With the Fire on High

And sometimes focusing on what you can control is the only way to lessen the pang in your chest when you think about the things you can't.

The world is a turntable that never stops spinning; as humans we merely choose the tracks we want to sit out and the ones that inspire us to dance.

I've had a lot of things to feel ashamed about and I've learned most of them are other people's problems, not mine.

...you can't control how people look at you, but you can control how far back you pull your shoulders and how high you lift your chin

It's wild to miss someone so much, and yet in order to care for them you have to constantly say goodbye.

And I know the past isn't a mirror image of the future, but it's a reflection of what can be; and when your first love breaks your heart, the shards of that can draw blood for a long, long time.

I feel like I'm being pulled in a hundred different directions and my feet are stuck in cement.

Whatever we are to become, I'm glad that we can laugh through the uncomfortable moments.

Where we come from leaves its fingerprints all over us, and if you know how to read the signs of a place, you know a little bit more who someone is.

People say that you're stuck with the family you're born into. And for most people, that's probably true. But we all make choices about people. Who we want to hold close, who we want to remain in our lives, and who we are just fine without.

the fear you have for someone else’s life always eclipses the fear you have for your own.

Cooking is about respect. Respect for the food, respect for your space, respect for your colleqgues and respect for your diners. The chef who ignores one of those is not a chef at all.

I’ve learned to trust pretty words even less than a pretty face.

That’s what I learned, about him and most guys: who they are when they’re giving you flowers and trying to get in your pants is not who they REALLY are when it’s no longer spring and they’ve found a new jawn to hang out with. And I know the past isn’t a mirror image of the future, but it’s a reflection of what can be; and when your first love breaks your heart, the shards of that can still draw blood for a long, long time.

And ain’t that what it means to be a sister? Holding things tight when the other one is falling apart?

Trust. Yourself, mainly, but the world, too.

I think you should write about the one that scares you most. Taking risks and making choices in spite of fear—it’s what makes our life story compelling.

I feel like something has risen inside me too, and it tastes a bit like hope.

Everything changes. I'll learn to be fine.

Since my earliest memory, I imagined I would be a chef one day. When other kids were watching Saturday morning cartoons or music videos on YouTube, I was watching Iron Chef,The Great British Baking Show, and old Anthony Bourdain shows and taking notes. Like, actual notes in the Notes app on my phone. I have long lists of ideas for recipes that I can modify or make my own. This self-appointed class is the only one I've ever studied well for. I started playing around with the staples of the house: rice, beans, plantains, and chicken. But 'Buela let me expand to the different things I saw on TV. Soufflés, shepherd's pie, gizzards. When other kids were saving up their lunch money to buy the latest Jordans, I was saving up mine so I could buy the best ingredients. Fish we'd never heard of that I had to get from a special market down by Penn's Landing. Sausages that I watched Italian abuelitas in South Philly make by hand. I even saved up a whole month's worth of allowance when I was in seventh grade so I could make 'Buela a special birthday dinner of filet mignon.

My Aunt Sara says it's in our blood, an innate need to tell a story through food. 'Buela says it's definitely a blessing, magic.

Some days, when my feelings are like this, like a full pot of water with the fire on high, I don’t know what to cook. Plans and ideas escape my mind and instead I let my heart and hands take control, guided by a voice on the inside that tells me what goes where.

...food is meant to feed more than an empty belly. It's also meant to nourish your heart." -Emoni

There’s so much I want for her that sometimes I think the seams of my skin aren’t enough to contain every hope I have. And I whisper it to her all the time. When I’m feeding her. When she’s asleep in my arms. When we are playing at the park. I whisper all the everything I know she can be and the ways I’ll fight for her to be them. I want her to know her entire life her mommy may not have had a powerful job or made millions, but that her moms did everything so that she could be an accumulation of the best dreams.

This stuff is complicated. But it's like i'm some long division problem folks keep wanting to parcel into pieces, and they don't reduce, homies. The whole of me is Black. The whole of me is whole.

What better way to take a leap of faith than to set something on fire and trust it will not only come out right, but that it will be completely delicious?

I’ve had a lot of things to feel ashamed about and I’ve learned most of them are other people’s problems. Not mine.

But I also got more than one city, one hood inside me. And anyone who wants to get to know me has to know how to appreciate the multiple skylines.

Home. I come from a place that’s as sweet as the freshest berry, as sour as curdled milk, where we dream of owning mansions and leaving the hood, where we couldn’t imagine having been raised anywhere else.

And I try to tell myself the same thing: forward is the only direction to go in; turning back around is for the birds.