The Infertile Gourmet

Adventures In Pee-sticks

Rule number one for people in the world dealing with infertiles is:  Thou shall not keep the infertile from her pee-stick.  It is as if the Gods came down and presented this oracle to the masses of women to answer thine most important question: Am I pregnant?

The answer might be an inevitable "no" but low and behold that does not keep us drooling, crazed, testing zealots away from our purgatory...the white throne where we shall dance our dance and reach our denoument of drama.

Where shall I begin with my week of adventures in the collection and use of thy stick?

Monday, three weeks into my birth control pills, I decided to test.  Quit laughing. I had all the symptoms: sore breasts, nausea, headaches, bloat, and uummmm desire.  Yes, I know I do google and I am educated.  Yes, I do in fact know that those are symptoms of the pill indeed but it would be my luck to get knocked up on birth control because that would be ironic.  So I tested. 

I hunted down a latent test that was stored away in a maxi pad box away from my patrolling husband..he would have no reason to look there.  He may have sent me back to the clinic if he knew I had possession of the illegal stick.  I digress.  So I locked the door and climbed upon the throne and whipped out the weapon to catch it's liquid master.  Of course the damn thing was a dud.  Can I just say the horror of the dud pee stick?  It is where the desired pink color does not move across the peep-show window.  My pee-stick was infertile. 

Fuck I shouted in my quiet rage because who was I going to bitch about this one to.  My husband has spies out for me and keeps tabs on my pee stick activity.  In my anger I pried open the plastic cartridge of Fact Plus...ladies hear that  FACT PLUS....and vowed to not let it get away with it's sinister plans of collaboration with my husband not to work.  I essentially hijacked and pillaged the cartridge with my nails.  I then squeezed urine over the strip to force it to do what it was supposed to do. 

I left the little fucker torn up, exposed and nude in the bathroom stall and stormed out to go yell at whoever I saw first.  I actually forgot to check it.

Fast forward to shower time.  I noticed the stick out of the corner of my eye and thought oh what the hell lets inspect it.  Two lines.  What?  Two lines.  What?  I said two lines.

I stared dumbfounded at the abused stick.  I called my sponsor er um my husband in to look. He looked at it to verify that I had seen what I thought I had seen because you know why would I trust my eyes.  He saw it.  With a calm and strong facade he said he would not believe that until I took another one.  I thought it was a mistake from the abuse that I had created.  I quickly dug out another one from the hidden stash.

The non-abused one was du du du dun......

Negative.

To make sure the testing was done correctly and we had a proper control group I retested before writing the conclusions on this blog.  Negative again. 

Moral of the story: Push those little sticks around enough and those bitches will give you what you want.

In order to replenish my stock in peesticks for my bomb shelter I made a dash to the pharmacy section of my presumed innocent grocery store trip.  Undercover as a grocery buyer I knew no one would be the wiser.  I searched far and wide for those elusive and colorful boxes filled with my drug.  Getting nervous that I would not fulfill my much needed fix I conjured horrible stories like the grocery store does not carry the peestick.  Another story was that they hid them to mess with us infertiles.  And the crazyest one was only thought up because I was fiending so much...I had a psychotic notion that there never was such a thing as the peestick.  It was all made up in my head.  I shook myself silly in the cotton ball aisle, slapped myself a few times in the hosiery aisle while admittingly picturing myself hanging suicide wise with said hosiery, and finally in the shampoo aisle I knocked some sense into myself and made a plan.

I was going to ask the two ladies at the pharmacy counter.

Yes, I would brave them knowing and finding out about my habit.  I would venture forth a turn a new leaf.  I was out baby!  I was taking this by the nose and saying..."Hi my name is Alex and I would like to buy  a pregnancy test".

I marched up to the counter with sweaty palms and confidently on the outside, despite shaking insides, stepped forward in the line and asked if where were the pregnancy tests.  Oh ladies if you could have seen me....you would be so proud.  I asked like a fertile who had the right to take one.  I asked like I was about to bring forth 2.4 kids and a dog.  I asked like I was the shit. 

The nice and unsuspecting pharmacy lady said "oh they are actually behind the counter here because people steal them." 

I replied in an all knowing way "It must be those crazed infertiles who take them". 

She laughed and said "Do you want to come around the corner and look through the window at them?"

