Bring it on Home

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Through the latest transition of my life, what seems to have been the biggest – and the most profound. The last 5 months have brought me to a place of observation, of quiet and explosive observation. The only thing I can equate it to is that I feel like I am being thrown a surprise party several times a week!

I wake up with no real idea of what will unfold, with excitement for all the possibilities of what may – and out into the world I go.

I have felt somewhat smug in the last month feeling like “I got this” - kind of having found the key to ALL of it – and I am laughing to myself even as I write those words.

Then last week a couple of things bitch slapped me in the face.

I started to look at that hamster wheel that I had jumped right the fuck off of in January and I remembered some of the things I loved about it – like the high of running at lightning speed – being the “Impossible Girl”. 

I liked – (like) – being known to have done the impossible. It was like I was lusting over a past lover that I had sensational sex with– a past narcissistic, abusive lover that nearly killed me -deciding to remember ONLY the sex and NOT the insanity.

So, as I was fantasizing about this hamster wheel, I decided to test the bounds of space and time to get 4 or 5 things completed at once, before making an hour drive to my son’s soccer game. “I got this” right – I can pretty much do just about anything, I mean really, I can do everything – right?

I got a little lost in this little fantasy.

I was not paying attention to myself when I realized I was going in the WRONG direction on an escalator. *Footnote this was the same exact escalator where 30 years ago I got my right foot caught in it and had to be taken out of the mall in an ambulance – yes that did an awful lot for my 13-yr. old self esteem.

So, I realize this and DECIDE – yes DECIDE that I will run – yes RUN up the escalator in the OPPOSITE direction. Why? Because I can do anything – I can go backward – while moving forward.  …

My bestie – the Universe said – “hey sweet cheeks – maybe this isn’t a good idea”

I ran faster – harder – I was going to beat this fucking escalator and I was going to WIN!!!

I CAN GO FORWARD WHILE GOING BACKWARDS…!

Not so gently the next time the aforementioned bestie said – “hey – fuck nut – knock it off”

I responded with equal vigor

I CAN GO FORWARD WHILE GOING BACKWARDS…!

A funny thing happens when you flip off the universe – it very quietly says “ok”

And with one very ridiculous fell swoop, I face planted. I tore my hand apart, I smashed both of my knees, my ankles and elbows for good measure. I have the imprint of the escalator tracks running down my shin. 

To top it all off, my Ganesh key chain charm ripped off the keys and tumbled down the stairs – “how’s that for removing all blockages sweetie pie” it totally yelled out at me!

I was embarrassed – bleeding PROFUSELY – and then it came. The laughter – the uncontrollable laughter. I could not even STAND myself – I wished someone that I knew was there to witness it. But really it was just a bunch of strangers that thought that I probably just escaped from a loony bin…

I got the message –

There is only one direction my dear– it’s forward. It doesn’t matter if you find yourself in the place that you had been in the past – you are there NOW, only NOW.

I can look back at the “Impossible Girl” and let her know – looking back is ok – going back is not an option. I can absolutely take the best of my past and lovingly bring it forward. But there is no going backwards.

Fighting against the stream – or the escalator – will tire you. It will leave you on your knees, bleeding and bruised. You can get up again and again, fighting it every day. Before long your legs will give out and you will sit on that stair as it moves you along in the direction you were meant to be going all the while.

We have this one life, the one that is now. When we are running in the opposite direction we are missing all of what is a head of us.

We are the stream, we are the forward momentum. Even when it feels like a familiar experience as a past one – it is new, it is NOW. So, live it, experience it and love it.

In love for the first time in my life -

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 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4Mc-NYPHaQ

It's just about Valentines Day - and for the first time in my life I am in love. Totally - completely and honestly in love. And I am in love and obsessed with my very own broken heart. If I look back on this day 12 months ago - I am looking at a very different picture -well, mostly. I was alone then, as I am now. I just didn't know it yet.

