Showing Up
By Stephanie Kemp
November 9, 2025
So often when I sit down to write, it’s to spew toxins. Get rid of the mental dung. Emotional Sturm and Drang. Fury. Fear. Anxiety. Shoulds.
The What Ifs……
In my life (and everyone else’s) at this moment, there is so much of that.
But I want to write about the good that is swirling this morning.
It is 8:14am. I have been up for three hours. Drinking coffee with my husband, talking to one daughter in Italy while the other sleeps soundly in the hug of a house that is our home.
I never take it for granted, this husband, these daughters, our home.
I am the luckiest and I always know this, even when I’m spewing.
And last night was soul fuel.
Adam and I went to a gallery show of his friend, Vicky, who he went to high school with and hasn’t seen in over 25 years.
She is a ceramicist (beautiful vases, lamps, bowls).
She lost everything (house, studio, art) in the Eaton Fire.
She started again (moved to a new town, started a new studio, got back to work).
Vicky is a badass.
And watching her figure out who Adam was in real time and then hug him was so pure - a friend showing up for a friend and the difference (in a face and smile) this can make in a life or a moment. (This happened in his face and smile, too.)
Vicky is (in every way) beautiful. I immediately (also?) had a crush on her.
I wanted to buy (all of) her pottery but very quickly realized I would need to circle back after I make (a lot) more money. (I will do this.)
Within seconds of chatting (you can’t hog an artist’s time at her own gallery opening), we discovered that Vicky is friends with my friend, Christine, who also lived in Altadena.
Christine, whose gorgeous home was technically spared but remains uninhabitable (on its beautiful street with a jagged ribbon of missing neighbors) as she continues to battle insurance while reconfiguring her life, too.
Christine, who every single day since January 7th, has fed people and kept her community together through her Little Flower Candy Company bakery and cafe. She never closed (or closes) her door to anyone.
It was also Christine, whose food (soup, granola, bread, quiche, lasagne, sea salt caramel candy), was often the only thing I could (or wanted to) eat during my six rounds of chemotherapy, the third of which coincided with the fire/s.
When my Pasadena infusion center had to shut down and I was driven all over my paralyzed city, from hospital to hospital, trying to get my empty chemo bag flushed and refilled with the right R-EPOCH chemical cocktail.
When Adam, Frances and I had to evacuate our house (Eaton Fire), then my sister in law’s house (Sunset Fire) and then our family friend’s house (Palisades Fire), before being able to go home again.
The last time I saw Christine was the morning after my chemo bag was finally refilled and my house (and my sister and brother in law’s house and our family friend’s house) didn’t burn down.
I dropped off clothes at Little Flower, because not only did she keep her door open for firefighters and first responders and everyone reeling from unimaginable loss (often feeding people for free), she also spearheaded a clothes drive from her sidewalk. (She did this until too many people donated and the never-ending rolling racks got in the way of her primary mission of providing food, at which time she, of course, commandeered a clothes drive move to an off-site location.)
I hugged Christine sideways, not wanting her to see the chemo bag and cord hooked up to my chest port. I hoped she wouldn’t notice the synthetic hair attached to and hanging from a newly acquired beanie.
She had enough to worry about. (Did I mention that she is also the world’s best mom to three of the world’s best kids?)
I wanted to show up for her.
I haven’t seen Christine since that day.
I haven’t been back to the cafe since I finished (God willing) chemo.
I miss her (and all of the friends I haven’t seen).
These thoughts (of all of them) are making (all parts of) me hungry.
I will write Christine to tell her that I met her friend Vicky last night.
…that Vicky and Adam want to see each other again and we all want to have a dinner with her. (We will even cook! I want to make her my mom’s tetrazzini, but I bet Adam will want to make her - and Vicky - something fancier.)
I will tell Christine that I wish I saw her more often and that I tried to eat something from her cafe every single day of my treatment (mostly via the world’s best friends and Meal Train), not only because it was delicious but because I also wanted to channel her (kindness, energy, strength) to get through a really scary thing.
Maybe I will even resend her the poem I wrote about her (during the pandemic, another impossibly scary thing):
“Grateful Every Day”
is an easy thing to say.
But to those who say AND mean it,
life is better, I have seen it.
Maybe I will also send the poem to Vicky (or write her a new one) to thank her for all of her strength and soul fuel.
And maybe I will finally explain the beanie I am (still) wearing, trying to follow their leads as I continue to move through a very scary thing.
Happy Sunday.
(I am going to Little Flower. I hope I will get to hug my friend.)
