 96th Street, and walked into Central Park. It was a nice evening, and even the Uptown part of the park was busy.

    I found a secluded spot, dug a hole by a bench, buried him with his toys, and took the subway home.

    T.E. McMorrow is a reporter for The Star.

    Leo the pig has hit what appears to be his adolescence — constantly leaving a mess on the floor and trying to carve out a little space of his own just to be left alone.

    For those of you unfamiliar with the story of our pet house-pig, let me explain that he joined our family over my most strident objections. My wife, Lisa, and elder daughter, Adelia, had fallen for what appeared to be an online con, a Texas breeder who claimed that it would weigh no more than 10 pounds as an adult. Don’t ask how much he cost us or to ship by air.

    More than once I said if we got a pig, I would move out to the shed.

    “Fine,” Lisa and Adelia said.

    Oh, he was cute when he arrived, all pink and tiny and seeking warmth under our chins. I said they were crazy and warned that he would ultimately be about the size of our Lab mix dog, albeit with stubbier legs. Now, at about 2 years old, he weighs more than 30 pounds — all muscle and determination — and he still wants to cuddle up under our chins.

    As such things often go, Leo has become more or less my pet, or to be more precise, my problem. Lisa wanted to send him back for a refund; Adelia is entirely indifferent. I find him interesting and amusing.

    Since I get up well before the rest of the household, it is I who puts him out in the morning, and it is I who makes his breakfast while fending off his aggressive nuzzling of my ankles. If I am not fast enough, he makes his displeasure known by knocking over the antique kitchen chairs; already one has been taken away for repair. He is not much put off by shots from a spray-bottle, which we keep handy. Often my first words of the day are, “Leo, cut it.” Well, perhaps with a bit more profanity.

    Just this week, the beast took to tearing up The Sunday Times with his hooves, then pushing the shreds into his dog bed by the radiator and nestling down amid it all. Midday on Monday, my wife sent a phone photo; Leo had curled up for a nap inside his recently cleaned litter box.

    Shortly thereafter, Lisa was headed for Bridgehampton. I said she should get him a room of his own, or at least swing by Agway to look for a nicer bed.

    Air travel is a conundrum, at once wonderful and terrible. It is wonderful to travel so far so quickly, but terrible to have to leap over all the hurdles it throws in your way.

    (By the way, if our family friend Maria Matthiessen is reading this, I warn her that she should stop right here: I’m about to engage in a binge of what she calls “route talk.” And if you don’t get that reference, I refer you to a recent episode of the public radio program “This American Life,” about the five topics that without fail make conversations boring.)

    After Christmas in Nova Scotia, my husband and I hopped, skipped, and jumped down to Massachusetts for New Year’s. Although we encountered no ice storms, no canceled flights, and no geese on the runway, we almost missed our connection in Toronto. I don’t think we would have made it to Boston at all if my husband hadn’t used a wheelchair when we transferred planes.

    The modern airport can be like an obstacle course you’d see in a movie about military training, can’t it? It really isn’t a user-friendly space. Not everyone is able-bodied enough to hike the long distances between gates and security checkpoints; and not all airports have people-mover conveyer belts or carts to take the tired, the lame, or the aged from one holding pen or line to another. Airport navigation is about the only circumstance I can think of that can make a person feel grateful for being reliant on a wheelchair (though I guess athletes who participate in wheelchair races probably consider that sport to be another upside).

    As is so often the case, our flight was a half hour late arriving from Halifax into Toronto, and after we landed — “deplaned,” to use the lingo — we had to move like Ethiopian middle-distance runners to catch the connecting leg to Boston. Three different airline assistants moved us to the front of lines when we went through security (for the second time that day) and then United States customs.

    We arrived at the departure gate with frazzled smiles on our faces, just as boarding was announced for “those traveling with children or needing assistance.” Since there were only a few daily scheduled flights that would have gotten us down to New England on Canada Air, I felt certain the wheelchair had spared us a night in Toronto.

    Some time ago, a woman of a certain age whom I barely know confessed that she was in the habit of requesting a wheelchair in airports even though she didn’t really need one. Perhaps guilt loosened her tongue, but who knows? Maybe she was bragging about her wiles. I myself shoot dark looks at those drivers I sometimes see parking in places reserved for the handicapped, ever watchful because my husband has, and needs, a handicapped tag. I don’t believe in taking advantage of it when I am alone in the car.