The last few months have been a full on education. I didn't realize fully that I had applied, been accepted, enrolled and was being taken to task on this new course work - however, I am here and like the great student I have become, I am taking notes.

When we talk about our broken hearts - it's usually about when someone you love leaves you - they hurt you and it feels like they have come into your soul in the middle of the night and they have stolen the parts of you that you thought were safe with them,

Friends and family will actively try to fill you back up with all of the reasons why you should hate the person that left - tell you how they never deserved you - how they will regret it - how you can do so much better. Our support systems - the people who hold us up, who are willing to go to battle for us, who want to hurt the people who have hurt  us - just want us to feel better. They want us to see ourselves as they see us - as our beautiful selves. And for this and for all of these people - we are so lucky.

Here is what I am learning.

Deciding to love someone is not a fall - its a choice. I wouldn't say that I really believed that until now.

Now I have had the experience of "being left". Honestly, it has not been the best - until now. Now I am fully present to my own heart - I am learning exactly what it means to love someone, unconditionally, even if they left you.

As I was reeling from this break-up, a friend of mine lost the love of her life - to death.  I consider her and her loss daily. Each time I think of them,  I brake more. I brake for her, for them. For all that was truly lost. The compassion I have for her grossly outweighs the sadness I feel for myself.

Compassion has been the single most valuable experience in my life. The compassion that I feel for my friends transferred to the person who hurt me, I no longer wanted to strike back at him.  Instead, what I felt was more love for him. I felt relief and gratitude that he was still alive, that I still had the opportunity to see him and maybe even fight with him again, but more so that he still had a chance to live a happy life - even it if wasn't with me. It was then when I truly understood unconditional love. When you love someone unconditionally - by definition, it cannot be conditional on whether or not you are in a relationship - it can only exist.

Here's the other part of that. 

I have read every article on how you have to love yourself before you can love anyone else fully, and although I thought I knew that, it never moved beyond my surface. And as  a great student, I could recite all of the words around this tenant of life - however - what I practiced was ladling out all of "my" love and feeding the soul of someone who sat next to me. When they were finished with it - they stacked their empty bowl on the table and walked away. There I remained - empty pot - empty ladle - I was totally empty without someone to feed.  That was a shattering revelation.

Over the past 3 months, I have been inundated with love - in ways that are beyond explanation - in ways that seem to be landing on me from heaven - from Earth - from the moon, the stars and the sun. Each time I felt my heart break, when the rumble of tears that shook from my toes to my worn out ducts that seem to have lost their shut off valve, the sky parted and love from every source came in an around me over and over and over again. As I think about it - the level of love that I received was commensurate with the level of pain I was experiencing - in fact it was so much more.

People from every part of my life were showing up. From the very first love of my life more than 30 yrs ago, to the very last person I met on the street who smiled at me - I was being cared for. I was and continue to be overwhelmed by love. My heart continued breaking over and over and OVER - not with pain, with LOVE - the shift in perspective was and continues to be profound.

Finally, last week, when a note came through my door one afternoon - that read "just keep doing amazing things" - it was then, in that very moment  when I literally fell to the ground,  head over heels in love. And I chose to fall so deeply in love with my broken beautiful heart. I realized then if not for this beautiful brokenness - I would not have known the depths of love that I do now.

I am filling my own pot now. I am savoring it, tending to it, allowing it to rise and to rest. I am going to let it simmer and layer in the depth of the experiences I am having now.  This perfect meal that I am making - it's just for me.

Someday, when I am full - when I am ready I will share it again.

For the first time she was in no hurry.

#andshewas

Mizpah

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Do you remember in grammar school when getting a Mizpah necklace from your best friend was the coolest thing? I thought it meant that part of you belonged to someone else, that whomever had the other half felt the exact same way you did and that you could count on them FOR LIFE.

Well, needless to say I have no idea who has the other half of the Mizpah that I received in 4th grade - but I am sure at the time I loved them with all my heart.

