04/24/19

Roasted beets and green beans with lemon

I didn’t used to like beets.
As a child the only exposure I had to beets were the bright red, floppy, mushy discs in salad bars and the Piccadilly cafeteria line.
I could never bring myself to try them, even when my Abuelita begged me to.
“They’re good for your eyesight!” she’d exclaim. “They have lots of iron!” she’d proclaim.
But they never, ever appeared appetizing to me.

Then, one day, I ate them roasted.
And they were DELICIOUS. Caramelized, sweet, tender.
Beets make my heart beet. Continue reading →

04/11/19

Grief becomes joy

7 years passed by in a blink.

And in these three years I have learned more about myself than in the 32 years prior.

When I first lost my mom, it was difficult to look into the future and envision a normal life. I was 31 going on 32, and could not believe that my time with my mom was over; just like that.

For weeks and months my nights would be filled with thoughts of sorrow. How she would never get to see all the milestones my brother and I still needed to reach, and how my future children would go without knowing their maternal grandmother. My mind was littered with worry, and sadness and until I learned to cope with it all, it would turn out to be one of the hardest times of my life. Continue reading →

04/11/19

7 years

My mom’s heaven is a house on the seashore where she awakes every morning to the sound of gulls and crashing waves.

Her mornings are filled with homemade pancakes and bacon, walks on the beach, and swims in crystal turquoise waters. Sometimes she floats. Sometimes she snorkels. Sometimes she wades up and down the shore casting out her fishing pole hoping for a bite. Sometimes she lays in the warm sand, working on her favorite word search puzzle soaking up the perfect sunshine without a care in the world. Continue reading →