Sometimes you are surrounded by, let’s face it, ugliness.

As part of our multi-week transition between California and New York, my family spent a week in what I have deemed “the pet hotel,” a pet-friendly hotel in Midtown that welcomed our cat, Foxy, who was in shock after her flight. For my husband, these accommodations were an upgrade, as he had spent the previous week alone with Foxy in our empty rental house in San Carlos, sleeping on the dusty floor. Sure, the pet hotel had beds, and actual furniture. But who, and what, had previously occupied that furniture? The carpet was rough and stained. The air conditioner was loud and broken. The place had an odd smell, but if we opened the windows, Foxy freaked out from the constant sirens and traffic and would hide under the couch for hours. Her temporary litterbox consumed all the air. When I sat on the couch, I put a sheet down first. I was grateful for the shelter and that we were all together as a family. Beyond that, I was having trouble finding beauty in the place.

So I made some. I searched the kitchen (there was a kitchen!), and found three tools: a plastic cutting board, a pot, and a butter knife. These would do. The summer tomatoes and green beans and potatoes and radishes and eggs from the farmers’ market in what would be our new town wanted to be a Niçoise salad, nourishing and colorful and textured and pretty much the opposite of its pet hotel surroundings. I foraged some olives and tuna and mustard and lemon and olive oil and decent salt and ok pepper from the store across the street. The beans and potatoes and eggs each took turns boiling in the single pot, scooped out of the pot with a fork and spoon and dried on a towel since there were no tongs and no colander. The butter knife with the right amount of pressure managed to slice and dice what I needed it to. I felt resourceful, like I was willing the simple tools I had to step up and do more than they had been asked to before.

We ate around the space-saving booth-table together. It was beautiful and it was enough.