High noon on Thursday, I began the Northward drive from Miami. Passing power lines, cows, and little else, I fell asleep that night listening to crickets by the lake behind my parents’ house in Atlanta.

The next morning, my beautiful sister Kassandra woke early to breakfeast with me the Flying Biscuit—where the grits really are dreamy and an order of eggs and love cakes (black bean cakes with tomatillo salsa, feta, and sour cream) will lift you on the way back to the road.

I also admired my mother’s tomatoes,

lavender,

calla lilies,

Kassandra’s eyes,

and the gardenias that my mother has coaxed into a significant mass—a few traveled with me, perfuming the car as I drove on to Carrboro, North Carolina,

the wonderful town within Chapel Hill, where I sat on the lawn with local peach ice cream and the Weaver Street Market circular detailing local farm produce being featured this week at the co-op.

That night, I laughed with Ben, Jeremy, Seve, and Kyle and their friends at Enoteca in Charlottesville, waking with the sun to wander the farmers’ market that begins here at 7 a.m. on Saturdays, filled with tempting pie cherries this time of year.

My favorite market vendors hugged me and advised I take 81 for a more scenic drive (good advice that I took),

and this is their beautiful jewelry—when at the Charlottesville Market, do stop by and tell them I’ve sent you,

I miss the lettuce from Radical Roots with edible flowers on top of the lettuces and bought some for the road,

stopping by the Goat Cheese Man’s stand with its radishes,

and cheese donations, buying green garlic,

noting these baby carrots as I strode toward the car, keys at the ready for the final stretch to Brooklyn,

into this new apartment, a new job, and a new chapter…

I’m moving to New York for an incredible new job with PopTech, a network of social innovators I am excited to join as their Digital Content and Community Manager in Brooklyn, NY starting at the end of June.

In the meantime, I am delighted to announce I’ll be part of the Knight Foundation gathering of News Challenge winners at MIT next week premiering the second phase of Knight Pulse (just wait until you see the visualization piece!) as my last hurrah before transitioning to wonderful new things in Brooklyn. More soon here about this wild Miami year, but for now,

I’ll be updating Twitter as I roadtrip in the next few days from Miami to Brooklyn. Here’s what I’m listening to as I drive… (and would love to hear from you in the comments; truly, the music sounds better with you)—

 

 these vagabond shoes: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

New York, New York – Cat Power
Fresh Blood – The Eels
Paper (Hot Sax version) – Explode Into Colors
Six to Midnight – Stray and Grass
Lasso – Phoenix
In Context – Field Music
People – Silver Jews
The Next Time Around – Little Joy
The Reeling (Sammy Bananas’s Big Choon Mix) – Passion Pit
Music Sounds Better with You – Stardust
The Universe is Going to Catch You – The Antlers
Oh I Can – Rock Plaza Central

Will you come visit me in Brooklyn? Say you will…

insisting you notice her even as she sweeps grandly away, trailing drops across leaves,

that bend in the sun, recovering from her fierce appearance,

and like filmmakers that race to shoot while streets are wet,

I am learning to wait in readiness, part of the Nature Paparazzi corps,

to catch her exit and the dazzling scene she leaves in her wake—

As we corner in on a long weekend, the rains have increased to their usual frequency for this time of year, bringing out spiders,

and reviving plants I watched wilting earlier in the week.

Here’s to a few days framed with sun, as we turn toward restorative summer—

I heard a knock at the door, and opened it to find one of the homeowners handing me four mangoes–two that are ripe, two that need another day or so.

We started talking about the coconuts that he harvests from the street, and that led to a machete and a handmade, welded striking implement cracking open coconuts on the porch, draining the milk, admiring the meat (which you score and then scoop out), and an explanation of how to make coconut milk—blend quite a bit of coconut water, a little coconut meat, a date and a dash of cinnamon for sweetness.

As a storm rages outside, intermittently lighting up the cottage, I am drinking it all up and in, sipping the milk (fresh coconut water tastes infinitely better than the packaged product, as you can imagine) and shaking my head at all the years I let a terrible cake experience with sweetened, shredded kind of coconut hold me back.

I prescribe fresh coconut.

If we can imagine meat—the word itself, without its weighty moral baggage and simply referring to these hairy things that hang from tropical trees—as a delightfully firm, silky white layer hidden inside a shell, perhaps spritzed with a little lime, we may all feel a little better…