Rice was, and still is, one of my favorite foods. We almost always had some extra stored in the fridge, some leftovers from the previous night. It was very convenient and easy to warm it up for a quick snack. Back in the day, I loved watching the Food Network, and I remember watching an episode where they recommended covering your bowl of rice with a wet paper towel. Maybe Alton Brown? Couldn’t say. But this “hack” would keep the rice tasting more fresh by preventing it from drying out in the microwave. This was back in the early 2000s, pre TikTok, but we all still loved finding a life hack on a blog or TV show. And it worked! I used it pretty much everytime I heated up my food from that point forward.
One day, I heated up my rice as usual. And when I turned around my abuela, whom I lived with, was watching me. She turned, laughing, as she always was, and said, “I learned your trick”, roughly translated from Spanish. I said, “what?” And she said, “I saw you wetting a paper towel, which I was confused by, but then you heated up your rice with it over the top. So I watched you and learned your hack!” I laughed with her and said cool, and moved on. Knowing her, and her jovial personality, she wanted to learn the new technique to try and make it better than me next time. Which I appreciated. She loved being the best, and she loved making food everyone loved.
This was the first time she mentioned it to me, but not the last. She always seemed to be watching and taking in some of our tricks. But like a lot of things, you do not understand the significance of someone, especially older and wiser, watching you and learning from you. And probably more importantly, not jumping in to correct you. Not assuming you are doing something incorrectly, or trying to question your technique.
I think about my abuela all the time, but especially today, on International Women’s Day. There are an endless number of things I can say about her, but this seems like a pertinent lesson. The importance of taking time to build up other women around you. There is so much we can learn from each other if we take a second to listen before you jump in explaining why your own way is better. If you see someone using a technique different from you then ask them about their process. Learning about their approach without assuming they are wrong will help keep an open mind and positive perspective to learn something new. This is mutually beneficial, you build up those around you while improving your own approach to a task. Staying curious is the key to being aware of innovators and trailblazers around you!
The other point of this story is to say, don’t ever underestimate the power of positivity and complimenting someone. My grandmother’s passing comment has stuck with me for over 20 years. I loved the moment we shared, laughing and talking about my trick. It was so small, but it made my day. I so appreciated teaching her something, and felt like we bonded. I felt excited to tell her about other cooking tricks I was learning. It has been many years, but now I look forward to trying to make connections with others in this way. Finding common ground and saying what I like about someone else. I love the idea of telling someone that you watched their approach and loved it, and are adapting it for your own life. This can be for any topic, clothes, food, photography skills, or maybe their fitness routine. It does not need to be complicated, as this story definitely wasn’t.
So, Happy International Women’s Day. How will you lift someone else up? How will we build a strong community of women?
