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International Women’s Day 2020. We arrived at my friend Brie’s apartment in Crown Heights a little late. She answered the door and greeted us with hugs and kisses. Max and I walked into our very first ‘Clothing Swap.’ The party was in full swing.

“Hooked on a Feeling” played as we made our way down the little hallway and into the main living room. There, around a huge heap of clothes in the middle of the room, we were greeted by beautiful, brilliant, bright, shining women- all shapes, sizes, complexions, backgrounds, every hair and eye color, with diverse tastes and style, all personality types, night, day, and everything in between. Each was in some various stage of undress and dress, gleefully trying on cast away garment after garment, posing in the mirror, cheering her sisters on. We dumped our bag of cast offs onto the top of the heap and joined.

“Oh, Wow! That looks so good on you!” “Rachel, you have to take that! That is fire on you!” “Oh my gosh, Olivia, you got my hat! It’s perfect on you!” It was, quite simply, all love. Love of fun, of gathering, of each other, of fashion, love of parties, chocolate fondue and strawberries, good wine, and new outfits, love of female conversation about life, love, our bodies, our homes, our world, the globe.

I watched Maxey. I wasn’t sure how she would react to a room full of barely clad women dancing around a pile of clothes and hanging out in their underthings. But she jumped right in, feeling the power of woman. She stood there in a yellow dress with everyone telling her how amazing it was on her. Then a black floral dress, a spicy red top, a grey sweater. She was fine- initiation to this special club complete.

I stopped to watch her in a white top with an open back. The group paused to assist her, with one young woman telling her, “You have to see how pretty the back is. Is it OK if I just unhook your bra in the back and you can tuck it in and see?” Max, excited, said “yes.” Then, the woman who I had never met before, still don’t even know her name, did something remarkable that I am so grateful for. Before touching Max, very responsibly, very lovingly and direct, in an utterly primal and protective way, she stopped and asked her, “Is it OK if I touch you? Do you feel safe?” And she was SERIOUS. I was in awe. In absolute awe. How far we have come! How conscious we have become! How absolutely fierce we are!

We left the swap that night with a bag full of new things. New to us, anyway. We walked Olivia to her train and then headed a few more blocks to ours. Maxey, very dreamily said, “I wish I had friends like that.” I couldn’t help but smile. Because I know full well that having friends like that and being a friend like that comes with time. It comes from living. From seeing things, experiencing things, good and bad. Having friends like that comes with knowing who you are. She’s too young to understand all of that right now, and that’s OK. It is enough that she experienced the magic of it all, that she showed up and took part because it is now in her framework. And when she arrives at that place in time where she is surrounded by friends like that, and finds herself being a friend like that, she will recognize it. But most importantly, she will accept nothing less along the way.

Sincerest thanks to all my sisters in Crown Heights that Sunday night. You were teaching when you didn’t even realize it.

Love to you all. Take care out there.

Today was magic.

I woke this morning to sunshine and the promise of Spring. I wanted to feel it, the world with all its wonders. No worries. No politics. No virus headlines. No rules. So I gave myself the precious gift of a day filled with all of my heart’s desires.

I started with a two and a half mile run, then a long walk with Charlotte, giving way to a nice quiet breakfast at home before hopping the train to Washington Square Park.

People seemed so conscious of each other on the train. Much more so than usual. There was more eye contact. The novel coronavirus-2019 has brought a certain cognizance. Sniffles were a little louder. And coughs… well, simple coughs seemed deafening, with all eyes on the offender.

The train operator’s voice could be heard at every stop suggesting to keep your mouth and nose covered and to wash your hands when you get off the train. Out of about 25 passengers in my train car, only one had a mask on. I took note. The mask looked so uncomfortable. At one point, she removed her mask and blew her nose. I watched my fellow train passengers. I felt the strange need to hug them, and to hold on tight. I imagined their horrified expressions. “We have today, ” I would tell them.

The park was good medicine, as usual. There is just something about Washington Square Park. There is something about NYU, something so very alive, just sitting there and soaking it all in, the meetings of the minds and the arts.

Someone played piano in the sunshine, while bits and pieces of conversation floated on the breeze. And yes, that’s right, there was a baby grand piano right there in the park. “How is your show doing?” a gentleman asked a young beauty who was stretching what must certainly be her dancer’s body. I snapped a selfie. Wishing I could capture the electricity of the afternoon, the absolute tangibility of life.

I sat on a bench and watched people, feeling the warmth of the sun. Then I walked. Exploring. Window shopping. Daydreaming. Pausing to jot a few things down. Poetry. Bits and pieces of stories. Inspired by everything around me. Creating. For hours…

Finally my spirit was full, but my tummy was empty. So back on the train, heading to Vegan Pad Thai and Papaya Salad. Corthaiyou: “The best Pad Thai in London and New York”. (Dennis from London once told me.) I’ve never eaten my way across London, but I can vouch for the New York part. They are glad to see me, and it makes me smile. This is my spot. I’m a regular now, and it feels like home.

