Carrie Saum

In the spirit of fall, I'm sharing this with you. You need it. I need it. We all need it to make it through the final days of fading sunshine and early days of falling leaves. Or something.

When I turned 21, my body crashed.

Visiting my family in the Sierra Nevada foothills is one of the great pleasures of my life. I get to work, cook, and play while my amazing folks keep an eye on my kid. My inspiration and productivity skyrocket when I'm able to step away from my version of the daily grind and get a little refocused and centered. The food I make tastes a little better, and I move a little easier without a three-year-old constantly in tow.

Last month, I heard my kid say "I'm sorry" to a complete stranger at Target for no reason.

Trail mix is a quick way to keep me from having a full-on hunger meltdown. I find it easier to whip up a batch of my own so I can control the ingredients and the quality.

We had no turkey, no casserole dishes heaped sweet potatoes or creamy green beans, no pies made from scratch, no beautiful table settings or nice dishes to heap our non-existent feast upon.

This probably won't come as a surprise, but taking care of yourself is probably going to piss some people off.

Next, juice your blood oranges. Or skip this and buy the juice from the spendy little corner market that sells $8 fair trade chocolate made from cocoa beans harvested purely through meditative thoughts generated by unionized zen monkeys in Thailand. They also sell blood orange juice. You’ll find it next to the $15 cashew milk.

My friends, food is getting fancier.

If you grew up in a typical Christmas tradition, you probably had the same dinner at Thanksgiving and at Christmas.