As I have been sitting here doing my best to observe all of the debris from the past weeks, months. I have found myself split in two. One part a sobbing, physically weak confused person who feels the weight of her alone-ness like an elephant sitting on her chest every morning. The other part a logical, methodical, spiritually awakening woman who is saying "everything is all right".

The latter woman also says - go ahead and cry, you've been here before and you'll get to the other side. You are exactly where you are supposed to be.

Meanwhile my sobbing self wants to tell her to shut the hell up - because she has no idea how to fix this and I don't want to "get to the other side" - I want to go back and make none of it happen in the first place. I want to go back!!! I don't want to be HERE!

Generally I will call her a few choice names and then I will revisit old emails from my ex, I will write him new ones - I will bathe in the drama of heartbreak. I'll look at great pictures from my cafe, try to figure out how I can whip that or some version of it back into shape - I will remember that the home that I love is being packed up and that I have no idea where I will be one month from now and then I will sob.

When I was done with that practice last night I got a call from a friend that I have had for over 30 years, We have a great way of wading into each other's lives at just the right moment and last night was no exception.

He was telling me about a friend of his who is always miserable and he said - I wanted to say to her - look at Katrin **and this is what got me** "her life is terrible right now" - and with all of the shit going on in her life she is still laughing with me on the phone.

Sooooo - I had to correct him.

Because as soon as he said  "her life is terrible"  I knew INSTANTLY that was un-true. So I told him. I actually  have the best life ever - I am the most fortunate person I have ever known. I have the best, most loving, generous and kind family and friends that any person could ever imagine. And I listed ALL of the amazing things that are happening RIGHT now - I felt pretty great.

The elephant that had taken up residence on my chest went for a walk -

I started to really observe the duality I had created in my self .

When I started this post - pre-awesome conversation with great friend - I thought of the Mizpah for my broken heart. I assumed it was my sobbing self that had that bright idea - however when I looked up the definition I was surprised to find out that my "you are exactly where you are supposed to be self" that had that little nugget of magic up her sleeve.

Mizpah is Hebrew for "watchtower." to commemorate a promise, even though no person was present other than the two people when it was made. It was  also agreed that they would consider the mizpah a border between their respective territories, and  would not pass the watchtower to visit one another "to do harm" (Genesis 31:52).
The mizpah has come to connote an emotional bond between people who are separated either physically or by death.  "The LORD watch between me and thee, when we are absent one from another" (Genesis Genesis 31:49)

I quickly realized that it is the Mizpah that is within me. I have made a promise to allow for the territories to exist between these two parts of myself. That I will allow each side to do their work. That although I feel separated from my self at times, the watchtower exists. I cannot allow one side to take over the other to harm the process that is afoot. 

It just takes some time
Little girl, you're in the middle of the ride
Everything, everything will be just fine
Everything, everything will be all right

I am in the middle of the ride - it's equally terrifying and exciting. It is now no surprise to me that I love roller coasters - 

When I get to the top of the first crest of the first fall of the biggest coaster - I am terrified - I am regretting the decision to get on the thing to begin with.  I start to think of the probability of the ride breaking apart, and that I will die on it - I think about how stupid I was to even get on it to begin with - I think of how I could get off - how can I get back - and then in one short second...

I am taking my hands from the bar, hands in the air - feeling the rumbling - the wind - the terror and the the delight and I know everything - everything is going to be all right. 

and she knew she was where she was supposed to be 
#and she was

An Open Love Letter and Fond Farewell

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An Open Love Letter and Fond Farwell from Mamma

It is with great sadness and love that I share this post today, as it will be my final day of business for Dali Mamma.

I have thought about this post, this love letter, to my family, customers and friends for the past week and knew above all else – I wanted to share my great joys with you, not my great sadness.

Dali Mamma was conceived more than five years ago in Central Park with two of my sisters and I. It was just two words – two words that came together out of my mouth and into my soul. I knew, and my sisters knew, when I said “dali mamma” for the first time, that it was going to be something special. And it was.