With pure joy only an infertile pee stick whore could muster I skipped to look at my bounty.  I almost gave myself away when I too quickly said "I'll take the cheapest two in the box ya got."

She began to read off the choices and I cut her off knowing my preferred drug of choice.  She began to hand me the box and I again too quickly said in almost a nervous loud voice "NO, I will have two boxes." 

Confused by her role in some unknown drama she tried explaining that there were two in each box.  Almost cutting her off again my fake confidence was eroding and way too quick I said I know. 

Oh My was her reply.  Shit the cat was out of the bag.

Guilt took over and I started explaining and tripping over my usual eloquent words.  "I take alot of tests..one can never take too many when they are infertile....I know it is crazy but some people go skiing for fun or play hockey but this is what I like to do for fun....is that so wrong?  I am an addict OK?"

There I had said the truth.  As I walked out of the pharmacy I looked back at the scene of the crime....those two ladies were laughing.

In my glory of being the proud new mother of four whole tests I skipped home to take one.

The third story involves an unlikely character in my pee stick adventures.  Gary the next door neighbor.

In hearing at the Shabbos dinner table of my problems with peesticks he made the most joyous offer....his line of work which is medical testing has boxes and boxes of tests and he volunteered to give me a whole box.  I screamed and laughed and jumped around in my seat clapping my hands like a little girl getting a puppy for christmas.  After the squealing commenced I told Gary he was my hero.  I started flirting and twirling my hair at Gary.  Trust me, I would never usually commit this act but gee willikers this was a whole BOX of tests.

Later on after the party left David asked me "So now how do you feel about Gary?" 

I said he was my hero and started singing I need a hero...duh dunn du dunn du duuuu He's got be strong....ya know the rest. 

Moral of this story:  Allies in a war join the fight when you least expect it they consist of people one would least expect to fight side by side.

My battle cry:  FUCK INFERTILITY!!!

Bloated, Bitchy, and Weepy Cook For Hire

Does anyone else want a piece of me?  Are you looking at me?  Yeah you.  You got a problem?  Cause if you do well...sob sob sob...My life sucks.  My dogs ripped up another toilet paper roll and then finished up with dessert on some paper towels.  AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!  When are you coming home David?  You are working to much and I resent you for having a cush job in a pretty building, pretty people, and what really pisses me off is that you get to drive the "nice" car and I get the work vehicle.  WWhhhhaaaaaaahhhhhh stop chewing on my glasses doggy.  My life stinks and I am overwhelmed because my dog ate my glasses.  I am going to kill the contractor!!!  Fight ensues with him leaving and walking out on me like he was a husband  ...domestic contractual abuse anyone?  More piss to clean up off the floor.  When in the hell is the cleaning lady coming to cleaning this fucking house?  I hate everyone.  Everything makes me cry.  Last birth control pill will be taken tomorrow night...two more months of this to follow. Help!  I am crazy!

This is how fast my brain has been firing from anger, to murder, to crying, back to anger, weepy, and then rinse, lather, repeat.  I do not do well on artificial hormones.  Come to think of it I could do away with all hormones.  Sanity is a rare commodity in the Gourmet's kitchen these days.  I chop off the heads of cabbage with gusto.  I slice open that mean and annoying watermelon.  I mince garlic passionately.  I knead that fucking dough like it is the neighbors I hate.  No love in this food.  Only tears and anger come out of me these days.

I have two more months of this lunacy.  Then, I get to up the ante and be admitted once the real drugs kick in for the IVF.  I highly doubt that I will be one of those women who float through without the craziness attacking me left and right.  I may not make it.

If I am gone for more than a week from here on out...check the papers because I may have commit murder.

The Mexican Dodgeball Game

Did any of you read one anothers comments?  Has anyone installed a Trojan horse on my computer to check my emails?  Because I found one today on my Mistress (my affectionate name for my high-tech lover....at least she and I use protection).  If it was one of you out there be sure that I will find out by the trail of bad eggs you left.  Bad joke. You win some you lose some.  Everyone asked the same question: What about Mexico?

