welcome (to) home
Throwing a party in my hometown
brought me closer to my senses, my self, those around me,
and my next project.
I always notice how it smells when I land in my hometown in the spring. From the air the land is well, flat, but vibrant green patchwork and familiar to me. The air is sweet and not yet thick with summers humidity. Corn, grass, manure, honeycomb- I inhale deeply as soon as I can, the scent only growing deeper in meaning to me after years of living in a city. This winter I was suddenly compelled to host a few dinner parties in my hometown - Tulsa, that is. I couldn’t get the thought out of my head, and even when I told myself that I wouldn’t be able to, didn’t have the time or the money or the help, I was still researching produce seasonality in Oklahoma. I wondered what would be sprouting from the land, say, around springtime? Who are the major farmers there? What can you grow during that stretch of summer that is so painfully familiar to me - where every day is cloudless and bright, scalding temperature crawl towards 105, 110 degrees. I tried to shake the idea off.For a reason unknown to me now, it seemed to be a silly idea. That’s the thing about what compels us out of nowhere - often, the whole story is not complete without our leaning in with a curious demeanor. 
The Oath Studio in Tula, Oklahoma. Photographed by Cooper Harrison.
I couldn't get the thought out of my head, and I knew I would need help. I hired an old family friend, Parker D. Wayne, to help me produce and host the nights. Something deep in my gut told me that he was the one to partner with. With him behind me, we dove right into planning. Immediately, I felt massive amounts of resistance in my personal life and fell into a depression. I thought it was a sign to stop the planning. Parker, from a computer screen and while sitting thousands of miles away said (yelled) things to me like, "When you feel resistance, I want you to LEAN ON IN SIS." "I wont let you quit." "I think we need to do this."Well, who wouldn’t be motivated?
And how does a thing get planned? One detail at a time. April was filled with details, and the only tasks on our calendars on the first weekend in May was, do it. The entire week before the dinners was a glorious build up. Parker and I travelled all over Oklahoma and, with each stop, we were given exactly what we needed. We hugged the farmers, they slipped extra produce in our bags. In a Southern drawls, thick as honey, they spoke poetry to me -Try some blood oranges, they grow great here. This is Kelly-Anne, she makes the sourdough that we sell here. Tell your momma I got some eggs for her. We raise the cattle here, ma'am. For us that grew up landlocked, and in states hot as hell, growing varieties were quite small. We never even came close to seeing celeriac, rhubarb, oysters, blood oranges, lamb, fresh fennel, scallops. These flavors, and a lifetime more, I only came to know in my late twenties. What I am saying is, it felt important to know more about what is growing in the place that I came from, and to tell some people about it. 
We thought through everything- every smell, every light, every candle, every drink and plate and chair and glass. My sister did the floral arrangements - wild and vegetal, brilliantly disarming- and my brother made a playlist. The night was hosted at The Oath Studios - a historic home in Tulsa with deep roots to the arts community. Every inch of the night held connection, soul. While I could mention the service, the food, they both feel like a side players in the bigger story of the night. A hundred hugs were had, glasses passed, friends made and held and reunited, candles burned down and dishes piled up. At the end of the first night, everyone involved was jumpy with excitement to do it again.The next night, at the end of dinner, the dining room erupted in cheer as my mom brought out the secret seventh course - a warm and aromatic stack of her chocolate chip cookies. My dad stood at the end of the table in applause, plump and happy from decades in her kitchen, while my sister and I clutched each others arms, tears streaming down our smiling faces. The majority of the people in that room grew up eating those exact chocolate chip cookies, requested them for birthday parties and weddings and baby showers. Without her knowing, this eruption of joy over such a simple thing, a cookie, confirmed what I knew was true about that night - that all along, it was about her, about the bonds that keep families circling one another, passing knowledge down, showing up, sharing a recipe, and maybe even sometimes a lifes passion transfers from one generation to the next. That is the spirit of being at home, anywhere. 
As the smell of the cookies dissipated through the evening breeze and everyone brought their final sips of amaro outside, the dining room filled with the smell of freshly cut grass. You’re familiar right? For me, it is up there as top aroma. Saturday morning, brewing coffee, neighbors with their hands in their gardens, they clean their garages and the daily agenda is this - have fun, play, be home for dinner. My knees are scraped and I am 10 years old now, right before everything got really embarrassing. At least, that is how the smell felt. 
My older brother lights me a celebratory cigarette, I am 33 again. Looking through the windows of the historic home, I inhale the tobacco and observe inside my mom drying plates next to Parker. As he stands before her, an other-worldly man, she has known him since he was a teenager. They laugh together. My sister kneels next to an old family friend, leans in to hear her story. I can’t hear them but they suddenly laugh at the same time. My dad has taken over the conversation with a group of people he has known since their pre-pubescent years. 
The familiarity of the nights guests was an unexpected sweetness, but the truth is that it would not have mattered who showed up to dinner. It was not the guest list but rather a certain spirit of home that carried us that night. As when you are truly at home, it didn't matter who came to sit at the table, and it didn't even matter where that table was. You just put out the call - dinner time! And we, all so dramatically different, can come!
I came back to Brooklyn so deeply excited to start the Home Dinner services this summer. A few nights ago, some friends all stopped by suddenly and with little warning. Well, I had some food laying around so I started to cook - chicken thighs wrapped in lime, a crunchy and cold salad with anchovies and almost too much oregano, pan fried garlic bread. A friend put some olives on a plate, an accidental dinner party formed. My friend Becca, the last to arrive, observed the roasting chicken and the frying bread and she said, “Wow, is it always dinner time at your house?” I could only answer, hell yeah girl. Yes, it is.
My deep gratitudes to the farmers of Oklahoma Swans Dairy, Oaktree produce, High Fence Farms, The Feed Lot, Susan Harwell, and Bodean Seafood.
To Lolly Mclain, Jacob Randall, Parker D. Wayne, Cooper Harrison, Victoria Bruhn, Logan Bruhn, Rose Bruhn - this night was ours. Thank you a million times! PS - Come over? Eat at my house. Stay tuned for Home Dinners, this summer, in Brooklyn, NY.