    Our trip from Nova Scotia to Boston took 14 and a half hours, a little longer than a nonstop to Beijing or Dubai. Looking at a map, I think we might have rowed the 300 or so miles across the Gulf of Maine in better time.

    Come back, Stephen Talkhouse, all is forgiven!

    This strange sequence of words was like a whisper in my ear as I trudged along the partially plowed sidewalk on Main Street ’round about midnight on Saturday, still blissfully unaware of the incoming polar vortex and its ruthlessly frigid Arctic air. A whisper, or perhaps the wind. Come back, Stephen Talkhouse.

    The Talkhouse — the establishment, not the man — where I spent an awful lot of hours (and a couple awful hours) over the last 12 months — for professional reasons, of course, mostly — is closed until March. As some of its principals and crew headed to Florida for a Soldier Ride benefit, the nearest watering hole/concert hall/community house to my little apartment was suddenly inoperative. The long holiday season is over, the wind whispered, and the deep freeze is on. Get out while you can.

    I still remember the feeling when Labor Day came to Montauk, and the lines at Gosman’s Clam Bar, where I worked many a summer, grew shorter with the daylight. I remember the subtly shifting hues of the September sky and sea. I can still recall the yearning in a local man’s voice as he noted, almost 30 years ago, the mass exodus from the South Fork at summer’s end. “Back to the city,” he said wistfully. “And you wish you could go with them.”

    After childhood as a year-round resident of Montauk, I used to do just that, clearing out well ahead of Columbus Day. Then I lived in the city year round, and as time passed spent less and less time here. From the outset, the summers in New York were horrible, intolerable, and eventually I couldn’t bear the thought of another, and here I am again.

    Into a second winter in Amagansett, I’ve experienced two summers of the Fabulous Hamptons like I’d never known them before. We all know of the crowds, the traffic. Surely we can all recount all-too-true tales of rude and ostentatious behavior, inconceivable self-regard. Noise, litter, and nowhere to park. Much like New York. . . .

    Yeah, it’s a lot nicer here without all that. The Reutershan parking lot is more accommodating without the Ferrari positioned, by design, to occupy two parking spaces. But these are the desolate days, and April seems a long way from here.

    At the Talkhouse, there was live music. There was recorded music. There were familiar faces, friends, and fun. And now there isn’t.

    So I had to stop in on Saturday. I had to get one more impression, one that would have to last a while.

    It had been a good year at the Talkhouse. I’d seen and heard plenty of great artists, and met and interviewed quite a few of them too. I was recruited to work the merchandise table for a couple acts and made a few extra dollars in the process. I’d performed there a few times with my band, the Hot Pockets, and introduced the indescribably perfect tribute band Lez Zeppelin at their second show of the summer.

    And on Aug. 15, ’–round about midnight, ragged from multiple jobs and just back from an East-Hampton-to-Queens-to-East-Hampton sprint in The Star’s embattled van, I’d had a brief but exhilarating chat with Sir Paul McCartney, as Jimmy Buffett and Angelica Huston stood nearby. How often does that happen?

    Come back, Stephen Talkhouse, wherever you are.

    Christopher Walsh is a reporter for The Star.

    They say as a woman ages the first thing to go is her body. With me, though, it was my teeth; the body went second. For the past few years my teeth have been breaking down and falling out. But my smile, and it’s a big one, has been beautifully restored thanks to my new dentist in Southampton. I’ll be offering my thanks to him tomorrow when I chomp down on that traditional turkey dinner, celery and all.

    Except for the fact that I’m white and not as funny, I was beginning to look like Moms Mabley, the comedian who used her toothless smile as part of her act. My smile has a life of its own. Under the worst circumstances my teeth would just burst forth and make their presence known, sometimes in a very inappropriate manner.

    I believe the condition of your teeth is a genetic trait, which didn’t bode well for me. Both my grandmothers, grandfather, my aunt, and some cousins all had false teeth. Mind you, my new teeth are not false; they’ve been restored. If my choice was to get false teeth I think I would have chosen to look more like Moms. My grandfather used to make us kids laugh like crazy when he took his teeth out and made jokes or chased us around chomping his toothless gums. But it was really creepy going into my grandparents’ bathroom and seeing their teeth in a jar. I tried to avoid looking at them for fear that they’d start chatting away with me while I was doing my business.

