Have you seen all the advice…besties, work-pals, loose connections, family, partners… connecting with people who populate your world is the most important action for health and happiness. I take this to heart. Thank you all for taking time to write me notes, click the links, buy me a coffee, and connect with me by reading. I feel so privileged to have a spot in your inbox, your reading, creating, viewing and eating lives.
More ways to flourish through companionship? Say hello to the neighbor who walks their dog past your house. Ask a friendly acquaintance who you run into at the grocery store if you can join their book group. (I might have just done this, and I’m not embarrassed! 
) Offer/accept a last-minute invitation to come to dinner. Join a club. (I just joined a hiking club and I’m going snowshoeing with strangers!) In other words, show up, for yourself and the people in your world.
Also, make it easy, hang around people you love!
Look at these beauties. 
read
I recently read, GROUP, by Christie Tate, and let me tell you, that was a wild ride. Buckle up! In her memoir Christie seeks help with life struggles of connecting and maintaining relationships, pernicious perfectionism, disordered eating, denying herself pleasure in any aspect of her life. She finds Dr. Rosen who invites her to join a group. As the song says, “I just might have a problem that you’d understand. We all need somebody to lean on.” Crowd sourcing solutions to problems may be the way to go. Let’s say that Rosen is an unorthodox genius who we all may want in our corner. Christie is vulnerable, enraged, funny, infuriating yet easy to like.
Next up, DEMON COPPERHEAD, by Barbara Kingsolver, a modern recasting of David Copperfield, this one about the opioid crisis in Appalachia. I am sort of prepared for bleak and sad, but I’m telling you straight up, the beautiful writing I expect and love from Kingsolver may not carry me through. I am guarding my joy these days. Have you read? What did you think?
Just a quick reminder, I’ve created a read.write.eat. Bookshop Store, where you will find many of the books I’ve recommended in the newsletter. Buying books from my shop is another way you can support my newsletter.
write
This quote came across my desk from Verlyn Klinkenborg’s, Several Short Sentences About Writing and (almost) freed me!
Your job as a writer is making sentences.
Your other jobs include fixing sentences, killing sentences, and arranging sentences.
If this is the case—making, fixing, killing, arranging—how can your writing possibly flow?
It can’t.
Flow is something the reader experiences, not the writer.
A writer may write painstakingly.
Assembling the work slowly, like a mosaic,
Fitting and refitting sentences and paragraphs over the years.
And yet to the reader the writing may seem to flow.
The reader’s experience with your prose has nothing to do with how hard or easy it was for you to make.
You’re not writing for the reader in the mirror whose psychological state reflects your own.
You have only your own working world to consider.
The reader reads in another world entirely.
So why not give up on the idea of “flow” and accept the basic truth about writing?
It’s hard work, and it’s been hard work for everyone all along.
There’s good reason to believe this, apart from the fact that it’s true.
If you think that writing—the act of composition—should flow, and it doesn’t, what are you likely to feel?
Obstructed, defeated, inadequate, blocked, perhaps even stupid.
The idea of writer’s block, in its ordinary sense,
Exists largely because of the notion that writing should flow.
But if you accept that writing is hard work,
And that’s what it feels like when you’re writing,
Then everything is as it should be.
Your labor isn’t a sign of defeat.
It’s a sign of engagement.
The difference is all in your mind, but what a difference.
Do you have any idea how often I’ve felt inadequate and stupid because I rarely “flow” when I’m at my desk? What a relief to know that there is nothing wrong with me. That toil is just, well, writing. Maybe this passage takes the pressure off you as well. I hope so.
Maybe you, like me, promised to submit more work in 2023. I’ve been busy and brave. I sent two pitches for two essays in the first week. One had a typo in the first sentence, a speed bump I hope 
the editor can overlook. As I mentioned in my last newsletter, I can’t let a mistake derail me because…life, right?
In case you’re curious, sans typo, here’s the start of the pitch… if you’re an editor and this essay appeals for April/Sexual Assault Awareness Month, drop me a note and I’ll send you the entire pitch or essay.
In “The Worst Thing A Girl Can Be” I’ve written about how in my 40’s, my tweener son showed me a disturbing “no means yes” frat-boy video that enacted and decried date rape as fake. The video and my son’s confusion triggered me to finally admit, out loud and with fervor, that when I was 16 and found myself beneath a stranger in the back of a car, I was raped. The narrative I’d told myself for years was that I’d put myself beneath that man.
Don’t be silent. Put your truth, your work into the world. We will be richer for your voice.
This newsletter is free and a delight for me to write. AND, it takes time and consideration to put together twice a month. Maybe you’d like to say a quick thanks by clicking on the adorable button above and treating me to coffee!
eat
Speaking of joining clubs, how about this one? Wine clubs, out? Olive oil clubs, in!
I made this and boy am I glad!
California Pozole (which isn’t really pozole at all, more a wet taco, but that sounds disgusting)
· 3T olive oil
· 1 lg yellow onion, finely chopped
· 3-4 shallots, sliced thin
· 1-2 poblano chiles, finely chopped
· 3-5 garlic cloves, finely chopped
· 1t ground cumin
· 1t ground coriander
· 1t dried oregano
· Kosher salt and black pepper
· 6 cups homemade or store-bought low-sodium chicken stock
· 3lbs boneless, skinless chicken thighs and/or breasts (I used both)
· 1 ½ cups cooked or canned pinto beans
· 2 cups cooked brown rice
· ½ cup unroasted pumpkin seeds
· 2 cups shredded cabbage
· 1 bunch of parsley, roughly chopped
· 1 lime, quartered, for serving
· Crumbled tortilla chips, thinly sliced radishes, I sliced jalapeno, diced avocado, roughly chopped cilantro, thinly sliced scallions, salsa, and sour cream, for garnishing
Step 1
Heat the oil in a cast iron skillet oven over medium. Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until they have softened without taking on any color, 4 to 6 minutes. Add the garlic, cumin, coriander, and oregano, cook, stirring frequently, until the garlic and spices are fragrant, about 1 minute more. Season well with salt and pepper. Place in your slow cooker.
Step 2
Add the stock and chicken and cook on low until the chicken has cooked through and is no longer pink, maybe an hour. Don’t worry too much about the time, this is meant to get going and then walk away. Honestly, I left mine on low for 3 hours before I got to this step. Using tongs or a slotted spoon, transfer the cooked chicken to a cutting board. When cool enough to handle, shred the meat.
Step 3
Add the shredded chicken back to the pot along with the cooked beans and 1 cup of the cabbage. If you feel there is not enough broth, add water. I promise it will be flavorful. Allow everything to simmer on low together for another thirty minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
Step 4
Meanwhile, sauté shallots in more olive oil in a skillet, add poblanos. Sauté till soft and slightly golden. Add pumpkin seeds, cooked rice and chopped parsley. Sauté and crisp up.
Step 5
Ladle soup into bowls. Add rice, and the garnishes. Serve with limes, for squeezing on top.
