Sisters with a Side of Greens Quotes

“Nobody wants to take a stand on one side or the other. Too much gray. Too much making excuses for their personal reasons and individual ways of thinking."
"What's wrong with, like, finding out the whole story, asking people for the whole context? What's the rush to categorize things as right or wrong, good or bad? For what? So we'll have an excuse to judge them quicker? Conserve our compassion for someone who deserves it more?”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“I sprinkled a dose of Momma's seasoning into my cupped hand and dipped my tongue into the tiny pool of memories I knew one taste would evoke. Salty, savory, smoky, full of earthy flavors that somehow blessed everything it showered.
As the flavor crystals and bits of dried herbs dissolved in my mouth, I closed my eyes and swallowed the heavenly fusion.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“There, front and center, popped up a name that made both of them gasp with pleasure. They faced each other and simultaneously exclaimed, "Vine and Rose!" They slammed into each other with a tight cling that sealed their deal, screaming like they had been called to contestants' row on The Price Is Right.
Their cries brought Kerresha running from her bedroom. "What's going on?"
Marvina sang, "We got it!"
"What is it?"
Rose gave the countdown from three, and they declared, "Vine and Rose."
Kerresha beamed. "I love it! Vine says fresh ingredients; Rose says fragrant. And taste is all about the combination of smells. Plus it's a kind of a combination of your names."
"Yes, all we needed was to add love, and it generated the perfect solution!" Rose explained.
Kerresha smiled. "Sounds about right for you two.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“And Miss Marvina, could you bring me my charger? And something to eat from your kitchen? The food here is horrible."
The request for food never landed on better ears. "You got it."
Marvina whipped up a batch of chicken salad using some of the chicken breast from the Christmas meal surplus. After peeling off the crispy fried skin, the tender meat made for a perfect light sandwich filling. But just in case Kerresha wanted the extra seasoning flavor, Marvina grabbed her container of seasoning, wrapped sandwiches, a bag of chips, and napkins to take back to the hospital.
She made enough chicken salad sandwiches to feed all four of them, including Falcon, as well as anyone else who might want a taste 'cause that's what folks with the gift of hospitality do.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“And Miss Marvina, could you bring me my charger? And something to eat from your kitchen? The food here is horrible."
The request for food never landed on better ears. "You got it."
Marvina whipped up a batch of chicken salad using some of the chicken breast from the Christmas meal surplus. After peeling off the crispy fried skin, the tender meat made for a perfect light sandwich filling. But just in case Kerresha wanted the extra seasoning flavor, Marvina grabbed her container of seasoning, wrapped sandwiches, a bag of chips, and napkins to take back to the hospital.
She made enough chicken salad sandwiches to feed all four of them, including Falcon, as well as anyone else who might want a taste 'cause that's what folks with the gift of hospitality do,”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“Here." Kerresha entered again with a brown, glass bottle with a ring of colorful beads on top. Looked like something straight out of witch doctor's medicine bag. "Hold this to your nose."
Marvina waved the bottle away. "I don't mess with new age, psychedelic stuff. I stick with God."
"It's lavender. I'm pretty sure God made it."
Kerresha twisted the top off the bottle and held it under Marvina's nose.
The scent, deep, calming, and pure, filled her the same way she imagined her body would feel if somebody poured the color purple all through her soul.
A minute later, the anxiety level had gone from a 7 down to a 2.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“Cooking with Momma's spices helped Marvina process. Never mind she didn't have enough people in the house to eat everything she laid out for preparation. Several pies, pork chops, chicken, greens, macaroni and cheese, hot-water corn bread. She was just cookin' to be cookin'.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“Afterward, Marvina and I fried the chicken, and, I tell you, all hell broke loose when Kerresha tasted the meat.
"Oh my God! Holy Jesus and Guadalupe Mary!"
Before Marvina could ask her to stop using the Lord's name in vain, Kerresha leaned back in her chair and feigned a heart attack. "Oh my God! Mmm, mmm mmmmm! Where? What kind of voodoo did you put in this chicken?"
"Ain't no voodoo here in this house," Marvina bucked.
"Yes! There is!" Kerresha licked her fingers. "I promise you. On God." She put a hand on her heart. "This chicken just took me back to the spiritual power of the ancestors."
Marvina was so flattered she couldn't be mad. We both looked at each other and laughed, because, truth be told, this was exactly the reaction people gave the first time they tasted Momma's seasoning on expertly fried chicken.
"Y'all." Kerresha raised both hands in the air like she was getting happy in a holiness church. "Is it the grease? The seasoning? Chickens raised by unicorns?"
"It's the seasoning," my sister and I said simultaneously.
Kerresha swallowed another bite. "Whatever y'all put in that seasoning is a miracle. A double miracle, since it also has the power to make y'all finally both agree on something.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“We stood still, the tenderness between us almost tangible. The scent of the spices, human empathy, and plain old muscle memory combined to re-create the gooey magnetism of being near Marvina again. Felt like macaroni and cheese---the kind with a bubbly brown crust on top--- in my soul. Mmm mmm good.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“I didn't know if you were still living... in sin. I didn't want a bad influence in his life."
I spoke past the growing lump in my throat. "I'm not a monster. Just because I naively fell in love with a semi-divorced man doesn't mean I would have harmed your son. Jesus! You'd think I spent most of my life on death row by the way you talk about me when I've never seen the inside of a jail. Unlike Warren Sr.!"
To this day, I have no idea why I had to tack on that part about Marvina's deceased husband. It was petty, but seeing as we were already wallowing in the muddy puddles of our past, what difference did it make?
"He wasn't a jailbird," Marvina spat back. "He only went in once for a ticket he didn't pay before the deadline." She opened the oven and slid the onion skins inside next to the peppers.
"Don't I know this already. I hope the forty dollars of mine that you put toward his bail served the both of y'all well.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“We're not responsible for what our parents do. They're not perfect people."
My sister raised an eyebrow at me. I was walking a fine line, and she wanted to shove me over to the safe side to protect her charmed memories of Momma.
"Well, it's the truth. Parents are prone to failure," I reiterated. "You and I know this better than anyone."
Marvina glared at me. "No one is perfect. Not mothers. Not daughters, either."
"I never claimed to be perfect. I made a mistake."
"No. A mistake is when you act without realizing those actions will have negative consequences as a result. That's different from a lapse in judgement." She didn't mince words. The way she sounded all calm and collected while criticizing me--- classic Momma move.
"Do you get a pass for being young? Naive? Inexperienced?"
Kerresha's spoon clacked against her bowl. "Ummm... Are we talking about me or one of y'all?"
"These are general understandings," Marvina deflected in a soothing manner.
"I call BS," Kerresha said.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens

“This ain't no time for you to be a deadbeat sister. Again."
I gasped. "Deadbeat? Again?"
Kerresha dragged her suitcase up the steps, now.
"Absent. Estranged. Not present. Whatever you want to call it." The words erupted from her mouth like a geyser.”
― Michelle Stimpson, Sisters with a Side of Greens