My life has been like dodgeball the last two years.  First I got picked for the wrong team and was picked last.  Then I got creamed quick  by getting knocked upside the head rather than the uterus.  The last few years have been ...well..shit.  My husband, the talented creature that he is, could not find a job despite his quality education with a master's degree and cute buns.  I mean come on who in the world except for us who have cute buns could not get a job?  Anyhoo, my eggs have been unemployed as well.  Not one sperm even gave them an interview.   Accompany these major obstacles with a few deaths including the tragic stand in of a child who was named Curry (my beloved dog who did not play life dodgeball well enough to avoid the big truck that hit her).  I will not even bother to name the myriad of nuisances that the whole game has held for us.  Yes, I am grateful for the husband and yes, I am grateful for our successful real estate business but aside from these two things this game has sucked.

When life throws curveballs you know you are in the wrong game.  So back to dodgeball.  We thought we would get out of dodge and start a new life.  We tried so many things to get a new job, stir up our life in St Louis, and fucked enough to get an entire herd of cattle pregnant (omit the cows from the fucking it was just us..if that is uncomfortable to picture then do not but remember my husband has cute buns!) that we thought we had turned over every last stone.  Hence our desired departure from a city that held nothing.

My mother has said that my Dad and I have one thing in common...We fall in shit and come out smelling like a rose.  That has been true my whole life.  Things got tough and I fought back and won.  Or I gave up the fighting eventually and life turned the problem upside down.  We were committed to moving to Mexico.  We were selling our present buildings and buying more to make a comfortable living once we were resting my flat buns and his cute buns on a sandy beach. What has happened is an unforeseen last minute pull-out.  The universe has switched our plans.  Maybe we were not done with this city like we thought.  The plan now is to set our lives up as if we are moving to Mexico.  We are acting on the same plan except we are going to buy a new house here until we do move. 

Dodgeball games go fast.  We have started a new game but do not know how long this one will last.  It is odd because this job is almost too perfect.  It is everything that my husband is.  It is a perfect mold.  He is already thriving there one week into his job.  We expect the bottom to drop out any moment and when it does Mexico here we come. 

I realized today that there is one good thing about being low in the dumps: when you were as low as we were you expect the shit of life but now that things are going so well we are excited  about our new found life and are afraid of losing it.  It is like the song lyrics by Janis Joplin..."freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose".  We have something to lose and if we do we are ready but for now we will live in the moment and see where this game goes.

No timeline.

Timelines get us into trouble.  Expecting what will happen and assuming the door that will be open tomorrow is silly.  So silly.  Foolish humans planning the stars.

A migraine missile hit me yesterday.  I should have known we would have massive storms tonight.  Thunder and heavy downpours clogged the windows view.  It reminded me to get out there and enjoy the rain.  I grabbed David, threw the dogs on a leash, and strolled outside to do the Gourmet's rendition of Singing In The Rain.  David hung back and did not jump into the river that was now three inches deep.  Lots of water..if I had had a canoe oh the places I could have gone.  I yelled at him over the wind and the pounding rain to come on and play.  He said that there was lightning.  I yelled back "Tempt fate". 

After the rain settled down to a boring drizzle we decided to finish up the wet evening in the pool which was now warmer than the outside air.  Once we were in the pool David asked why I said to tempt fate.  I replied that if we avoid fate it finds us. 

He faded on me then and said he needed to get inside to get to sleep. 

For months now I have been getting responsible David to say fuck it to responsibility in preparation for Mexico.  Now his other side is coming back..the workaholic David.  I am a bit nervous.  I like him carefree.  I also like him to be happy. Tonight he had a conference call at 11:00 pm to Korea.  Family time.  In three weeks he is going to Israel.  Tomorrow morning at 7:00 am he has another conference call. 

My dream home is around the corner and a relaxed life is fading on the road behind me.  I know I can turn around anytime and head back to the relaxed life.  For now we are headed on another road and who knows when I will get back.

I cook alot with bittersweet chocolate.  When cooking hot chocolate I use real milk, a pinch of cayenne, a sliver of cinnamon and a hunk of chocolate.  If I put too little bittersweet chocolate in the cooking milk it lacks boldness  and if I put too much it gets clumpy and rests at the bottom of the cup.  If I use milk chocolate it taste plain funky.  There is a secret and talent at getting it right. 

Exclamation Points!!!!!!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!Lots of these!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Has anyone seen office space?  Uummmmmmm Yeeahhhhhhh.  David got a job!!!!!!!!!!  A real one.  The kind that he actually will use the knowledge he learned in school.

