Vanessa Ya Lopez

“There is nothing you can see that is not a flower; there is nothing you can think that is not the moon.”
― Matsuo Basho

“The hot air was pregnant with jasmine and eucalyptus.”
― Tembi Locke, From Scratch: A Memoir of Love, Sicily, and Finding Home

“Pain is part of life. That much I knew. If I could just teach her how to be resilient, how to love big, how to fear less. How to weather hurt, either at the hands of others or even the hurts she might unknowingly inflict on herself. I wanted her to know that love can come in many forms. That sometimes it can look like letting go, but it can also look like never letting go. That one day she might have to love someone in ways the world wasn’t ready for. That reaching for that kind of love would bring with it struggle, but in the end, it could be grander than her wildest imaginings.”
― Tembi Locke, From Scratch: A Memoir of Love, Sicily, and Finding Home

“And there’s grace in being willing to know and hear others. This, for me, is how we become.”
― Michelle Obama, Becoming