Featured Articles
Breaking Down Borders
by Elana Zaiman
Liv Fun: Vol 6 – Issue 2
In March 2016, my friend Ellen (we call her “The Connector”) introduced me to her friend, LueRachelle, and to the work of the Saturday Sewing Sisters. This group of women from the Sarah Allen Sisterhood of the Women’s Ministry of the First African Methodist Episcopal Church in Seattle gather one Saturday each month to sew washable feminine hygiene kits (based on the Days for Girls template) for girls in Limbe, Cameroon, one of Seattle’s sister cities.
These kits, I learned, enable girls to go to school during their periods so that they don’t fall behind their male classmates, don’t burden their families with the cost of disposable feminine hygiene products, and don’t feel compelled to offer sexual favors to men in their village to be able to afford to purchase these products on their own.
I also learned that some of the women from the Saturday Sewing Sisters travel to Cameroon to hand these girls their individual kits (each kit lasts three years) and to educate them about their periods, reproduction, self-esteem and self-image.
Hearing about this project, I was immediately hooked. I asked myself why and was surprised by the many reasons this resonated so deeply:
… because as a woman, I want all girls to have access to feminine hygiene.
… because as a Jew, my values inform how I show up, not only in the Jewish world, but in the world at large.
… because education, human dignity and self-esteem are high up there on my values list.
… because as a citizen of this country, I am appalled by the hate crimes against African Americans, and in 2016, I sensed that hate crimes were on the rise, and I am not about hate.
Liv Fun
by Leisure Care
Summer 2017
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Tethered
by Pam Mandel
He’s always ready to go before I am. I check multiple times for my phone, the house keys … do I have everything? He looks in the back door, disappointed to see my shoes are still on the stairs … what is taking me so long? Harley is my walking companion; we’ve been doing this for over a year now, almost every day.
Tales From the Edge of Competence
by Tammy Kennon
The ominous blue glow of the new GPS was the only brilliant thing in the cockpit. It was 8 p.m., and I stood shrouded in doubt and a blanket, trying to ward off a late October chill. The grand launch of my new sailing life was a few hours away, and I had chosen this moment to learn how to use the technology that would guide me from the dock in North Carolina to southern latitudes, dreamy white sand beaches, and turquoise water.
Breaking Down Borders
by Elana Zaiman
In March 2016, my friend Ellen introduced me to the work of the Saturday Sewing Sisters. This group of women from the Sarah Allen Sisterhood of the Women’s Ministry of the First African Methodist Episcopal Church in Seattle gather one Saturday each month to sew washable feminine hygiene kits for girls in Limbe, Cameroon, one of Seattle’s sister cities.