If David had invented a job for himself this would be it.  It is for a start up company that is backed by the mother company in Japan.  He, most importantly, likes the people he is working with.  He has usually worked in an international environment with people of all backgrounds consequently he can say greetings to all of the people  in the world in their language.   Rumor has it he can say hi in Martianese.  All of the people he will be working with are from other countries...a position he is most comfortable.

Second he will be travelling to Asia, Israel, and other places as a requirement for the job.  Cool.  Totallly rad dudes.

Third it is on the top end of the pay scale he was wanting.

Fourth he is officially middle management. I am going to buy him a Lumberger coffee cup.  I already told him no Lumberger sex..because ewwwwww it was gross enough in the movie.   He has two..count it ...two people under him.  He did not even have to knock down his cubicle wall and tell the consultants that the whole company was shit.  You know why?  Because at this company there are noooo cubicles!

In order to prepare my working man for the white collar world again (we have been working hard on our buildings fixing, painting, scraping, and grunt work) we went to get manicures and pedicures this morning.  David had never had one and he loved them!  He says he is going to go every month.  Next month he is bringing his friend Nadeem for a guys day out! LOL ...man that cracks me up. 

After my toes were purple and his were painted clear we skipped over to the Galleria for more girly things like shopping for new clothes for him (my my he is dashing in brooks brothers jackets rawwwrrrrrrr) and then us girls had lunch. 

Tonight he had dinner with everyone at the company  and is on his way home.  The second piece of good news is while he was at dinner we got an offer on one of our rental properties!!!! Closing should be no problemo  because the buyer's mother is vice-president of a bank!  Now how is that for luck. 

I hear the garage door opening...I gotta go tell David more good news and that the world is spinning on a new axle.  Damn if I were not on birht control I would dare think I would get knocked up!

(Damn I an idiot...axis...stupid....axis..not axle...Oy!)

Shabbot Revenge

The last post had entirely too many of these!!!!!!!!!!!  It was sooooo annoying!!!!!!!!  That post was a little to up for my dark clothes wearing, poetry writing, deeply contemplative, college-age identity called Dra.  She is way too cool to tolerate so much positive BS and looks down upon anyone who goes Pollyanna.  To suit Dra and make up for the last post I am going to do a Shabbot Slam instead of a Shabbot Shalom...

Every friday night (you know the Jewish thing) we make a decadent dinner and open the door for any friendly walk-in.  We co-host this shindig  with our pals next door who are Jewish Go Pestalozzi Hebes...that is our gang.  My friend Chasmyn , one  of the many drop-ins rotating in the gang moved to Oregon last year.  The problem that I have tonight is that she found a new Jewish gang.   We are pissed!  Oops  no exclamation mark....We are very deeply disturbed an honorary member of the tribe would try to join a West Coast sect of the Hebes. 

Tonight she writes in her blog that she is going to eat Shabbos dinner with this gang.  Cheater. Traitor.   Retliation is a necessary part of gang life.  Here is a list from the gourmet what we Pestalozzi Hebes had for our dinner:

First I made my Vegetarianos Tostados that I stole from Hotel Paraiso in Zihuat.  Second, I made homemade flan soaked in a carmelized sugar syrup.  Third I handmade fresh tortillas with my tortilla press that I smuggled through three airports underneath four kilos of coffee.  I cooked them on the grill with an apple wood for flavor.  In addition I used some of this masa to make pinched-end quesadillas with swiss and cheddar cheese....also on the grill.  Cate brought spanish rice...YUM.  For beverages I found some choice bud-Jamaica pronounced Hahm-ai-ka.  Jamaica is a red flower bud that is boiled and then cold water and sugar are poured into a pitcher.  Mexican healthy Kool-aid. 

My recipe for the evening:  Grilled Poblanos

8 Poblanos

1/2 cup sour cream

salt

1 onion

1/2 stick of butter 

Cook onions until transparent in the butter.  Grill poblanos over a grill (really good if you soak a special type of wood like mesquite or apple in water and put over the hot coals to create smoke)  until the outsides are charred.  Peel off the charred skin and slice in strips.  Put strips in pan with onions and cook for ten minutes.  Add sour cream after the heat is turned off.  Delicioso filling for homeade tortilla.

Gourmet Tip Of The Day:  When cooking vegetables add salt in the beginning so it melds the flavors together.  Adding it at the end often makes the cook use too much because the flavors were not staged.

