Go away jitters

I'm sitting here, trying to calm my nerves in a way that doesn't involve a stiff drink. I'm really excited about a pretty decent flock of interviews for interesting Culinary jobs over the next six days. Ruminating on the fact that I'll be sitting down with the readers choice third best Chef in DC, a lady on a list with the likes of Michel Richard and Jose Andres as well as the fact that I'll be doing a stage at one of the hottest restaurants in one of the most upscale areas of VA Wednesday has given me a serious case of the jitters. Jitters are bad. Ask the lady I interviewed with Wednesday and she'd probably say I made a good impression, but she might also mention the fact that I was pouring sweat for the first 10 minutes of our meeting. In my defense if was really hot!
As I try to focus on the fact that I'm a damned good cook, for some reason I can't shake the memory of my very first remembered culinary endeavor.
My family LOVES egg nog. I, at age 11, felt it would be a good surprise for them all if I made home-made egg nog to greet them with when they came home, having for some inexplicable reason left me home alone. I dug out my mothers old checkered Betty Crocker cookbook, or perhaps it was The Joy of Cooking, and poured over the printed recipe. I investigated our pantry and fridge and was pleased to find that we had everything one would need to undertake the task.
Early on, I came across a word I didn't understand in it's context. Temper. I stared at it for a long time. I was supposed to temper the eggs, but my only experience with tempers had to do with tantrums and I didn't see how that would help.
I questioned how important that step could be if I, at eleven, was unaware of it's meaning... so I skipped it; dumping a bowl of cold eggs into a pot of simmering milk and sugar and watched in horror as the strands of eggs curdled and bubbled to the surface. You can imagine that we didn't have homemade egg nog that night and there was a price to pay for having wasted all of those good ingredients in a poor home.
BUT - I wondered why. Why did those eggs betray me? Now I know, and for every mistep I've made, I've worked hard to do better, to know more and BE greater. It's some comfort I suppose that I haven't curdled an egg in a custard since. Some.