NO Rose All Day

Part 2: The Faunt’s Guide to Radical Hospitality

Feb 07, 2025

Now, Back to Diet Coke

I love everything about it, sipping it through a straw like it's summer—year round.

The cold metal smashed against your palm, that perfect first sip of bubbles. Ahh, *chef's kiss.* Instant relief—like ice cubes (played by actual ice cubes) during Natalie's I love-hate my mom, I'm having a baby, scene from Season 3, Episode 2 of The Bear.

Also, it's trashy, fabulous, and grown, all at once—just like a Real Auntie Housewife.

Even the can is its own moment—silver with cherry-red lettering, that tiny-ish cursive "Diet" floating above COKE. NO SUGAR, NO CALORIES the bottom of the can promises in 14-point font (I'm guessing), which is ridiculous, really, because let's face it, a can of Diet Coke has about as much nutritional value as Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. That's not why we're sipping. We're here for the bubbles and the aspartame, baby. Because what's true of Diet Coke is what's also true of Coke, American Coke—not Mexican Coke, you can't beat the feeling.

Know what else is a feeling? Hospitableness. And let's face it, in this weird lonely, complicated, anti-social, IDGAF about the coup, sober-curious era of America, how does one properly hostess soirées when every guest has different needs and relationships with alcohol?

The OG Faunt: Melba's Guide to Radical Hospitality

Fortunately, I learned radical hospitality1 from the best of the best: a woman named Melba.

Uncle Bud (my mother’s brother) and mom (Melba) in Oakland, CA circa 50s or 60s.

Yes, my mother. IYKYK. As a writer, wife, and hostess, she basically welcomed and introduced every South African arriving in the U.S. in the 1960s to the world.

And by world, I mean New York City.

As a cultural activist, political organizer, educator, neighbor, connector, single parent, faunt, sister, daughter, niece, and friend, my mother's radical hospitality was a vibe.

Every space she inhabited (our home, your home, and what urbanists call third-spaces) was a Dark Tower of beauty, creativity, no-nonsense, and play.

In other words, an experience.

She did it with her peers as well as young people.

On Saturdays, for example, she ran "Mornings," a class in our apartment. The children of my aunties and uncles (friends of the family) and I learned about jazz. My favorite part—the red carpet she laid out made of Reynolds aluminum foil.

She offered the same warmth to artists and comrades visiting internationally. In high school, for example, I mom gave up my bed so South African photographer and activist Rashid “Jumping Jack Flash” Lombard could hone his craft with American photographer Eli Reed at Magnum Photos in NYC during the summer of 1986.

Me, mom and Uncle Rashid circa 1986. Studio Museum in Harlem, NYC. Reception for acclaimed South African photographer Peter Magubane.

Know what else many South African artists and activists of this period are notorious for? Besides galvanizing American support for the African National Congress of South Africa (ANC), a “terrorist organization” aligned with the South African Communist party during the Cold War? Centering art as a cultural weapon? Bringing international attention to the atrocities of South Africa’s apartheid regime? If you guessed freeing and liberating oceans of brown liquor and beer from liquor cabinets and bars throughout Lusaka, Dar Es Salaam, Havana, Moscow, the GDR, Morogoro, London, Luanda, Maputo, the Bronx, Jersey, and Manhattan—brava!!

Even now it still bugs me out how my mother, a Black American woman married to a Black South African man, my father, in her 20s, and who remained entrenched within the community—one of her many chosen families—after their break-up in her 30s, didn't begin drinking alcohol until her 40s.

Which also basically proves that being a woman over 40 in America—just like in the 1980s—requires a little something to take the edge off and keep showing up.

Then, as now, for her and my aunties, that meant living: making art, making noise (activism), sharing ideas, having sex, dressing to the nines, having fun, engaging in meaningful conversation, cultivating beauty, having house parties, dinner parties and brunches with cool people, cool music, Freixenet, Lancer's, Stolichnaya, Amaretto diSaronno, OJ, and General Foods International Coffee.

It doesn't always seem that way, but we've come a long way, babes.

Still, we rise. Still, we fight. Still, we imagine, reimagine, remain hopeful, and curious. And now, unlike then, there are also boxing gyms, meditation apps, and cat videos to relieve cornball societal pressures about beauty, body image, ~~aging~~ living, and success.

Memory.

As I’m writing this sentence, my mind is recalling a xerox copy of a print of a photo. One of my besties, Tracy, sent it to me a couple of years back. It's me and mama when she was in hospice. Still, the consummate hostess and doer—she's giving pure elegance: a white shirt—collar up, pearls, blackberry on her lips and nails. The look out of her eyes, twinkles—my first high.

Since Day 1, that's been my mission in life: cultivating sparkles in people's eyes. It screams joy and connection. Also I love attention—the good kind. Sparkles soothe, they’re my spirit’s au natural mood stabilizers.

So in honor of sparkles, and this sparkly week—the 5th was MJK Day, Melba’s birthday (Happy Birthday!!)—and aunties, faunts, and othermothers everywhere, those who care, and don’t, about the surgeon general’s warning—here's to igniting magic.

Making Magic: Your Turn

Radical hospitality isn't about what's in the cup. It's about making people feel seen, welcomed, and acknowledged.

So grab a 12-pack of Diet Coke (my eternal ride-or-die) for your for real sober guests. Serve yesterday’s curated zero-proof bevs for the "I'm taking a break" folks, your younger guests, or yourself.

Let's keep it real—the drink is just the start, a gesture.

Hospitality is soulful—in many ways, an innate quality. It can also be cultivated. For the faunts who've forgotten, what you waiting for?

Be the light. Attract more light. Curate light. Flash your pearly whites (or yellows) in a mirror. Finish your lipstick application with lip pencil. Show up for your next eye-brow threading in sequins. Wear stripper glitter to your next political meeting. Send star emojis. Go grocery shopping in an evening gown or tuxedo.

Sparkles are hospitable for both yourself and others.

To quote my grade school’s motto, “Go forth unafraid.”

Be fauntastic.

We got this.

The Faunt by Ipeleng Kgositsile

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