I leaned back on the beautiful elephant cushions and considered my day. It was a good day. I felt every second go by, completely conscious of my place in the world today. No worries. No politics. No virus headlines. No rules. Just people and sunshine. Music and conversation. Exploration and good food. I paused to scribble one last thought before I caught the train home…

May I always remember that all of my todays make up my whole story.

Don’t waste today, Y’all.

Hugs and kisses out there.

There are moments when you make eye contact with a stranger, giving way to an intimate smile, out there. Someone’s sleeping child rests on your shoulder during your evening commute, out there. Somebody buys a struggling stranger a cup of coffee all the time, out there. And someone is crashing on someone else’s couch indefinitely, out there. There are times that I am so moved I want to cry, out there. Because I have seen love at work in the people, out there.

Love and light tonight, Valentines.

Standing there waiting for the Q train at Cortelyou Road, in Brooklyn, my senses were overtaken by the scent of something that compelled me to find it. In fact, every time I caught that train the smell was there. It was a mixture of fresh spices that I had certainly never experienced before, that much I knew for sure.

For a long time I thought it was coming from an open apartment window. Because it smelled like love, and it smelled like home. It also smelled like a distant land, the spices transporting me to a place I was sure I did not know.

One day, I climbed the stairs and followed my nose to what we refer to in Texas as a ‘hole in the wall’. (The resourcefulness of New Yorkers amazes me, and the things that they can do with spaces the size of a closet are always so interesting.)That heavenly scent was coming from inside.

“Cafe Tibet”, the sign read. I was ready for it. Whatever that smell was, I was all in. A tiny soft-spoken waitress with lovely, kind eyes seated me, and I perused the menu. I had no idea what to order, so I just went with my gut. (Literally.) I ordered Chana-Katsa, to start, and Mixed Veggies with Tibetan Gravy for the entree, and threw in Veggie MoMo.

I studied the tiny cafe while I waited: charming lanterns, pictures of Tibet, the teachings of the Dalai Lama, the muffled sounds of the city just outside the door. All of it blended to form the most pleasant vibe.

The waitress re-appeared from the magical, mysterious back, and as she placed a bowl on the table in front of me, I couldn’t help but smile. There it was! That scent! It was coming from the bowl that she was placing on the table right in front of me! It was the Chana-Katsa. Chickpeas with garlic, ginger, lemon, scallion, and spicy Tibetan sauce. That first bite was everything!

Next, the Mixed Veggies with Tibetan Gravy. Then the Veggie MoMo. I disappeared into the unknown. I’ve never been to Tibet, although I dream of going. But I was tasting it. Exploring another land by savoring the dishes that had been so carefully prepared for me.

As I picked up the MoMo with my chopsticks, and put it in my mouth, I looked up, making eye contact with the waitress. She had a question in her eyes. With mouth full, I grinned and nodded yes. (Yes to everything- to all of it. Yes to the moment- to the here and now.) She smiled in return. There were no words. We didn’t need them.

Dear NYC-

It’s been a year, today, since Maxey and I drove into town and you embraced us with arms wide open. Now, every single morning an old dream comes true for me with pen in hand. We’re marking the day with a production that my baby wrote, directed, and stars in. Because there’s a new dream in town…

All my love and gratitude, N.

It has been a week since I sat down to have coffee with my husband at my favorite little coffee shop, Cafe Phil, in Bed-Stuy. I had just snapped a picture and shared it on Instagram. It was our 21st anniversary. I checked TMZ real quick, as I always do. Then I audibly gasped.

Not Kobe…

NOOOOO…

I handed my phone to my husband. He took one look at it and said, “they’re wrong.” I prayed they were, but in my gut I knew they weren’t. The headline read, “Kobe Bryant Dies In Helicopter Crash… Everyone on Board Dead.” I just knew, from a journalist’s perspective, there is no way they would have reported the story, with such finality, without obtaining confirmation. (Harvey Levin isn’t that careless.) I also knew their proximity to the accident meant even greater odds that the story was accurate.

We disappeared into our phones, searching every other news outlet for more information, hoping there was nothing. And there was nothing for quite some time. Until there was something and then it went dark for awhile.

There we were on our anniversary, sharing coffee, having dropped our precious youngest daughter off at a friend’s 13th birthday party, waiting ’til time to pick her up again, while cross country a family was just destroyed. My mind was reeling. They would never be the same again, their family of six. We are a family of six. Magical and Whole. 6. Their pain was thousands of miles away and yet it was perfectly tangible. Sitting there at Cafe Phil, I could feel Vanessa Bryant and her girls, their shock and disbelief, their utter devastation.

