The Leading Lady

Romanticizing My Life One Pot of Meatballs at a Time

I started out life full of romantic ideals. But by the time my children were school age, I had grown jaded, angry and depressed.

I was working full-time and growing a business while raising my family.

I wasn’t part of the PTO mom circles. We didn’t even speak the same language, but I knew their rituals. The first day of school meant celebratory mimosas at 9 am., early enough to sober up by pickup time. Friday nights everyone dressed up in blue and white. then attended the high school football games. On Sundays, they went to neighborhood BBQs.

I’d shake my head. By 9 am I was already in my third meeting of the day. On Friday night I was driving back from the City, stuck in rush hour traffic. On Sunday, I was anticipating with dread the following day, as I went about my mile-long errand list.

I went from hopeful to hopeless in the span of a decade.

People talked about self-care as a cure. The closest I got to it was manicures between meetings and bubble baths on the weekend.

There’s a moment in the movie, The Holiday when Arthur tells Iris that she is acting like the best friend instead of the leading lady. Iris pauses, tears in her eyes, and says, “You’re so right. You’re supposed to be the leading lady of your own life, for God’s sake.”

Arthur may as well have been talking to me. I was most certainly not acting like the leading lady of my own life.

I spent years in therapy barely able to slow down enough to be there. Even in that room, my mind was ten other places. To allow myself to slow down for an hour meant six voicemails to return and an hour less to do it.

Eventually, however, I admitted what weighed so heavily on my mind that it took dozens of sessions to pull it out of me. I had become someone I didn’t recognize. The years of pretending to be something I wasn’t, the years of stress, the years of hustling hard—all of it had worn down my authentic self. It had turned me into a supporting character in my own life.

I knew I needed to save myself. But what would people think?

My therapist told me something that I have never forgotten. It affected me so deeply that I wrote it down and to this day, that piece of paper still lives in my journal.

Believing that who we are is defined by what other people think of us cripples the joyful spontaneity of our authentic selves. If others disapprove, and their opinion defines us, then we modify ourselves or shrink from view. We cease to exist except as a reflection of what others think.

Martha Beck

It was then I understood that if I wanted happiness I had to honor my authentic self more than I feared judgment. I had to get back to being the leading lady of my own life. I had to find that hopelessly romantic girl again. The idealist that I had left behind.

What did she want? What made her special?

Romanticizing your life isn’t frivolous. It might be the whole point.

It means living authentically as yourself. Being present and enjoying what’s in front of you. Inhabiting your life fully—-not living it for others, but for yourself.

That realization helped me stop believing exhaustion was noble. That joy should be postponed. That there is a “right” time for celebrating.

We get so used to doing for others, we forget this is our first time living too.

We simply get lost. Reframing our viewpoint gets us back on track.

It was then that I changed my lens. I proclaimed that I would “love where I was right now”. I chose peace instead of punishment, even if my wounds were only self-inflicted.

I made a list of all the things I wanted to do, that I could do. Like learning to make sourdough bread and chocolate croissants, expanding my garden, and feeling better in my body. Reading fiction again.

The more present I became, the more present I wanted to be.

Now, even my coffee is intentional. I no longer drink four cups of coffee just to survive the day. I drink one cup very slowly made using a French Press—and enjoy every moment of it.

My morning walks are ritual. A peaceful stroll through my neighborhood leaving my phone at home. As I pass people multi-tasking their walks and meetings I realize that I used to be them. But now, I take pleasure in slowly observing everything about the color of the sky and the way the breeze feels against my face.

At night, before I start dinner, I turn on my favorite music. Often an old vinyl album I bought back in high school. The record may skip a little, but the beat soothes my soul.

After dinner, when the dishes are washed and the counters wiped clean, I make a cup of tea. I grab a book, light a candle and turn everything else off. The house quiets, signaling it’s time to rest. It’s a stark contrast to the years I stayed up until 2 am, trying desperately to squeeze more productivity from an already depleted body.

