This Week / Vague To-Do Lists + American Flag Socks

Hello, friends. We made it to the weekend! I am trying to trick myself into feeling those Saturday feels, even though I am staring up a mountain of a to-do list. Everything I need to accomplish this weekend is both monumental and vague at the same time. “Downsize life.” “Pack furniture.” “Figure out health insurance scenario.” Tonight, I will be figuring out a tequila scenario because I need to give my brain a rest from the logistics of this whole renting-out-our-house-and-bouncing-to-New-York thing.

We all need to give our brains a rest, from worrying about our own lives, from worrying about our collective future. I got the notice of Kavanaugh’s confirmation in Home Depot, while discussing sod cutters with a guy whose ankles and calves were tattooed with American-flag “socks.” All I could think was, I do not identify with anything that is happening here. But here are some things I bought and watched and read this week that I very much DO identify with, including these sunflowers from the farmer’s market which are now in a vase on my dining table.

1. PURCHASED. I cannot resist a luxurious faux fur moment, and the color is gooood.
   

2. “For to permit yourself to do only that which you are good at is to be trapped in a cage whose bars are not steel but self-judgment.” Much needed permission to NOT pursue excellence in everything we do.
   

3. Currently watching this series which explores trauma, mental health, and isolation. It’s strange and uncanny and I am here for it. Jonah Hill is excellent in it. But Emma Stone is double excellent, per usual.
   

4. What #MeToo has accomplished in one year.
   

5. LOL Banksy stumps us all, again.
   

6. Simple, yet packs a punch: the best delicata squash recipe.
   

7. Remembering an old favorite because it’s decorative gourd season.
   
   

Life, Lately / Homecoming

This time last week, I was drinking my coffee on a bench in Domino Park, watching the blue-green East River lap the foundation of the Williamsburg Bridge and fully crying in public (and making a failed-but-concentrated attempt to stop myself). I did what I came to New York to do: find an apartment. We received the email the night before: “You’re approved!” And I simultaneously felt a tingly oh-my-god-what-have-we-done?! type of shock and also something else. Homecoming. That wave of warmth and relief and clarity that signals you’re in exactly the right place at the right time.

It keeps sneaking up on me, that feeling of home, of rightness. Probably because I spend so much of my time seeking it, trying to perfect every little facet of my life and often failing (as we do), that it’s impossible to notice. I remember feeling it when I met Adam and sometimes in college around two or three in the morning, when I’d stayed up all night to write an essay. Now it’s happening all the time. On Sunday afternoon, waiting for the L Train, sweating from the heat of the station, avoiding the mystery liquid dripping from a beam overhead. Tuesday night, reading in bed, listening to the air conditioning rattle.

It strikes me that I’ve felt most at home within myself when I’ve ventured the furthest from what I know, often based on nothing but intuition. Starting a freelance business, moving to a strange city for a boy, writing about things that make me uncomfortable, culinary school, all the plane tickets I’ve ever bought. This must be what it takes, to peel back all the layers of what we think we are (or what other people have said we are) and find what’s true.

The light changed, the morning before I left New York, from cool white to warm caramel. I’m not entirely sure, being a born and bred Angeleno, but I think that means it’s fall. To me, fall is its own kind of homecoming, a release from the slight madness of summer heat. I feel that clarity and I see into the future, for the first time in a long time. I know it will be fleeting. I’ll continue to hunger, to not settle. But for now, I’m enjoying these moments—even as I play the role of crazy lady, choking down tears on a park bench.

Everywhere We Ate in Rome

Eating, while traveling, is all about learning. Learning about a place, yes. But also about your own appetites. I live for that revelation of biting into something new, discovering I love it, and wondering where it has been all my life. The world seems wider, more hopeful in those moments. Normally I find two or three dishes that stay with me and that I hope to return for one day. In Italy, I found new obsessions almost everywhere, even during quick pit stops for snacks or gelato breaks. I can think of at least ten things I need to come back for. It helps to know that Italians, too, are obsessed with their own food.

They are what we would call "food snobs" here in the US. The label cancels itself out because they are all snobs, ready to give you their opinion on how to choose your pecorino and which market vendor sells the best salumi. In Tuscany, we asked our cab driver where we might pick up steaks to grill back at the house we stayed in. He insisted on parking the cab outside the butcher's and taking us inside himself, so he could translate and help us pick the right ones. We didn't, he insisted, want to put our dinner in jeopardy because of a language barrier. But I think he'd be surprised how far a desire to eat well often takes us. 

Everywhere We Ate in Rome: 

Antica Caciara—This salumi and cheese shop has been a staple in the Trastevere neighborhood since 1900. Over a century in business, apparently, leads to perfection. I'd never tasted pecorino that bright, sharp, salty, and wonderfully flakey all at once, the technicolor version of the mild, not-as-good-as-parmesan pecorino I'd known before that. 

Casa Mia—In the name of sampling the menu and of vacation in general, I shamelessly ordered two plates of pasta here. Carbonara and cacio e pepe. Both entirely worth the cringe-y moment when I explained to the waiter, in broken Italian, that yes—they were both for me. 

Da Enzo—A tiny, tiny trattoria in with a giant line, worth the extra moment to call and make a reservation the day before. I ordered amatriciana, a Roman pasta dish that is greater than the sum of its parts which are olive oil, cured pork cheek, tomatoes, and pasta water as far as I can tell. When they come together, the sweetness of the tomatoes and the salty, sumptuous feeling of that pork cheek multiply tenfold. It's really something.  

