Virtues from Motherhood: Learning to be a leader

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A few years ago I read a fortune from a fortune cookie that said “ Leadership is the ability to hide your panic from others” and I thought, this is the strangest thing ever. You’d assume a leader is a leader because they have it all ironed out and have no need to panic, boy was I wrong. Aside from the very obvious form of leadership, motherhood, I had to develop and fine tune my professional leadership, which is very different from my role as a mom. As a mom my leadership is tiered and drawn out over Ava’s entire life, but professional and peer leadership is very “at the moment” focused.

My cultivation of professional leadership was thrust upon me at 23, when I became the office manager for an H&R Block location. I had recently become a certified tax pro and my district manager felt I was ready to lead an office, I was flattered but also nervous. I was the youngest employee in the office, and now I was the boss? I had to manage people twice and nearly three times my age and that alone seemed intimidating. The other component was meeting all these goals, deadlines and expectations where there was little or no room for error and sometimes that meant thinking on my feet. Spoiler alert, I still have my job so clearly I did something right but at times it felt like I was just winging it and that’s when that fortune cookie saying made sense to me, panic but don’t show it.

I didn’t really grow into myself or feel comfortable speaking to people until I hit my mid twenties, before that I would grin and bear it but I would turn really red, stumble over my words and rush through whatever it was I was saying. This job role, as well as my time at City Tech, helped me groom and polish my speaking and leadership skills because it showed me that when you have something to say people will listen, they will regard your words.

Leadership doesn’t come easy though, I have classes with peers who are deathly afraid of speaking to the class and during group projects they hide behind the podium and happily let me speak. As I’ve taken senior courses though, more and more professors stop me and call them out, because I have this skill and rather than do it for my peers I should teach them or encourage them to be able to do the same. At first this annoyed me (because I hate group work and my doing the whole project is just easier to me) but then I realized that at one time it was me who was hiding beside the podium and being a wallflower. I had a math professor who made us present algebraic equations in a group project and I am awful at math so I took a back seat, but this professor wouldn’t leave me alone she made me read and do more than half the work when we presented, and I though I’d die. Clearly I didn’t die because I wrote this blog post but I do recall the fear and anxiety that moment gave me and I realize why my professors now ask me to not just do the project for them but show them how.

Leadership is a learning curve and sometimes I am absolutely winging the sh*t out of whatever it is I’m doing, but I know if I don’t get it right there’s a lesson in there, be it don’t wait till 3 days before or how to better use a computer program, there is a take away. Leading is always going to be a give and take because a good leader knows sometimes the best form of leadership is stepping aside and taking notes, we can’t all be good at everything and a good leader knows that they don’t work above the team they work with them.

 

 

Academic Self-Discovery: My Experience with Math

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For many, the career they’re interested in perusing will require them to take classes that can be challenging. Some students when faced with this situation will push themselves and dedicate more of their time to the subject. They will do this because their goal is reaching the career they’re passionate about. While there are other students placed in the same situation that can discover the field they initially thought of going after might not be the right one for them. There is nothing wrong if this happens. It just allows students to find out what better suits them.

When sharing stories with other students, the class we usually struggle in common with is math. Math and I, from time to time, can be friendly towards one another yet we are never really friends. I’m a liberal arts and science major (LAS), currently in Pre-Calculus and will have to go up to Calculus 2 (1575), and what drives me is the fact that I need to pass these classes to get my degree. I’ve had moments where the problems on the board or pages look like hieroglyphs. When taking exams I can sometimes forget methods or even go blank. Yet, the moments that I do understand how to solve something it is one of the best feelings of accomplishment.

There is no shame in getting help. This applies to every subject. If I am unsure, confused or struggling with a topic, I can ask the professor during or after class, I can go to tutoring, study with friends, etc. What works best for me is doing the problems over and over and explaining how to get the answer to someone else. Repetition, writing and explaining help with remembering what steps to take to solve the problem and my thought process to getting there.