I wanted to create an extension of my home - my family, for the community to share. I wanted to cook simple food, made with farm fresh ingredients that would make people happy. I wanted Artists and Musicians to have a place to showcase their work and to get out into the world. I wanted to know all of my customers by name and to know what they loved – not just for lunch – but for life. And I did – I did all of that.

Often when a business closeses – there is talk of failure, talk of defeat. However, when I look at the past five years, I look lovingly on all of the spectacular experiences I have had and that I have shared with thousands – literally thousands of people. I have had the great privilege of cooking for and knowing all of you and I would not change a thing.

My goals for the Mamma were simple – to cook beautiful clean food and to make people happy. I met and surpassed both of those. I could not have done that without the tremendous staff I now have, nor any of the people who came before them. We were always a family. We laughed every single day – all day long. Jeff Lentz is an amazing loving chef who put all of his care into the Mamma – ensuring that everyone he met was well cared for. He shared his smile and his food with everyone who walked through the door. Dominique Quirino was the saving grace to Mamma. She came in and took charge and care of everything. She kept us on point and she kept us close. They are amazing friends for life.

I could not imagine a better working environment. Where tears were only shed because we laughed so hard. Where we were committed to the principles of kindness, humor and sustainability. Our creativity was cultivated most often from morsels of what was left over and from our inability to let one lemon rind pass through our hands until all of its gifts were properly unwrapped, grated, candied or roasted.

The Mamma was a village – it wasn’t one person who made her what she was, it was a collective, collaborative effort and I was lucky enough to have had the opportunity create lasting farmships and work closely with people like Justine & Brian Denison from Denison Farm, who tirelessly farm and grow the most amazing organic produce in the area, Sean O’Connor from R&G Cheese who makes the best local cheese and Sara Dapson and the Albany Boys & Girls Club where Traveling Tastebuds first took off.

There are people who truly made the Mamma come to life, like Erika and Brad Colacino, my cousins and my friends, who have been there every step of the way with me. Brad and his band Stranger at Home played at the opening of each café. Nick Cosimono who has been a constant source of inspiration and Tanya Zahowski, who has been the hands that have held me up through every step of this experience. Ellie Markovitch is the most amazing person, let alone chef that I know. Her commitment to all things good made our kitchen warm and wise. Kasa Wahl-Losee and her husband Mark Losee came in with love and support whenever we needed it. And last, but definitely not least, Vincent Tocco – the window to Mamma’s soul – his continual commitment to bringing his gifts to our windows and walls was amazing. Thank you, Erika, Brad, Nick, Tanya, Ellie, Kasa and Vincent – you filled the Mamma with song and story.

To my staff, both past and present – Jeff Lentz, Dominique Quirino, Ellie Markovitch, Kasa Wahl-Losee, Mark Losee, Amanda Huggins, Jennifer Ann Nichols, Jim Wilson, Tammy Wilson, Alex Casey, Kayla Coons, Sara Dapson, Chloe Mincher, Veronica Nunes, Ava Markatos, Rachel Reed, Gavin Ellis, Jack Ellis, Leah, Maxwell Ellis, Alyssa Romer, Michael Buchann, James Haney, Sandy Kershaw Cutler, Jillian Mayott– thank you for all that brought to the Mamma, she wouldn’t have become what she was without every single one you.

Not only had I been so fortunate to have had the most amazing people to work with over the last five years, but I have had the most exceptional family who have cheered me on for more than 40 years. So, to my family, with all my love and thanks – please know that every single one of you inspired me every day to bring the best part of myself to the Mamma. You all were my driving force and I could not have even dreamed this dream if not for all of you.

And for my boys, who taught me how to love so fiercely – who have lovingly shared their Mamma with all of you – I love you.

And so this is the Mamma’s farewell – thank you so very much for giving me the opportunity to feed you.

