The name Whitney was too modern and lacked sophistication, she said, so she refused to use it. Her habit of addressing me was, instead, a perpetual scolding. Those years of navigating her tutelage and the staff of the Excelsior had prepared me for the sometimes-brutal process of working my way up from prep cook to executive chef to corporate manager to business owner. It was proof that sometimes the hardest things in life become the building blocks of the greatest achievements.