Now, Chasmyn, you are lucky that we did not commit the instant death blow to you....no Gary Challah.  Trader Joes Challah instead.  Oh, but there is one more thing.....HA HA HA HA  I made homeade Salsa Verde....Neiner Neiner Neiner. 

Yo Biatchhh ya wanna eat with the West side Hebes...that is fine but us Pestalozzi Hebes.  Just dont be showin your face here again!!!  (well really ..we reallly realllly miss having you here and I wish you would come to town to visit..maybe we Pestalozzi and Westerners can unite...instead of wandering through gang warfare for forty years.)

Your Bi-Polar Infertile Here

Ok, so do you all remember when David thought he had that job that provided IVF coverage?  Yeah, and it did not work out?  Right, so well we kept our appointment with Dr Silber anyway which was on the fifth.

Ok so I am presently on birth control pills!  Do you infertile's know what that means?  Alex is on the IVF roller coaster.  We are sitting in the office feeling like everything felt right as if we were supposed to be there.  Do I think it will work? No.  I am not that naive.

I generally live my life with the question in mind of "If I do not do this will I regret that I did not?"  I know that when I am eighty years old and sitting on that front porch I would have kicked my wrinkled butt if I had not taken this chance.  Money...I will not care about that in fifty years.  I had to do this.  Again, I think it might work only a little. 

My bi-polar ways of whether to adopt, do IVF, or let Hope stay in my bedroom and paint the walls a natural color has been a challenge for me and an annoyance for my readers because I am in half a dozen possible categories on their blogs.  Is there a cure for a bi-polar infertile?  I think so...take the chance when it presents itself.  That is what I am doing. 

Cheers to me and the right to become an infertility drug junkie! 

You all know the cliche story of "that couple tried for years and years..went through all of those infertility treatments finally adopted and bam!  Knocked up!"  right?  I have  a reason why straight from the RE's mouth:  Why am I infertile?  Dr Silber says that  (now cut me some slack here I am going to chop this to bits...he explained it much better)  I have too many eggs!  Yes, I said too many eggs.  Woman like I who have too many eggs often have irregular cycles and too many follicles that never finish their climb up ovulation mountain.  When they are young their infertility seems to be non-existent.  Once they get older like around 35 they start to become fertile because their eggs have diminished to a normal amount.  These woman stay fertile into their forties and go through menopause much later than the average fertile.  So now there is a medical reason why fertility can happen for an infertile later on after all the adoption and medical treatment proving that it is not just about "relaxing"!!!!! 

I know several woman who could not get pregnant in their younger years but once they hit 35 or 40 did finally have that child.  One woman finally had a child at 48 which is a fabulous story that I have been meaning to tell.  I do not want to wait that long. I want it now. 

I am pleased that Dr Silber did not recommend going through IUI and like treatment because people with my problem often cannot go through with it because too many eggs are created thus can-celling the cycle.  My research has told me that next step would be IVF and he confirmed that. 

Adoption would be fine as well but who would pass our homestudy without "proper" jobs.  That leaves us to my own eggs and my own uterus.  Paris and Nicole (my ovaries)  are going to have to go to rehab.  Ohhh poor babies. 

Finally after so much time in limbo we are jumping off a cliff.  Stay tuned.

Hands Today, Gone Tomorrow

Once upon a time in the land of Ovulation (Mexico) I would sit my immature retired derriere on the lounge chairs of Paraiso which was  a hotel/restaurant on Playa La Ropa.  My favorite snack to eat as I grazed for eight hours was the Tostado Vegetarianos.  Made from a crisp tortilla with beans on top and then piled high with grated jicama, betebel (which I later to find out was beet), and carrot.  Resting on top like a mountaineer upon his mountain of vegetables was  a decadent amount of crema (sour cream that went to college), avocado, and queso cotija.  Cotija is an older crumbly cheese aged beautifully in a cheese nursing home.  The finale was the river that ran from the mountain of salsa mexicana...chunky goodness mixture of tomato, onions, little baby limes (god damn fruit is not even infertile), cilantro, and the popular veggy the chili...no salsa parties without the chili have ever occurred in the history of salsa.