    When we were younger, my sister and I were the only ones who had to drink milk at the beach to protect our teeth, according to our mother. While everyone else was sipping bubbly soda, we were spitting out warm milk into the salty water. We’re probably the cause of the polluted water in the Long Island Sound off City Island in the Bronx where we grew up.

    It’s odd that our teeth are so troublesome. My mother was very conscious of taking us to our dentist, who lived over an hour away from us and practiced from his home office in a beautiful area of Westchester County. He was a nice man but a torturer. Even though we let her know how much he hurt us and how much we hated him for that, she still piled us into the car for our monthly (sometimes weekly) trips to the good ol’ torturer.

    Putting it in perspective, I think maybe she had a crush on him. While we were shaking with fear in the examination room, she was probably flashing some leg to him in the waiting room. And she was a professional dancer so she had good legs. My mother’s legs and God knows what else probably distracted him while he was working on us. She was a flirt, my Mom. That’s the only reason I can think of for the pain this nice man inflicted on us adorable little children.

    Because of his painful treatments, we resisted going to the dentist in our adult years and of course we’re paying for it now, literally. No matter how expensive your clothes or how beautiful you might be, if you have bad teeth, nothing else matters. But the beauty here is that I’ve found a fairly young and very advanced dentist who does it all — root canals, extractions — and except for the initial numbing injections, the work was pain-free.

    I got very good at smiling with my mouth closed because I was so embarrassed when my teeth started going. But that was really hard because I do have a big smile and I can’t always control it. I came up with all kinds of tactics to hide my teeth, including wrapping my scarves higher on my neck to cover my mouth in case I met someone I had to talk to. But no more. I’m giddy with my restored teeth. And the timing is perfect as Thanksgiving is a time to spend with others. I’ll not only be smiling, I’ll be drinking bubby soda. Hell, it’s a holiday, I might even be drinking a bubbly beer and eating a crusty wing, my favorite part of the turkey!

    Janis Hewitt is a senior writer for The Star.

“At a certain point you’re going to plan that gathering which you won’t be able to attend. You’re going to make your final arrangements.”  — from the blog The Screaming Pope

       Q. Dear Pope, as you know, I’ve been thinking about this for some time, and recently settled on Oakland Cemetery in Sag Harbor, which I’ve been hoping to show you one day soon. Should I select a plot on higher land, so that drainage is good?

       “Everyone is opting for higher land these days, but remember Venice and Amsterdam have survived below sea level for centuries. Not to be overly phobic, but higher land also puts your plot in danger of terrorists and drones.”

       Q. Should I buy four plots instead of two, to give my wife and me more space?

       “I would opt for four plots so you can offer your mourners some amenities. With your extra two plots, you can build a little workout area equipped with, say, a treadmill and elliptical for those who want to get aerobic while they’re paying their respects. I personally can’t remember anyone unless my heart rate has reached a certain level. A normal heart rate is like death to me.”

       Q. Should I put a little mini wall around the plots to show that we are important and make it easier for those coming to pay their respects to find us? Should I put a nice little bench nearby to encourage people to give a little more time to sitting and remembering all that was good about me?

       “Again, affirmative . . . my rule of thumb is bigger than a gravestone, but less than a full-blown mausoleum. Oh, one little point: Your bench should a have a plaque. People have short memories and by the time they get to the bench, they may not be able to remember who you are.”

       Q. I struggle between the cheaper and environmentally preferable option of cremation versus full-body burial. But in the end, does cremation seem too final?

       “I like cremation since it’s sexier. I always wanted my ashes scattered in the women’s locker room at Equinox so that I would be surrounded by naked women for all eternity.”

       Q. Should I write my obit and the farewell remarks that will be made at my send-off? Or should I just trust that whoever writes them is going to know what they are doing?

       “Remember Ashford and Simpson? I think the obit can be written by you and your eulogist with one of those little EMI doodads next to the credit, in case the eulogy itself makes it to the Top 40.”

       Q. Should I engrave on the tombstone a link to a website that will have a robust offering of my history, speeches, awards, achievements, etc.?

       “A no-brainer.”

       Q. What should my epitaph emphasize — my good-heartedness, my veteran’s status, my love of family, my Honorable Mention All-City Football Team recognition in Omaha, the love of my cat, Reed?

