Come Away With Me
🍕 A slice of pizza, handmade art, and Guess Who.
Every day after lunch, my third-grade teacher would dim the lights and press play on Norah Jones while we slipped into silent reading. I'd just transferred schools, so my time there was brief, but those afternoons left a permanent mark.
“Come Away With Me” turned a stark classroom into something sacred. A moment so simple, yet twenty-something years later, still vivid enough to soothe my roughest days. That song remains my instant retreat when the world feels jagged and loud.
I've been thinking lately about the women who stand at the edges of our stories. The ones who don't get holidays or hashtags. The ones who mother the world quietly.
Like the kindergarten teacher who saw my child not as a list of benchmarks but as a whole-hearted little human whose endless questions deserved thoughtful answers.
Or the stranger who stopped me in the grocery store to say she liked my earrings, with spit-up on my shirt and a newborn in the carrier on a day I hadn't slept. Ten seconds of kindness that rerouted my entire afternoon.
The woman who took me in during an internship a thousand miles from home. Teaching me that aging isn't about fading away but stepping boldly into a freedom found beyond caring what anyone else thinks.
The women who hired me at their farm-to-table restaurant. Who taught me to cook, to arrange flowers without rules, to walk away from a life that looked good on paper but didn't feel like mine. Who gave me a remote job when I needed one and stayed on the phone just long enough to keep me afloat.
And you.
The ones who read this newsletter, who reply, who subscribe, who trust me with your homes and your time. I don't take that lightly. I hope you know how much that means to me.
We talk about mothers this time of year, and we should. But I also want to celebrate the women who mother the world, who raise, anchor, and restore us in small, radical, everyday ways.
Every woman is a mother to someone.
Even if she's never given birth.
They say if you scream “mom” instead of “help” in a crowded area, nearly every woman turns to assist, mother or not. That, to me, says it all.
And to the few good men who made it to the end? We see you, too.
Half-eaten pizza, handmade art, and Guess Who
A note to my mom & her grandson (AKA my son)
*Happy Belated Mother's Day to those who celebrate. Perfectly on-brand for me to be a day late, my mom would expect nothing less.
As I write this, half a slice of pizza is on the counter, honeysuckle in a thrifted vase, and art is strung up with twine behind me. I've just finished my 11th round of “Guess Who,” and I've never been more tired, or more grateful.
To the boy who made me a mom:
You are every good part of your dad and me. You're my favorite song, my best idea, my whole heart walking around with no helmet (I am unwell). Loving you makes my heart feel impossibly full yet always vulnerable.
To my mom:
Mom, if I'm even half the woman you are, I’ll consider it a life well-lived. You're the woman who buys the weird thing, cranks the music, builds the life, and adds glitter just because.
A little chaotic. Deeply kind. Fiercely loyal. Playlist: always on.
You taught me that struggle, “doesn't make you less worthy, it just gives you better stories.”
You should always buy the turquoise. Wear the cheetah print. Make the art.
And that nothing: not money, not perfection, not a perfectly planned life, is more important than love.
Nobody's kitchen actually looks like their cooking photos. Behind every beautifully plated meal on social media is a counter covered in dirty prep bowls and at least one almost-disaster. Real cooking is messy, and I refuse to pretend otherwise.
What's in My Mom's Incredibly Chic Bag
Because She's Cooler Than Me
Her bag contents are basically her personality in physical form. Completely reliable but full of surprises, down-to-earth yet somehow elevated, classic with these perfectly unexpected edges. She's equally comfortable at a farmer's market or a fancy restaurant, carrying both drugstore staples and little luxuries that make life feel special. That refusal to be just one thing is what makes her extraordinary.
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