Humans Of City Tech

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“5 years from now I’ll be 26. I should be done with PA school by Gods grace. I should be engaged. thinking about getting married. And how far do I think I can get in life: Honestly I just want to get to the point where I’m comfortable with my life, doing what Love and hopefully After my PA I could continue and eventually get my MD.”
a young man sitting on stairs with fist in front of face
Kabir D Omolaja 

Virtues from Motherhood: A reminder about love

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Too often we find ourselves in toxic relationships, both men and women, and question how we let ourselves fall into this unhealthy pattern when we know better. Sometimes we’re able to tell other people the things they need to hear to be strong and pick up and move on but we cannot seem to grasp it in our own lives. In my own life and even that of the people close to me I’ve found such amazing people in some unfair situations but rather than write a traditional blog post about it I’m going to write an open ended list of what love is and I hope my readers will add to it. Also, always remember love starts with YOU, love yourself, love your body, love your strengths and weaknesses and love every day you wake up with the chance to shine!

LOVE IS,

Compassion

Understanding

Learning

Trust

Excitement

Sharing

Lazy Sundays with take out and TV

Enjoying one another without words

Forgiving imperfections

Helping one another grow

Good Morning notes

Bringing home their favorite snack after a bad day

Cuddles

Forehead kisses

Understanding their past without prejudice

Letting go of fear

Experiencing new things together

LOVE IS NOT,

Condescending

Judgmental

Controlling

Painful

One sided

Abusive

Ultimatums

Conditional

Stressful

 

Remember that no matter what you’re going through or what you’ve been through you deserve love. Love takes work, commitment and a desire to build with each other and most of all it takes time. Nevertheless there is never ever an excuse for love to consume you life in negative ways or to break you to the point of losing who you are. Love should be the harmony of two lives living side by side it is not a force that rules your life. Love is happy.

 

So tell me, what is love to you?

 

 

If you or someone you know is struggling visit halfofus.org for ways to help.

The Beauty of Sugar Sculptures

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Sugar is a centrical ingredient in the confectionary world. Being that I aspire to be a pastry chef, I am used to working with different types of sugar all the time. Each sugar can serve its own purpose in how it is utilized to create a particular dessert. There’s granulated cane sugar, turbinado sugar, light brown sugar, dark brown sugar, 10x sugar, pearl sugar, raw sugar, artificial sweeteners, and the list goes on. All of these sugar options are widely used to not only sweeten a dessert item but for its other properties as well. For instance when making sugar cookies, it is sometimes topped with granulated sugar and this is used to add crunch as well as more flavor to the cookies. If 10x sugar (also known as confectioner’s sugar) was used, it would essentially melt into the cookie causing it crackle.

a red basket made out of sugar

Image by: Brianna Vasquez

Sugar is so valued and readily used in the confectionary world that it is almost always present as an ingredient in every dessert. One of the most amazing ways that sugar is utilized is to create sugar sculptures. The art of creating sugar sculptures consist of composing the most elaborate artistic masterpieces that are completely made from sugar and its fellow derivatives. In order to make these sculptures that sugar must be broken down and heated to a high temperature to allow it to be molded or shaped into the desired appearance. The recipe for making pulled sugar is granulated cane sugar which is cooked with water and glucose which can also be substituted for high fructose corn syrup. Then, an acidic agent is added to prevent crystallization from occurring when it reaches the hard crack stage which occurs at 300 degrees which is when coloring can be added right before it comes off the heat to allow the water from the coloring to reduce.

a red basket filled with fruits made entirely out of sugar

Image by: Brianna Vasquez

Hot sugar is divided into three separate categories which are pulled sugar, blown sugar, and cast sugar. Pulled sugar is when the sugar has been cooked into a liquid and poured usually over a Silpat which is a silicone rubber mat. The sugar is then pulled and folded repeatedly to incorporate air into the sugar which helps it to have a shine instead of being opaque. The sugar can then be molded into a variety of designs or shapes. Blown sugar is essentially pulled sugar that is blown into a shape with the help of a rubber pump. A portion of the pulled sugar is wrapped around the end of a rubber pump which is usually made out of wood or metal. Then, air is slowly pumped into the sugar to avoid it from cracking. Then, when the desired shape is achieved, the blown sugar is placed under a cool fan to allow it to harden to the shape. Finally, cast sugar is still a form of pulled sugar in which the hot sugar liquid is poured into molds this allows the pieces to harden into a desired shape that will be used as a base platform to hold you showpieces that have been blown or pulled.