       “I wouldn’t go into any of these items. Everyone knows those things. I will share with you what I think to be an extraordinary aspect of your character. It may seem like a small thing, but the way you comb your hair says so much. First of all, you are the only guy I know who still puts a comb through his hair and certainly one of the only ones in our age group who still has something left to put a comb through. But I’m sure even if you were bald you would still pull the old comb out in polite company. It’s a spiritual act, by Jove, and the world needs to know this. Combing and praying are virtually the same thing for you. So your epitaph could read: ‘He combed with the hand of God,’ or ‘At home with the comb of God,’ or ‘God, where did he get that comb?’ We can work on the details. I don’t think we have it quite yet.”

    Paul Critchlow is writing a memoir tentatively titled “Outrunning the Peter Principle: Tips From an Inveterate Corporate Survivor.” He lives part time on North Haven.

    Francis Levy, a Wainscott resident, is the author of the comic novels “Erotomania: A Romance” and “Seven Days in Rio.” He blogs at TheScreamingPope.com and on The Huffington Post.

       We tried, but, as usual, failed to escape Thanksgiving.

       “Let’s go to Sam’s,” I said to Mary when the subject came up, “and have a large pizza with cranberry topping.”

       It’s not that we are antisocial — we do care for our relatives, but when they’re foregathered all at once it can be overwhelming, especially if you are — as Mary often is — the designated cook. (I, being the designated joyful one, have an equally arduous task.)

       She was let off the hook somewhat this Thanksgiving, having only to make three shepherd pies and turkey soup for 14 for the day after.

       Somewhere she heard that roasted turkey might turn out better if cut up a bit. The butcher advised against it — with reason as it turned out, for the various parts ended up unevenly cooked, some hardly at all. Which got her to worrying so about salmonella that she was ready to chuck everything and start anew with a whole new one.

       “See, I told you I didn’t think I’d be very good company this Thanksgiving,” she imagined herself saying to her siblings as reports of salmonella poisoning began to come in.

       “Salmonella Mary. . . . It has a nice ring to it,” I said. “And you alone will be left to inherit your mother’s estate.”

       Gavin, our son-in-law, a chef, among other things, who, even though he was still in mourning for the Broncos’ recent last-minute loss to the Patriots, rallied to reassure her that everything would be all right.

       “See,” I said to Mary this morning. “I ate a turkey sandwich last night, and I’m still . . . aaargh, aaargh, gasp, gasp, oh, Jesus, oh my God! Still . . . still. . . .”

       I quickly got up from the floor because I didn’t want to overdo it. “Still here!”

       “Okay, you can taste the soup now,” she said a while later. “And tell me if it needs salt.”

       I dipped the spoon in — gingerly, eyeing her carefully, inasmuch as I was reluctant to take leave of my that it was very savory as it was. As was she.

       “I don’t know what I’d do without you,” she said brightly.

       I, of course, was happy in the knowledge that she still likes having me around. . . . At least I think she does . . . for most of the time . . . for much of the time, anyway . . . in small cathartic doses then; let’s leave it at that.

     There are Hamptoners who only use their houses here one week a year. I know this because two years ago I worked as a sous chef for such a family. Headed by one of the biggest Wall Street whales, they only inhabit their Water Mill House during Thanksgiving week, the rest of the year being spent in the city, Florida, England, France, and probably more places to which I’m not privy.

       With its team of gardeners planting all sorts of autumnal foliage around the vast bay-touched property, its cozy fireplace-lit rooms, and its barn with indoor squash court and bowling alley, the compound is an idyllic spot in which to celebrate bounty. They have much to be thankful for.

       I received a call a few days before Thanksgiving from the estate manager. I had known her when she was the private chef of now-divorced friends, a Wall Street pasha and his wife who had a house on the ocean near the Maidstone Club. She knew that I cheffed on occasion. Could I start Monday? There were three days of prep work before the extended family of roughly 30 would gather on Thursday.

       I had never been a sous chef. I had worked the line at a restaurant once, had been a cook at two top Los Angeles caterers, had a couple of catering companies of my own, and had been a “private chef” for several clients from L.A. to Connecticut.

       I would be working under the clients’ French chef, who followed them to their various residences.

       “How’s your knife work?” she asked. Not great, was the truth. Knife work? This had never been important to me. Then again, I never worked for clients who cared if a carrot was properly julienned or a leaf chiffonaded. It’s not that I don’t know how to properly slice and dice, it’s just — like penmanship — I’d never mastered it. I’m a very fast cook, preferring to rely on the various blades of the food processor. But that, I knew, would not please a classically trained French chef. 