Emma—Make a reservation here, if you want to come for dinner. For lunch, we were able to drop in spontaneously.  Twice. (Okay, the second time was very much premeditated.)  It pretty much derailed our afternoon both times. In a nice way. In a food-drunk (and actual drunk) kind of way from a big plate of salumi, a bottle of Prosecco, and heaping portions of cacio e pepe. 

Fatamorgana—Thank goodness this gelato shop has more than one location. I came back three times (in different neighborhoods) for their orange-almond flavor, which felt dense and velvety and tasted like exactly what you think orange zest will taste like if you don't know any better, like an orange distilled—sweet, intensely bright and floral with a pleasant acidity.

Innocenti Suppli—The dumpling of Rome and the perfect snack (or appetizer, or meal, depending on your ambitions).  It's a rice ball mixed with tomato and veal, stuffed with mozzarella, breaded, and fried. It's the kind of crispy, pillowy, starch-on-starch-with-melted-cheese combination that melts my heart right out. You can get them all over Rome, but this place made my favorite.

L'Arcangelo—A cozy place with some innovative things on its menu. Although I honestly don't remember anything other than the artichokes, which tasted like they'd been soaking in olive oil for weeks. Tops removed, they glistened on the plate and fell apart at the gentle prod of our forks. If you've ever wanted to mainline an artichoke—if you love them that much (like I do)—this intense, pure flavor is as close as you'll probably get.

Mercato Centrale Roma—A similar concept to Grand Central Market here in Los Angeles and Chelsea Market in Manhattan, this is a collection of vendors inside of Termini Station, Rome's central train hub. Adam and I ate lunch here on our last day in Rome and found it a great way to reminisce about all the good food we had. We found artichokes, panini, suppli—everything we wanted one more taste of. 

La Norcineria di Lacozzilli—Porchetta. Porch. Et. Ta. The name rolls off your tongue like the fatty, amplified-umami flavor of porchetta on fresh ciabatta. Even one little sliver holds enough concentrated flavor to make you weak in the knees. It's almost not fair, how it makes everything else around it taste pale and bland by comparison.

Pane e Salame—You can order a giant cheese & salumi board here for 12 Euro, so I don't think I have to say anything else except that you should arrive before it opens at 11am. It's located in a touristy area (near the Trevi Fountain) and the line builds up quickly. But 12 Euro for copious amounts of pecorino and prosciutto and speck. It's worth the hustle. 

Pasticceria Trastevere—Italy is one place you won't be judged for having an all-sugar breakfast. It's tradition here. Sugar in the espresso with more sugar on the side, usually in the form of a cornetto or brioche (which is not like what we put our hamburgers on, I learned, but more like a croissant filled with chocolate or jelly). This place has good ones and lots of cute Italian cookies which I can't remember the name of now, but which I ate a lot of. 

San Cosimato Market—One of Rome's farmer's markets located in Piazza di San Cosimato in the Trasevere neighborhood. Smallish, but packed full of attractive produce and certain things you can't find in the US, like another obsession I left with: zucchini flowers. You can also get fresh cantaloupe wrapped in speck and loaded up on a skewer from one of the vendors there. The best shish kabob you've ever had. 

Life, Lately / On Being Restless

"You could make a real home here," people have said to us. They're right. It's peaceful here: neighbors with kind faces who actually drive the residential speed limit on our street, citrus trees and a planter full of basil and parsley in our backyard that we have somehow managed to keep alive. Even the "noise pollution" (the subtle whoosh of traffic on the freeway behind us) sounds pleasant. We've made some attempt at settling. We hung pictures, we painted, we hired a plumber to fix the pipes and threw a housewarming party (in that order, thank god). Yet. 

I am, have always been, restless. Or hungry, if you prefer. I blame the books and the solitude that comes along with reading so much. Dwelling in other worlds, other lives gives me an appetite: to learn more, to see more, to read everything, to eat more meals that make me weak in the knees. If it seems strange that I haven't spent more than three consecutive years in any one city since I graduated college, this may shed some light on it. I get curious about other places, other ways of living too easily. I married a similarly transient soul, which is fortunate or unfortunate for the two of us (probably a bit of both).

We've found soulmates in each other, but not yet in a place. Since we moved out of Downtown LA, into Studio City, we'd quietly resolved to stop looking for it. A house in the suburbs seemed a standard landing place, one we shouldn't plan to leave for the foreseeable future. We'll get there, we thought, and contentment will follow. It didn't.

The pull toward something new, a change of scene, feels even stronger this time. I'm already elsewhere in my head, longing for the thrill of a new city, the chance to learn its nooks and crannies.  I said we've never found a soulmate in a place. That's not entirely true. We've known for years what that place might be, if we gave it a fair shot. But New York City, objectively, is a tough place to live. It's not practical, we always told ourselves. 

But we are not practical. We are restless, if not downright impulsive this time. We made the decision a few weeks ago.  A decision from pure pathos. I still haven't come up with an explanation that will make any sense to anyone. So here is one that doesn't make sense: I like brick buildings and riding the subway, Brooklyn makes me nostalgic for my grandparents and the stories they told me about growing up and making a home together, I like seeing live jazz at 1am, and I like the special kind of solitude that is being alone amongst hoards of people. And I won't even mention the food. That goes without saying. Adam has his own reasons for loving it, too. They're not as bonkers as mine, but I'm grateful he has them and wants to try this as much as me.

So we're going to New York. Now you know, if you didn't already. I am thrilled and terrified in equal measure. I also might be severely unhinged. Only time will tell. But for now, my restless mind has another adventure in another city to contemplate. And I feel more settled now that we're busy packing our stuff, getting unsettled, if that even makes sense. It probably doesn't, but here we go anyway. Again.