“Why is there rice in my salt shaker?” she said. That is how it all started. 45 years ago this week, my friend and soulmate Liz Hudson came to UCLA from Sanger, CA to experience the “big city" and experience it she did...teaching us all how to party and see the sites much better than her dorm mates had ever done in their own city! The rest, as they say, is our history.
We could not have been more different but our irrational exuberance about life in general and our deep belief in honesty, integrity and generosity kept us connected all these years. So how do two women who grew up in totally different environments, and returned to those environments after college, see the world through such a similar lens? For me there was romance in farming and that was her heritage for five generations in California’s San Joaquin Valley. I learned and continue to learn so much about our natural resources, what it takes to feed us, what it means to be at the mercy of mother nature and much more. When we meet in Sanger next Monday, we will discuss all of these issues through the lens of our friendship, which at the end of the day is what matters most.
Michela O'Conor Abrams is the Founder of MOCA+