The Evolution Store

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The Evolution Store in SoHo is one of the weirdest, intriguing, and most unique stores I’ve ever had the pleasure of shopping at. It’s a store filled with science collectibles, natural hard-to-find artifacts from the depths of this earth, human skulls and other anatomical structures. It’s the kind of store I immediately told myself I’d be coming back to in the near future. Not only is it neatly packed with crystals, preserved animals and million year-old fossils for sale, but the employees are passionate and enthusiastic about their products, and are happy to teach potentials buyers the meaning or history of any given item. I can confirm that the skulls are real human skulls, and I almost cracked when I came seconds away from buying a handful of meteorite shards and moon rock (a sci-fi nerd’s dream purchase). Being in this store really feels like an adventure, and to think that this small store has both terrestrial and extraterrestrial objects just sitting on its shelves is really fascinating. It’s hard to give such a special store due credit in the form of words and images, so I highly suggest you spend a weekend downtown to stop by The Evolution Store, but here are a few images if what’s in store for your future visit.

a human skull an empty tortoise shell human skulls and bones

animal heads mounted on a wall Pyrite crystals

Life at Sea (Part I)

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This year I had the amazing opportunity to go on a cruise. Despite the wonderful thoughts of visiting islands and not having to fly on an airplane I still felt skeptical about the travelling by sea for seven days! Many of my friends have been on cruises before and shared their experiences with me. Confronting my fears saying that you’re so preoccupied with what you’re doing that “you don’t even feel the ship moving But! There is one day that the ship rocks a lot and you feel it. I even saw the juice in my glass moving.” So much for not being afraid huh?

Day one was the easiest, my friend was right, I didn’t even notice when the ship took off! The entertainment cast was doing their thing at the top deck, getting everyone amped up for 7 days of cruising. With free food all around the deck I thought to myself “well I guess this is not so bad after all”.

The evening came and the nightlife had just begun. With movie night screening in the outdoors on the top deck and a comedy show commencing hours later prepped you for that evening. Later on they had game shows and even a club you could attend.

The next day was a ‘day at sea’. Wondered to myself “how am I going to enjoy my day on a ship.” Woke up and got breakfast, later on went to the “adult retreat” and tanned for a bit. And by the afternoon I was out on the op deck in the jacuzzi watching the live game show with the entertainment cast. Two o’clock hit and I was already at my fifth drink! “This is the life” I thought to myself.

The next day I woke up in the beautiful island known as the Dominican Republic. Visited some historical landmarks by the ports and even got to visit a beach in Puerto Plata, Unfortunately my time there was short but the next  day I was arriving at St Thomas at 8am!
To be continued ….

The First Home of the Whitney Museum of American Art

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The concept of the Whitney Museum was birthed by a woman by the name of Gertrude Vanderbilt, aunt and adoptive mother of Gloria Vanderbilt who is the mother of Anderson Cooper. She was born into fame on January 9, 1875. With her lavish life, she financially wanted for nothing. But as she grew, she fell in love for the first time; with art. She loved sculptures and began to make her own. But a woman sculpting three-dimensional human figures was a radical concept in that era. Regardless of popular conception she studied at the Art Students League of New York, which was a prominent school for artists, in order to further develop her sculptural technique.

She married her Husband, Harry Whitney, on August 25, 1896. She was only 21 years old at the time. She wanted to marry someone that came from a wealthy family since that was the only way she would be certain that her spouse was not only in the relationship for her money. Harry Whitney was a descendant to Eli Whitney, inventor of the cotton gin. He was also a lawyer, horse-breeder, and heir to his family’s estate. The Whitney’s eventually had three children, biologically, within their time together until he unfortunately died in 1930; he was only 58 years old.

In 1914 the Whitney’s bought a studio which now resides in Greenwich Village. She, along with other artists, worked on their art and lived within those walls. The Rowhouses were built in the year of 1838 and then renovated into one big studio/residence by Auguste L. Noel. They commissioned him to merge three town-homes into one, giving respective spaces to each artist. In 1918 they also commissioned Robert Winthrop Chanler to redesign the interior of the building. He was responsible for a very artistic approach to a studio that had stained glass adorning the windows, a fireplace that was blazoned with bronze wispy flames that crept 20 feet up the wall touching the ceiling which was filled with mystical characters. It was a part of the Greenwich Village Historic District which was established in 1969 and it was later acknowledged as a National Historical Landmark in 1992 which ultimately saved it from being demolished.

