Well damn. I missed homecoming.
I thought I was finally going to pop my homecoming cherry this weekend, and yet here I am, still intact. Hurricane Isaias had other plans.
Trip planned. Tickets purchased. Outfits picked out. I was ready for Alabama State versus FAMU and the HBCU homecoming experience I never got to have in college. Then the schedule changed, the game moved to Friday morning, the activities I planned to attend fell through, and even my bus ticket was cancelled.
By Wednesday, I had paused my blog and content while everything shifted. By Friday, I was lying in my bed in Atlanta.
WTH.
My feelings were all over the place. Angry? A little. But mostly disappointed. I wanted to see classmates from my college era. I wanted the reunion, the familiar faces, the chance to experience something I had been looking forward to for so long.
This time, it wasn’t a conflicting schedule. It wasn’t limited funds. It was the damn hurricane showing up like she had been booked as the headliner.
Ma’am. I had plans.
I haven’t had a vacation in two years, and if I’m being honest, I don’t really know how to rest. This weekend was supposed to be a little pocket of escape from this crazy thing we call life. A chance to put something down, enjoy myself, and be somewhere familiar.
Instead, Friday was spent in bed, working on Floral & Spice and cleaning my house a little. Saturday, I picked up an Instawork shift because I still have to work to maintain this business. Sunday brought football, this blog, and opening the invitation for my next supper club.
The homecoming I had planned didn’t happen. And now, here I am preparing to welcome women into my home next Sunday.
Funny how the week turned out.
Lately, a phrase has been running through my mind: If you’re not first, you’re last.
Every day, it feels like I see another supper club popping up. Another beautiful table. Another gathering. And there I am, somewhere in the thick of the pack, preparing for dinner number two.
I’m not particularly interested in racing anybody. But that phrase kept coming back.
So I had to ask myself what “first” even means to me.
First means movement. It means starting, and then having the consistency to keep going. Because just because you started doesn’t mean you’re consistent.
I’ve already hosted my first dinner. Now I’m ready for the next one.
Years ago, my mentor asked me a question about competition that changed how I looked at business.
“How much is water?”
“Eighty-nine cents,” I said. This was the early 2000s, so work with me.
He told me water was free, and yet people had built an enormous market around selling it.
That conversation stayed with me. People can offer something familiar and still give someone a reason to choose their version. Seeing other people do the work doesn’t mean there’s no room for yours.
So I am starting. Period. And I am continuing.
What I want to create has substance. Yes, I love the food. I love a beautiful table. I love a cute outfit, too. But I want women to leave with something they felt while they were sitting there.
Seen. Heard. Celebrated.
I’m learning to look out at the women in front of me. To stop assuming the room needs a particular person, a big name, or someone with a following before the work can matter.
There are women right here with stories. Women who need somewhere to land. Women who look like me, who I can reach now.
I want to make room for them.
And honestly? I don’t feel behind.
I am on God’s timing.
I wanted this supper club years ago. Seven years ago, I wanted to move this part of the vision forward, but I wasn’t ready to carry what I was asking for. I was immature in ways I can recognize now. I wasn’t prepared to hear women’s stories or to listen with the care that responsibility requires.
Listening is a big part of this assignment.
The larger vision has been thirteen years in the making, and along the way, I have been building relationships. Making space. Lending a hand when I could. Learning how to show up for women before there was a supper club invitation to send.
I used to think, If I build it, they will come.
But I’ve learned that the relationships need tending, too. People need to know there is someone behind the invitation who cares about them.
When everyone sat down at my first dinner, I felt myself moving forward.
With everything happening in my life, I had still done it.
I had been so in my head about my apartment, its location, and the furniture I didn’t have. Meanwhile, my heart was already in the dinner. My heart was in listening to the women at that table, seeing each of them, and creating something we could share.
That evening helped me understand my own words a little more deeply:
Home is not a place. Home is a feeling we create for one another.
I could do this. I could feel the butterflies and still press forward.
I am on assignment, and I am no longer as intimidated by it.
I believe in me real bad.
More and more, I am learning to stand confidently in the gift God gave me. I also know I can’t carry every part of this alone. I need help, and I’m learning to make room for that, too.
This second dinner feels different because I’m opening the invitation beyond my friends. Women I haven’t met yet may walk through my door.
Am I nervous? Of course.
I have feelings about the food, filling the seats, and figuring out everything that has to happen between now and next Sunday. There are still obstacles. There are still practical things to work through.
But I’m moving with faith. From the food to the plates to the help, I’m trusting God as I do the work in front of me.
I want the women who come to feel like they’ve pulled up a chair at the grown folks’ table at Grandma’s house.
The warmth. The conversation. The feeling that you can settle in.
I want care in the table setting, the food, and the way you are welcomed. I want you to feel seen, because being seen changes how a room feels.
Nine women in a room, and somehow I still want there to be space to be still. To stop performing for a little while. To listen, speak, laugh, and enjoy being there.
When you leave, I hope you remember how you felt. I hope that feeling makes you want to come back.
Missing homecoming hasn’t changed my desire to gather. It has given me more ideas for next year.
I can imagine partnering with my university, welcoming Black women to a supper club during homecoming, and having a brand sponsor the trip. That is something I want to build toward.
Big? Maybe. But this vision has always held more than one dinner.
For now, the next step is right here.
Next Sunday, October 18, I’m hosting Duo, the second Floral & Spice supper club, here in Atlanta. And I’m making room for you.
If you’re nervous about arriving alone, girl, there is someone here who looks like you. Someone who wants to welcome you. And there may be another woman at the table who is glad you decided to come.
This is your space, too. Your story has a place here.
So maybe I missed my first homecoming experience. But next Sunday, I get to open my door again.
“If you’re not first, you’re last” can keep running through my mind. I know what I’m doing with it now.
I’m reaching the women in front of me. I’m showing up for dinner number two. I’m trusting the timing and continuing the work.
Come in, girl. There’s a place for you here.
Explore DUO & request your seat →
What gathering have you been craving—and what would help you feel at home when you arrived?