ABOUT US

Meet Melissa…

I grew up with two coffee makers, one for coffee (mostly Bustelo on drip) and the other for black tea (Mate Leao, always). Even though I drank coffee throughout my life I had a stint where I only drank matcha after having my son.

I’m run on sentence held together by rituals of self-discovery and fluid creativity. I have always been a consistent coffee and tea drinker. I am a creationary, mixed child of a single mother who emigrated from Brasil in 1980 to Tongva aka Los Angeles. I am a mother to an amazing 10 year old, and have been in and out of the service industry the majority of my life. I left the automotive industry at the beginning of the pandemic and like most people in forced isolation, went in search of what inspires me and brings me joy.

I kept coming back to my earliest memories of childhood in search of what makes me…me. Watching the fluid mechanics of the deep earthy color of coffee that would drip into my milk, just enough to change the color and flavor after begging for it to be added to my bottle as a small child.

I noticed that the majority of my memories included coffee in one way or another. So many memories centered around the daily functions of my small immigrant family that always began with coffee and tea, bread and butter, rice and beans, cheese and guava. My childhood memories are a symphony of machines percolating, smells of coffee, tea, burnt sugar in the air, the crunching of bread, and the fights me, my sister, and my cousins would get into for the solidified crumbles of coffee-soaked leche nido that lingered in the bottom of my uncles cup on Sundays. I even transitioned into preparing my mother’s espresso shots before night shifts at one point.

As my journey of coming home to myself has become more solidified, I invite you to join my tending the proverbial soil for what I hope to be a budding community.

Welcome to my Ritual, to future reflections of today’s memories of realities aligned with love and intention.