The Whitney Museum moved four times in the concept’s lifetime, consecutively outgrowing itself. Tune in next week to see the next home that housed this beautiful and innovative idea of Art.

The ceiling in one of the studios. One can see deer and other creatures in this photograph.

A fireplace sculpted to resemble fire. The twirls and fury of the flames creep all the way up the chimney and extinguishes onto the ceiling.

The art selection is from the later works of artist, Wilbur Niewald.

Virtues from Motherhood: My work with the FYLC and OpenLab

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On March 3rd I attended the second of three workshops with the FYLC, this one about using the OpenLab as a tool in the classroom. The discussion ranged from technical to academic concerns, all while trying to bridge the gap between high school and college. At the last workshop the focus was the struggles incoming college students deal with but this time the focus shifted to how to get them involved and engaged in the classrooms. With me at this workshop were the some of the masterminds here at The Buzz, Jill Belli and Phil Kreniske, who helped the audience of professors and faculty, understand the benefits and best practices surrounding the OpenLab.

My portion of this workshop was centered around my use of the OpenLab, how it’s benefited me as a student and peer mentor and how professors can better use the OL to get students excited and engaged with the work. I use the OL for many tasks on campus, like right now as a blogger, but I also use it as a peer mentor to orchestrate and update the FYLC page and of course in my own courses. I love the OL and I love the uniqueness and open concept it represents, versus blackboard which is gray in more than one sense of the word. The OpenLab gives students control, a say in essence, that they don’t otherwise have with academic websites and that makes a world of difference for a student.

As a college student I’ve seen multiple websites and hosts for academia but the OL has got to be my favorite because it in a sense reminds me of a social media platform. It’s colorful and it’s easy to access and connect to my other go to apps. Students are already online, on their phones, so why not make a platform that works seamlessly with a students lifestyle because don’t forget the millennial era student has a much larger digital footprint than previous generations.

The Edible Artform

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representation of a pendulum by way of macarons

Image by: Matteo Stucchi

Baking is an artform, one that is never truly appreciated. The truth is that art is so subjective in that it can take place through many havens such as buildings, music, and paintings. But I find that the most talented of masterpieces are those that are edible and perhaps I am biased in the fact that I want to be a pastry chef. Still, to create the best desserts takes dedication, precision, and intricacy. It all begins with the simplest of ingredients such as sugar, flour, eggs and other items that are incorporated in such a way that it creates the delicate, rich, and delicious desserts. Pastry involves a certain elocution that culinary does not necessarily have in which you must follow every single instruction in the recipe in order to create the best product whereas in the culinary world, there is always room for adjustments and the addition of originality in terms of flavor concepts.

representation of construction workers placing pie dough on a pie

Image by: Matteo Stucchi

If even a single measurement or the temperature of the oven is incorrect, the entire baked item will be ruined. The pastry world is complex in that it requires a lot of patience and articulation to successfully create the most complicated desserts. The techniques that are often utilized convey the true talent that is paired with this artform. For instance, the technique of tempering is used when trying to incorporate eggs into a hot liquid usually milk. Tempering must be used in order to prevent the eggs from curdling or becoming scrambled into the liquid. Instead of adding the eggs all at once which will quickly cook the eggs, the hot liquid is slowly adding into the egg mixture in small portions to gradually incorporated the heat into the eggs so it won’t cook them when the egg mixture is heated enough the egg mixture is then added fully into the hot liquids to finish the cooking process. This is just one of the many techniques that is constantly used in the pastry world to make custards, pastry cream, pudding, or Crème Anglaise which is used as an ice cream base.

representation of a snow hill by way of meringues

Image by: Matteo Stucchi

Matteo Stucchi, a pastry chef from Sulbiate, Italy who is currently working at a catering company, enjoys making beautifully designed art with the addition of delicious pastries. He creates miniature worlds that are constructed with pastries as well as the use of toys to allow these worlds to look like a realistic scene. His goal is to show that food itself is artistic and should be viewed in that way. He feels that when food is suggested as being an art, it is only in culinary practices not confectionary so he is utilizing his Instagram platform to convey that pastries can be artistic as well just as anything else in the confectionary world.