       I consider myself a creative chef. My formal training is limited. In my 20s my neighbor in the city, Peter Kump, founder of the James Beard House, inveigled me to attend the first class of his cooking school. Today it is the widely respected Institute of Culinary Education. I already knew what I was doing, having fooled around in the kitchen since I was 15. My first meal: Chicken Kiev from “The New York Times Cookbook.” Yes, the melted butter spurted. I was hooked.

       I loved Peter’s school, learned a lot, but found I preferred my usual method of immersing myself in cookbooks (always piled high on my nightstand), then using recipes as veering off points from which to experiment with my own versions. Like covering songs. A few years later, while living in London, I took a few classes at the Cordon Bleu, but found its methods dated. In one of the classes a dour woman demonstrated how to prepare a marrow squash, basically a large tasteless zucchini. I reverted to the books of Elizabeth David and Madhur Jaffrey, going through a stage where I cooked only Indian food, seduced by the exotic aroma of toasting spices. 

       As I was buzzed through the security gate, I was anxious about what the chef would think of my skills. Never mind my years of cooking untold dinner parties for friends, not to mention cooking three meals a day for myself. (For today’s lunch, just a regular weekday meal, I stuffed a poussin with dried fruits and threw some vegetables into the roasting pan. It took me the same time as making a sandwich, not including cooking time.) The first day went well. We mostly made menus and lists of ingredients, which we gave to another kitchen helper whose only job was to shop.

       That night the estate manager suggested we go out for dinner, an opportunity to bond. She chose Bobby Van’s. Since we were on Long Island, I suggested fluke. When the chef took a bite I could see it was not up to his standards. Then I tried it. Strangely cardboardish. I sent mine back. He didn’t, but he didn’t eat his either. I later found out this had scored against me. But I’d be damned if I’d pay $35 for an inedible fish.

       The next day the prep work began. Two housekeepers and the Water Mill and New York butlers bustled about on the perimeter. The chef eyed me suspiciously, but didn’t find much to complain about. I kept my eye on three kitchen maids who grabbed my chopping block to clean whenever I wasn’t looking. We endlessly peeled and chopped and, as there was not enough room in the three kitchen refrigerators, it was my job to find space in the pool house refrigerators, and its outside closet that stored cushions, but was cold enough to keep vegetables safely. For the next few days I made the trek between the pool house and kitchen dozens of times, carrying boxes of produce through where dozens of clumps of helenium were being planted, and wondered what it would be like to be so rich. I felt like I’d landed on Planet Billionaire: 10 or so acres of privilege and excess.

       On Wednesday, a team of seven tabletop designers spent 12 hours arranging foliage and owl and turkey candles and sculptures spilling a cornucopia of fruit and nuts, as anticipation built. When the head butler, a Brit who spent a lot of time making himself tea and eating jelly sandwiches, rushed through the house calling “Wheels up!” all hell broke loose. Everyone scurried about to ensure all was in order before our lords and masters descended upon the household. If I were rich, I wondered, would I have servants unscrew my Perrier cap as did the lady of the house?

       We made lunch for six. As we lined up platters of sea bass, lobster, and salads (lentil, Caesar, arugula — each one fiddled with by the chef with the precision of a diamond cutter), the missus sent word through her New York butler, Anthony, for us to prepare sandwiches. Back to the pool house with the uneaten food, no one daring to tell the boss that there’d been a communication breakdown. The bill from the Clamman alone was $700. When the chef saw the sandwiches I’d prepared he had a minor freakout. I had to start again and cut the crusts off the bread just so.

       On Thursday a half-dozen freelance butlers arrived (one told me he was paid $1,000). Glorified waiters, it was their job to set the tables and serve the food, but mostly to stand around and look servile. It upset me that we went through miles of plastic wrap and aluminum foil, but there was nothing I could do. It was clear the chef had no respect for Americans’ traditional holiday fare, boiling to death huge pots of vegetables and Frenchifying them with lots of butter and cream. Didn’t that go out in the ’70s with Cuisine Minceur?

       Service went smoothly. The chef had me put beads of Sevruga from a large tin on boring white crackers. Only two were eaten. I didn’t amputate any fingers, didn’t elicit much ire from the chef. But since he never had the opportunity to taste any of my food, I knew he didn’t respect me. I learned many lessons, most notably: Cooking is something I love, so I now I reserve it as a gift for the people I love.

—

       Debra Scott is a real estate columnist at The Star.