Small Recognitions
I’ve been playing host a lot this month. You all know, I assume, because you’ve been reading this newsletter, how much I love that.
My friend Cam stopped by back in May on his way up to Oxford for a wedding. I made coconut curry chicken and tried my hand at homemade naan and pulled it off, but at the price of filling my entire house with smoke. I had two friends and my boyfriend over, we reminisced about college while we drank two whole bottles of wine, stumbled into Sam’s to play pool and then parted ways.
Last week, my friend Darren from Wyoming blew through town by way of his new home in Minneapolis on his way to a wedding (an ex-boyfriend of yours truly, naturally). We drank beers at Fenian’s until the sky got dark and I set Darren up in my guest room. I managed to wake up early enough to brew a pot of coffee, make a quick breakfast just of scrambled eggs and toast while Darren strummed the guitar he brings with him everywhere. I had to run to work, but Darren hit the road with borrowed collections from Mary Oliver and Ross Gay. After talking, I’m inspired to start writing letters again, or at least more postcards. Maybe I should start small. I’m always overly ambitious, especially when I’m feeling inspired.
My friends Dalton and MK spent this weekend with me. We saw Goose at Cathead Jam downtown (I’m listening to the set on Bandcamp right now actually) and people watched, had brunch and shopped for used books. I made Alison Roman’s shallot pasta on Saturday before we went out for drinks, met a friend’s friends and got my tarot read in Fenian’s. In our spare time, we sat around reading and talking, watched an episode of Chopped.
My house wasn’t as cleaned as I would’ve liked this week. The fridge wasn’t stocked, I hadn’t cleaned the shower, I was out of soap in the kitchen and bathroom, and worst of all, I ran out of toilet paper at the tail end of the weekend.
I am not a glamorous, perfectly put-together host, is what I’m trying to say.
I think inviting someone into your home is an intimate act. Whether that’s a place to sleep on a long journey, a place to stop and pause and catch up, or whether your home itself is the end destination. And within that intimate act, I want people to understand how much I appreciate them, how happy I am that they’re visiting me and how much I care. It can sometimes feel like a lot of pressure, especially when it’s something you’re not used to. Though I’ve of course had guests before in every place I’ve lived, this feels like the first time I’ve really had a slew of people coming to visit me, driving through on their way somewhere else. It’s something I’ve always wanted, but it’s something to adjust to. I don’t want to disappoint anyone. And I want them to come back!
Something that’s helped, something I’ve accidentally been working on this year, is thinking a little smaller, or considering the small ways I can show someone I care. Money is tight nowadays, so for my friends’ birthdays, my present is I bake them something. Nothing extravagant, nothing complicated, just a treat I know they’ll like. I’m good, I think, at understanding what people like, but I’ll often go overboard. I know they love this expensive tequila, so I’ll buy the expensive tequila, even though I clearly cannot afford to be buying the expensive tequila. If I remember they want something, I want to get it for them, no matter how expensive. I want to show them I remembered, that I recognize them.
Last night, I saw a friend on her last night in Mississippi. She’s moving this morning, might already be gone. I handed her a copy of Local Color: A Sense of Place in Folk Art by William Ferris. I didn’t know if she had it, or if she’d like it, but I thought she might, and it was five bucks with store credit at The Book Rack. A small thing, I thought, a memento of Mississippi for an artist who’s moving. Seems right. Turns out she didn’t own it, and as a Bill Ferris fan had been wanting to read it.
It really isn’t that hard to care for and recognize someone, is it?
I didn’t make Darren anything complicated for breakfast. Just eggs and toast and a lot of coffee, because I know he drinks an obscene amount of coffee. I made a meal for Cam, a meal for Dalton and MK, and neither was expensive or extravagant. I plated everything nicely and we sat and we talked, and that was all we needed. Maybe my bar wasn’t fully stocked and the kitchen was a little obscene looking. Maybe nothing was effortless. But we can work towards effortless with practice. What was more important was Darren playing his guitar, Cam spending time with me and my friends, Dalton pulling books for me when we wandered through the used bookstore and MK and I people watching and comparing notes.
It’s becoming increasingly clear to me that all I have, all any of us have really, even if we don’t want to admit it, is the people we care about. I’ve been panicking about this for months, worried I’ve entered another period where I’m driving everyone I love away or sucking them dry, bouncing around my friends and loved ones and knocking them all flat on their backs. So I prefer to spend what little time, what little money I have, attending to the people I care about in whatever small way I can. It’s why my home is so important to me. All I want, really, is a place where I can welcome people in and take care of the people I love.