Then a flicker… I was conscious of it even then. The tiny miracle within the moment: that I was able to feel their pain, that I was able to harness love, and hope, and strength, and send it across time and distance to a mother and her children who had lost a husband and a father, to a father and daughter who were separated from them, just beyond the veil, to the others who had not yet been named and their loved ones, to every soul out there, wherever love, light, and goodness reaches. All because…

WE CAN LOVE PEOPLE WE DON’T EVEN KNOW.

I sit here tonight, sharing a few words with my tribe, in hopes of bringing some light, if only even a flicker, to the depths of the darkness. For the whole world has responded. It has felt a family’s pain, really felt it, and responded with love and light. And I am reminded that it is in times like these that we see the best of humanity. It has always been so. In the darkest of times, we find what it is that we are made of. Just like the stars in the sky. They’re always there. But it’s not until they are bathed in the inky dark night that we see their brilliance.

“What if I don’t make any friends?” I asked my mom, confessing my innermost fears late one night with my move to New York only days away. I considered everything I was leaving behind. “I mean, it’s taken me a lifetime to build the friendships that I hold so dear,” I dramatically lamented.

Looking back on it, it seems kinda’ funny now. I wasn’t worried about anything else. I was about to start over, cross country, from Boyd, Texas to New York City. I was moving into my new apartment sight unseen. I had never even laid eyes on the Brooklyn neighborhood that I was about to live in. You would think I might be a little more concerned about those things, but I wasn’t.

You see, I need people. Because I love people. All people. I mean, really, really love them. I adore relationships. What if I never connected with anyone in New York? How would I even begin to find my tribe there?

“They don’t know you yet. But when they get to know you, they’re gonna’ love you,” my mom returned. It was the sweetest thing ever. Because she really meant it. She has that much faith in me. And I’m happy to report eleven and a half months later that she was right. I have learned that your tribe will find you, or should I say that you will find your tribe?

I had to put myself out there. And so did they. And then we all started crashing into each another. It must be some rule somewhere, written in some ancient language, or some scientific explanation based on the law of attraction. In any case, my tribe has grown, and I cannot imagine my life before them or without them.

Tonight, I pause to consider their places in my heart and my place in their hearts, and I’m just overwhelmed with gratefulness for the life I’m living, for the ways I’m still growing, and for the story that continues…

Put yourself out there, folks. Someone, somewhere, is waiting for you. And when they get to know you, they’re gonna’ love you.

Peace and Love.

2020, I’m so happy to make your acquaintance. I think we are going to be fast friends. I see promise in you, and joy. I see long days stretching out ahead and the kind of nights that one hopes will never end, full of celebration and precious friendships. I see a story, so many stories, still left to write…

Having spent a lot of time at Grand Central Station, leading up to the new year, I have gotten attached to her. And I have fallen in love with her story of redemption. The Roaring Twenties have come ’round again for Grand Central Station, which causes me to consider her place in history and beyond.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/preservation-battle-grand-central-180969446/

I can relate to her having seen better days, how her charms were buried beneath layers and layers of life. And I can identify with her renaissance brought about by a little love and care, how it’s not over for her, how she still has so, so much left to share. I adore her majestic coming out in all her seasoned glory, amid a modern, polished city, and how she holds court in a way all her own, with a beauty all her own, making a statement that’s all her own as if to say…

“Aaaah, yes, I may be old… but Darling, you are boring.”

So here’s to the Roaring Twenties… and here’s to owning every day that we are upon this earth. Here’s to aging gracefully, with a certain flair, so that a new standard of beauty becomes our story, one that calls for us to hold court with grace and kindness, in all our great big beautiful glory. May we dance at the most inopportune of places and may we laugh too loud always. May we hold growing old in high esteem, and may we never, ever, ever, be boring…

Cheers.

A table rescued for $25 from a girl who was moving on, now sits in the kitchen of another girl who was moving on. 2019, I honor you as my teacher. You have taught me the value of simplicity, and the beauty of letting go. I am forever grateful, and better for our time together. Minutes, minutes before you make your exit, the fullness of your teachings are upon me: There are cycles and seasons. And I am safe and secure in the grand design, content and at peace within the divine order. I am a wild, wild woman who trusts, walking with purpose into my future, putting one foot in front of the other ’til I get where I’m going… loving all the while.

… Although I didn’t know it at the time. And yet somehow I did. Dreaming tonight of magical Christmas eves gone by, of looking out this window at Nano and Grandad’s house, of waiting for Santa, and feeling so, so loved. I am flooded with gratefulness for the beautiful memories of so much love and laughter, and for the souls who have passed that I was so blessed to call mine. Whispers on the wind now, colliding with the sounds of the present evening, inspire me to treasure tonight’s Christmas eve, and the next, and the next, and all the rest. For they are the memories of tomorrow.

Merry Christmas out there, Friends.

All my love…