FRIENDS AROUND A TABLE

Bread: so you never know hunger

Salt: so that life may always have flavor

Sugar: so that your life shall always be sweet

A typical Scandinavian housewarming gift includes these three simple ingredients. Recently, a friend with Scandinavian roots presented me with these items. Her gift made me think about the importance of our friendship and how those same ingredients are universal and underappreciated until they are not available. The Scandinavians have it right in providing basic food as a gift.

This week, a group of longtime friends gathered together for lunch on a California day of brilliant sunshine and not too hot weather. We sat outside in the arbor-covered patio and talked about our families, our activities, and our commitments to righting wrongs. We all belong to AAUW, a women's organization founded in 1880 by Marion Talbot, who was a champion of women's education and empowerment when college education was widely considered detrimental to women's health. Talbot began the long AAUW tradition of supporting women's equality and rights. Our group and the women of today benefited from the actions of women before us who advocated for our rights. First, all of the group are college graduates. We have been teachers, mothers, and community leaders.

We have learned to support each other in whatever way we each choose to express our opinions. Some of us attended the protest marches in various towns near us on June 14. Some of us write, email, and call our representatives about issues that are important to us. We have also learned ways to find quiet moments in our daily lives, whether by spending time with family, traveling to new places, taking long walks, or making art. We have learned the importance of community in providing companionship and support for the issues that matter to us. We have learned that community provides the bread, salt, and sugar of our lives.

There are 3 words in this piece.
Can you find how many times each word is repeated?

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Mencius:

"Friendship is one mind in two bodies."

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Check out AAUW here: https://www.aauw.org  AAUW welcomes men as members.

If you are in San Francisco this summer, visit the Kalligraphia exhibit
near the Rare Book Room in the Main Library. 

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If you were born in 1975 and are a woman, you have enjoyed equal rights for 50 years. Read Jesse Piper's post about her generation and the rights that women are losing now:

https://substack.com/home/post/p-166244658