Last Thursday I was thrilled/elated/lucky as hell to have been able to snatch up a $5 ticket for Largehearted Lit's event at Public Assembly featuring my newest life/literary obsession author Cheryl Strayed. Recently I took a very soul searching week long trip out to the west coast and when I came back there was a box waiting in the mail for me from my friend Noel which contained a copy of Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar. I knew approximately nothing about Dear Sugar (the once anonymous and hugely popular advice column from The Rumpus) but the title and the sender alone told me that this was a book I desperately needed to read and that had come to me at exactly the right time in my life. And boy, were those instincts accurate.
Aside from the things that Strayed and I personally have in common, particularly both having mother's who have died from cancer when we were in our early 20s, the book touched me and inspired me in such an unabashed and honest way that I - and many of the attendees on Thursday night I'm sure feel the same - felt like I knew "Sugar" from the first letter I read. Her writing and openness draw you in until you feel as though you are reading the words of a dear old friend who knows you inside and out, listens to everything you say and then doesn't tell you what you WANT to hear but rather what you NEED to hear It's a magical book that I now want to give to important people in my life - much the same way that Noel did for me.
I'm now deeply engrossed in Strayed amazing memoir "Wild" and spend most of my weekend alternating between reading it and committing ungodly abuses against my body at the gym. Oh and drinking and eating like a monster, obviously. Speaking of EATING, if you ever find yourself at Lighthouse in Williamsburg for dinner (which I highly recommend) and they have the brussel sprout salad on special DO NOT HESITATE and GET THAT IN YOUR MOUTH IMMEDIATELY. I was so psyched over this dish that I actually bought shredded brussel sprouts at Trader Joe's on Sunday so that I can attempt to replicate it in my own kitchen (which will likely be a massive disappointment). But not a disappointment is Trader Joe's Soy Chorizo which I made into a cheesy/eggy scramble of delight as imaged above. Yums.