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So often when I sit down to write, it’s to spew toxins. Get rid of the mental dung. Emotional Sturm and Drang. Fury. Fear. Anxiety. Shoulds.
The What Ifs……
In my life (and everyone else’s) at this moment, there is so much of that.
But I want to write about the good that is swirling this morning.
It is 8:14am. I have been up for three hours. Drinking coffee with my husband, talking to one daughter in Italy while the other sleeps soundly in the hug of a house that is our home.
I never take it for granted, this husband, these daughters, our home.
I am the luckiest and I always know this, even when I’m spewing.
And last night was soul fuel.
Adam and I went to a gallery show of his friend, Vicky, who he went to high school with and hasn’t seen in over 25 years.
She is a ceramicist (beautiful vases, lamps, bowls).
She lost everything (house, studio, art) in the Eaton Fire.
She started again (moved to a new town, started a new studio, got back to work).
Vicky is a badass.
And watching her figure out who Adam was in real time and then hug him was so pure - a friend showing up for a friend and the difference (in a face and smile) this can make in a life or a moment. (This happened in his face and smile, too.)
Vicky is (in every way) beautiful. I immediately (also?) had a crush on her.
I wanted to buy (all of) her pottery but very quickly realized I would need to circle back after I make (a lot) more money. (I will do this.)
Within seconds of chatting (you can’t hog an artist’s time at her own gallery opening), we discovered that Vicky is friends with my friend, Christine, who also lived in Altadena.
Christine, whose gorgeous home was technically spared but remains uninhabitable (on its beautiful street with a jagged ribbon of missing neighbors) as she continues to battle insurance while reconfiguring her life, too.
Christine, who every single day since January 7th, has fed people and kept her community together through her Little Flower Candy Company bakery and cafe. She never closed (or closes) her door to anyone.
It was also Christine, whose food (soup, granola, bread, quiche, lasagne, sea salt caramel candy), was often the only thing I could (or wanted to) eat during my six rounds of chemotherapy, the third of which coincided with the fire/s.
When my Pasadena infusion center had to shut down and I was driven all over my paralyzed city, from hospital to hospital, trying to get my empty chemo bag flushed and refilled with the right R-EPOCH chemical cocktail.
When Adam, Frances and I had to evacuate our house (Eaton Fire), then my sister in law’s house (Sunset Fire) and then our family friend’s house (Palisades Fire), before being able to go home again.
The last time I saw Christine was the morning after my chemo bag was finally refilled and my house (and my sister and brother in law’s house and our family friend’s house) didn’t burn down.
I dropped off clothes at Little Flower, because not only did she keep her door open for firefighters and first responders and everyone reeling from unimaginable loss (often feeding people for free), she also spearheaded a clothes drive from her sidewalk. (She did this until too many people donated and the never-ending rolling racks got in the way of her primary mission of providing food, at which time she, of course, commandeered a clothes drive move to an off-site location.)
I hugged Christine sideways, not wanting her to see the chemo bag and cord hooked up to my chest port. I hoped she wouldn’t notice the synthetic hair attached to and hanging from a newly acquired beanie.
She had enough to worry about. (Did I mention that she is also the world’s best mom to three of the world’s best kids?)
I wanted to show up for her.
I haven’t seen Christine since that day.
I haven’t been back to the cafe since I finished (God willing) chemo.
I miss her (and all of the friends I haven’t seen).
These thoughts (of all of them) are making (all parts of) me hungry.
I will write Christine to tell her that I met her friend Vicky last night.
…that Vicky and Adam want to see each other again and we all want to have a dinner with her. (We will even cook! I want to make her my mom’s tetrazzini, but I bet Adam will want to make her - and Vicky - something fancier.)
I will tell Christine that I wish I saw her more often and that I tried to eat something from her cafe every single day of my treatment (mostly via the world’s best friends and Meal Train), not only because it was delicious but because I also wanted to channel her (kindness, energy, strength) to get through a really scary thing.
Maybe I will even resend her the poem I wrote about her (during the pandemic, another impossibly scary thing):
“Grateful Every Day”
is an easy thing to say.
But to those who say AND mean it,
life is better, I have seen it.
Maybe I will also send the poem to Vicky (or write her a new one) to thank her for all of her strength and soul fuel.
And maybe I will finally explain the beanie I am (still) wearing, trying to follow their leads as I continue to move through a very scary thing.
Happy Sunday.
(I am going to Little Flower. I hope I will get to hug my friend.)