For dinner this is what I made.  The problem that became evident was what to do with the leftover beet greens and stems?  My sensibilities would be highly offended if I had let them rot in the fridge like I usually do pulling them out two weeks from now cursing about "What the fuck is that smell?  Oh shit I let good food go to waste.  Dammit." Soup always being the obvious I set to create an easy and fast side.  I am a soup slut anyway.  If I were put on a dessert (note the spelling)  island and I could only pick one kind of food it would be soup.  I crave, no I need it bad like a junkie to his fix.

The following is the make shift recipe:

What The Fuck To Do With These Beet Greens Soup?

1 pile of stems and leaves of beets

1 tablespoon of butter

5 to 10 cloves of garlic depending on whether you or your husband finds garlic breath sexy...we think garlic is an aphrodisiac and with all of this forced sex for infertility we need all the help we can get.  If one of you does not find garlic sexy refrain from the higher amount and possibly only use 2 to 3

2 small onions or one large

2 to 4 leftover what the hell am I gonna doing with this squash.  I use a green speckled squash found in international grocery stores but regular old green squash would work as well.

1 teaspoon of oregano

2 to 4 tablespoons of grapeseed oil.

2 tablespoons of that leftover tomato paste from last night

5 cups of vegetarian chicken broth or well the reg if you eat meat

juice of five baby limes or if you are sensitive to anything "baby" then use the juice of on adult lime

salt and pepper to taste

Cut up squash and onions.  Put on baking sheet and pour on some salt, pepper, the grapeseed oil, half of the lime juice, and the oregano. Broil on high for about 20 minutes or until the edges of the veggies are browning.

In a large saucepan melt the butter and add the stems of the beet into it.  A few minutes later add the cut up garlic cooking a few more minutes.  Then add the leaves and chicken stock cooking until it is tender. 

Mix the roasted veggies and the saucepan ingredients together and add the water cooking for another five minutes.  Add the rest of the lime juice.  Mix all ingredients in the blender.  Eat!

I really enjoy cooking from simple dishes to challenging 10 course meals.  Cooking is like a sixth sense to me.  Creating nourishment for a hungry belly or junk for an evening of snacking debauchery snakes through my gut demanding the obedience of my mind to create and my body to test.  I must feed people!  Eat!  I am a Jew for god sakes.

Stereotyping aside, there is a latent need to feed my flock; the people around me who I love.  Knowing that others enjoy a simple drop in on the spur of the moment coffee and modicum snack to a formal invitation to the palaces of the gourmet for feasting and dining upon her delicacies (food people..food not those delicacies ...save that for they gynos) pleases a deeper part of my existence.  My mind creates food and comfort through its abilities. 

The whole process of cooking connects me to the feminine side that I so desperately long for and feel is missing.  Cooking begins with purchasing and choosing the ingredients. My love for foreign markets begin with the necessity to purchase fresh everyday in a non-sterile environment.  From Paris's markets filled with its fresh chevre and special cantaloupes, to Egypt with its exotic spices, to Mexico's markets filled with chilies of all kinds and guavas I remember a deeper part of myself. Shouting, bikes, lovely smells, bright flowers, kids, dogs, special shipments of blood oranges, bustling busy people walking to and fro, a mess of squash falls to the floor, locals honey sits upon the make-shift shelves and honeys stand in the aisles kissing and shopping and loving, hot breezes and cold wintery chills, colorful fruit, and unidentified vegetables makes for a grand bouquet for the senses.  Life has centered around the market for many, many years.

When I walk those aisles I feel like every woman who came before me.  A woman who is vulnerable. A woman who is loving. A woman who wants bountiful meals for her family.  A woman who with her feminine hands chooses the flesh of her meal.  All of the woman who came before me from the matronly woman in her long petticoats to the naive and delicate woman who was recently married share a common bond....timeless bond.  We are creators. 

My hands are identical to my Grandmother Nellie.  Short fingers, chubby, strong, nails that tap loudly on surfaces, and pretty skin that says we are women who will protect our family, nourish them, and in lean times will work so hard.  We are the type of woman who hold babies delicately and who can run the farm if we have to.  I loved my grandma.  I miss her.

Do I dare dream of a day that a grandaughter of mine has these hands.  I can picture her in some market purchasing food for her family, rushing to pick up a loaf of hot bread, dashing to her favorite cheese stand, and carrying a heavy load of purchases to feed that generation.  I am probably no longer on the planet but my hands, the hands that fed my loved ones today, carry on their duty tomorrow.