Romanticizing our life helps us fall back in love with it. In fact, I can romanticize the hell out of any ordinary day now, and it doesn’t even require mimosas.

An afternoon matcha.

A morning in the garden.

A comfortable robe after a long shower.

A homemade candle and a rainy night.

Today, it was meatballs and a big pot of sauce.

There’s something deeply comforting and utterly romantic about a pot of meatballs and sauce simmering on the stove. Try it and tell me I’m wrong. Just make sure to turn the music up while you cook.

---

I make sauce the Italian way—different all the time based on the ingredients I have on hand. In the summer, it’s vine ripe tomatoes and fresh basil. In the winter, it’s whatever is in storage. I may use the garden tomatoes I store in my freezer, or the ones I canned. I use fresh herbs when I have them, otherwise it’s the herbs I dried or froze in olive oil. Sometimes I use onions, other times I leave them out.

I offer this recipe as a guide. There are hundreds of ways to make sauce tailored to where you are with what you have. This is what I did today on a cold, but romantic, winter’s day in the Midwest.

Sauce

Ingredients

• One large can of whole tomatoes

• One large jar of passata

• One small can of tomato paste

• One onion, diced

• Three large cloves of garlic

• (I had some leftover wine, so I used 1/2 C. You can leave it out)

• Basil (I used 2 cubes of basil frozen in olive oil)

• Italian herbs

• Garlic Powder

• Onion Powder

• Salt

• Pepper

• Parmesan Rind

• Water

Instructions

1. Heat a large pan or dutch oven

2. Add a few tablespoons of olive oil. This is when I added in my frozen cubes of basil encased in olive oil.

3. Add in onion if using and cook until softened.

4. Add garlic. Cook a few minutes until soft but do not brown (burnt garlic bitters the sauce).

5. Add the can of tomato paste. Cook the paste for a few minutes.

6. This is when I added the wine and let it reduce for a few more minutes. The type of wine isn’t important—red will give the sauce more body, white will make it sweeter. I used rose because that’s what I had. (Skip this step if you aren’t using wine.)

7. Fill the can of paste with water and add it to the pan.

8. Add the tomatoes and make sure to crush them. Sometimes I do this before adding them simply with my hands, and other times I do it with a masher in the pot.

9. Add the passata. Fill the jar of passata with water, put the lid on and shake it well to recover all the sauce. Add the water to the pan.

10. Stir in seasonings and the parm rind.

11. Let simmer for a minimum of two hours. The longer you simmer it, the better and thicker it becomes. Must be gently bubbling, never boiling.

12. Add in meatballs any time during this simmering process, if using.

Meatballs

Ingredients

• One pound ground beef

• One pound ground pork

• Two eggs

• Four garlic cloves

• 1/2 C parmesan

• 1/2 C Italian breadcrumbs (leave out if gluten free and add some extra parm)

• 1/2 C milk (or use water if avoiding milk)

• 1/4 C ricotta cheese (optional, but makes meatballs tender)

• Seasonings (basil, parsley, italian seasonings, salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder)

Instructions

1. Place all ingredients in large bowl. Mix with hands until it comes together and all ingredients are incorporated. Add more liquid if needed. Don’t overmix.

2. Form desired size of meatballs by scooping a small amount in hands and rolling gently. Make all the meatballs the same size to cook evenly.

3. At this point you can fry or bake the meatballs. I like to fry them for better flavor. To fry, coat the bottom of a skillet in oil of choice. I use olive oil because that’s what my Grandma used. Avocado oil is also a good choice. Fry each meatball until the exterior is brown. You’re not trying to cook until done. The meatballs will finish cooking in the sauce. Also, fry them in batches so as not to overcrowd the pan.

4. When the meatballs have browned, remove them to a platter lined with a paper towel to remove the oil.

5. Place meatballs gently into the pot of sauce.

6. Simmer gently with the sauce until dinner time.

Enjoy!