Setting the Table: Vol. 15

Back on the wall, five books deep & a Sunday essay I can't wait to share

Every Thursday, I'm setting the table for your weekend…a little collection of reads, recipes, fun things, and whatever else caught my eye this week. It's the moment before the chaos when you get to decide what kind of experience you want. NOT a to-do list…just really sweet possibilities.

I went back to climbing this week.

A throwback…and MY back doesn’t QUITE look like that anymore…

Seven months…off the wall. Seven months of slowly, quietly, without even fully realizing it, letting go of most of the things I had built around myself to stay regulated. I like to think about it like scaffolding. These self-case rituals are the scaffolding that support and encourage my growth upward, but aren’t necessarily built into the structure. My scaffolding included climbing 2-3x/week…walks around the city…monthly deep tissue massages & realignment…facials at my Chinatown spot (I have a package that lasts me all year!)…even something as simple as grabbing my afternoon flat whites from Black Press….all the small, private rituals that didn’t feel like much, but I absolutely depended on them. I’ve been SO busy building other things...The Freckled Fork (getting intentional about what it can be and what I actually want it to become), showing up for Millie in the ways she needs right now, being present for Yas. And in the midst of all that building, I let my scaffolding fall away…leaving me unsteady.

I tend to store tension in my chest, in my throat, in my shoulders. I wrote about it in The Quiet Rage...the way women learn to carry things in their bodies instead of putting them down. For me, climbing has been the one thing that physically forces it out. Climbing isn’t just another gym commitment… it's not a wellness trend or even something I’m half-assing on a Tuesday. Since 2022, it’s been a necessity…in every sense of the word. When I’m on the wall, I’m not thinking about anything else beyond solving the problem in front of me. With everything I have, with literally my entire body and all my strength, I’m hyper-focused and with every push and pull, my body is realigning…along with my mind and my heart. I mean…all that rage has to GO somewhere.

Millie’s felt the unsteadiness…the absence of my wholeness. Yas has definitely felt and experienced the unbalanced version of me…and I’ve felt it in ways I don’t love admitting.

So I’m back…on the wall, I’m walking home from work (getting back to those 15K+ steps/day), and I’m working to reinstall the other parts of my scaffolding as well, slowly and intentionally. It turns out there’s a difference in climbing walls vs. building & hiding behind them. I’ve been doing the latter for seven months, but it’s the former that gives me life.

I’m sure there’s a journal entry or an essay in there somewhere...but for now, I just needed to go back. So, I did.

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Since we're on the subject of Millie...Mother's Day is Sunday, and if you haven’t read last week’s post My Daughter Doesn't Trust Me …it’s a real one. It’s the hard but necessary work of raising a kid with intention and with truth, no matter how rude it might feel. For this Sunday, I'm bringing you something new...I spent years grieving something my body wouldn't give me. But this time, my reflections on this day are taking a different turn,

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THE GRAZING PLATE

(quick bites, short reads, things to nibble on)

• You Cannot Carry Every Version of Yourself by Ode to a Poet
  I read this at exactly the right time last week. Something about giving yourself permission to put down the person you used to be...not as a loss, but as a necessary act of moving.

• When You've Outgrown Your Old Life by A Tini Bit of Advice
  This one pairs with the one above, from February, but it still resonates and holds true. They're basically a two-part permission slip.

• Menstrual Cycle Self-Care: Your Body Needs Week to Week on The Good Trade
  I love that women are getting more intentional about this...finally moving away from the idea that we should be the same person every single week of the month. We're not. This framework for thinking about the cycle as four different seasons is genuinely useful.

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THE UTENSILS

(tools, recipes or things that help you do the work)

• Why Making Someone Their Favorite Food Is an Act of Love by Food Stories Told
  This is exactly the kind of piece I want everyone to read and then go cook something for someone they love without making a big deal about it. The whole thesis of what I try to do with The Freckled Fork.

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THE VESSELS

(what holds us, what gives our chaos shape and space)

• Motherhood Makes You Disappear by Life with Ryan
  This one…especially this week, especially with Mother’s Day coming, especially with everything I wrote above about. It’s not easy to read, but it’s important.

• I Didn’t Burn Out Because I Failed by Myleik Teele
  Myleik again…she keeps showing up in my feed with exactly what I need to hear. This one was an eye-opener after seven months of quietly dismantling everything that was keeping me upright.

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THE GLASSWARE

(the bubbles, the refreshment, what quenches)

But if you listened to them…does it count?
For the girl who didn’t actually finish reading one book last year, it’s already May, and I’ve devoured FIVE…count ‘em….FIVE whole books so far this year…All because of the accessibility of Spotify audiobooks. So far this year, I’ve read The Book of Alchemy, Awake: A Memoir, Famesick (just finished last week, LOVED.), Next of Kin (this one was a hard copy, bc I love GH) and then Obsessed with the Best (technically a cookbook, but we all know I read these cover to cover like the trashy romance novels they are for the gourmands of the world)…and I’m almost done with Extra Sauce (also hard copy bc I just couldn’t help myself). Audiobooks while I cook and while I walk? Groundbreaking.

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THE NAPKIN

(for wiping away the week’s mess, the reset)

What did you let go of this winter that was actually keeping you sane?

Not what you gave up because it wasn’t working. The things you let go because life got loud and they were quiet, and quiet things are easy to deprioritize.

Name it and then figure out how to get it back.

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THE DESSERT PLATE

(the sweet stuff, pure joy, no justification needed)

A Women’s Kitchen Takeover at Café Mutsi • May 15 + 16.
Three Women Chefs, two days, one kitchen, a table you definitely want a seat at… Southern freckles meets Mediterranean badass meets Nordic simplicity. Details coming soon via @cafemutsi…follow them so you don't miss the info when it drops…and totally worth the trip to the Catskills next weekend…if I do say so myself:)

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Thinking About This Week…

Stop building walls & hiding behind them…go climb them instead!

Happy Thursday, turkeys!
xo, Jess

Setting the Table drops every Thursday. The Mother’s Day essay drops Sunday morning…if this day is complicated for you, in any direction, I wrote it for you, too. Thanks for being here and for sharing this little table with me ♥.