Love Always,

The Mamma

Everything Must Go

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Today is a day - like many others I have been lucky enough to experience in my short life. My world, is in demolition mode.  The studs are being torn down today - the frame, the joints and the roof is being ripped off. 

So, Lucky? Yes,

When I look at my life, I have never done anything just a little. I jump BIG - often with no net - and some of those jumps are leg breaking or just free falls. But the big ones - the REALLY BIG ones have been beautiful, fantastic fireworks that explode in my heart over and over.

Seven years ago I was in the middle of a terrible divorce. All that I had known about myself and my life was gone. Demolition. That demolition however, was more like a tornado - there was no GM overseeing this project. I had no control over the parts of my life that were being tossed all over the city. I lost myself. I heard the primal rhythm of the tunnel chasing me, I was terrified and I was swallowed by the fierce and unrelenting storm.

After a couple of years I had gathered enough energy to start again. Not start over - just to start. And now five years later here I am again in demolition mode.

Over the last three months, my relationship, my business and my home have systematically been removed from my life. One by one.

I left a stable job to start my own business - one that I really new very little about. Although I had worked in food service for over 20 years, I never ran my own kitchen. What I did know then and what I know now - is that I could trust my self.

And I did it - I did it really well. For five years I have owned a business that has fed so many people, with food, with amazing art work, with music and with friendship. I loved every single moment - even and especially the really hard ones. Today - that cafe will close.

Shortly after I started the cafe - I met my last partner. We were instantly and intensely joined. At one point we had been engaged, until we weren't. We lived together, until we didn't and we loved each other until he stopped.

I moved to Albany with my then fiance, for the cafe and for him. Now that both are gone - my home decided joined the movement.

Some may say this is too much - all at once, I am part of that some - some days - but some days I am thankful and excited about what is next. It is all clearing - like getting ready for a colonoscopy, I have to let all of that shit go. Everything, everything must go.

This time around, I feel that primal rhythm, I hear the tunnel coming - but I have no fear. This tornado is inside me, I recognize the sounds and the feelings - I have the equipment to harness this storm.

When there is nothing left - anything is possible.

And she was ready.  #andshewas

Welcome to my latest project - my words, my voice - unrestrained and honest. I have spent the last 5 years of my life creating and living out a dream that I thought was about food - that I thought was about business, that I thought was about community, And it was filled with all of those things - but in the last couple of months, I have come to find out that this dream was actually about finding out who I really was.

I am not a "this" or a "that" I just am. And that is enough.

In this blog - I will share with you my journey,

For the last several weeks, I have had an un-settling feeling of being un-tethered, un-grounded and I have feared it. I have sobbed as I felt all that I knew - all that I thought I knew - was drifting away from me. In the span of two months all that was once part of who I am - became parts of who I was,.

My body no longer felt like it was mine. I was going through the motions of waking and working and talking - but I wasn't there. I could feel the Earth under my feet quaking each time they hit the floor. I would brace myself for the next fall - the next time I would feel like the ground would disappear from under my feet.

I would have moments of clarity - moments of seeing the gifts that were in the embers surrounding me - and I have great soul friends who have been reminding me and sometimes literally carrying me when I could not see the light in any of this.

This feeling of drifting out into the universe alone terrified me - until it didn't. Until I realized that this un-tethered feeling was so foreign to me because I had been tied down. I had allowed myself to be controlled by people and places that held me on a very short leash. And now - now that that I can feel free to move about the cabin of my life - I have to get acquainted with myself, with who I am and what it feels like to be free.

All of what has been happening - all of what I will be sharing - has been a systematic tear down of who I thought I was - of what I thought my life was. And now - it is slowly coming into focus. The blurred image submerged in tears is coming to the surface, I can look now and see that I have a new view, a new day and a new opportunity.

And it was time,

And she was ready.

Moving into the universe and she's
Drifting this way and that
Not touching the ground at all and she's
Up above the yard

The world was moving, she was right there with it and she was