Dear Friends,

On Oct. 1, I gave a consulta to an older lady from Plan de Flores whom I remembered well. I had treated her a few years ago for niacin/riboflavin deficiency. She also has dementia. It was quite a problem that day because I was seeing patients outside in the shade of the school building. She kept coming back asking for glasses. I had no door to close (and no glasses to give, of course).

Well, I am happy to say that she had no signs or symptoms of niacin/riboflavin deficiency this time. I have treated only three people for that (in my life). Two of them are elderly women who live in this county. You have to be pretty low before clinical signs show up (especially as dramatic as hers were). It is a poverty thing. You know how skim milk looks sort of blue--that's the riboflavin. When cream is present it covers it up.

Unfortunately, the dementia is still a powerful factor in her life and having a door to close didn't help. Several other consults were interrupted. We had adult multi-vitamins, so I could add them to her "aches and pains of age" medicine. She is a sweet lady, who just can't remember stuff very well.

Later, when we were at Andres' store buying groceries, a lady tried to pay for part of her purchases with her watch. She and Andres talked about it until they could come to an agreement about how much the watch was worth. Soon, she finished her transaction and asked Prairie for money to buy sugar. Prairie turned to me; I said, "Go ahead, her mother is sick." So we put her sugar on our bill. It comes in a 2 pound bag--80 cents.

It is an interesting life. We are poor enough to sew patches on our socks. But we live in a country where most people don't own socks. We wear socks almost half of the time.

Oct. 8 was quite different. Oct. 3 is "Day of the Soldier" here in Honduras. Mostly, however, institutions are going to Monday holidays. So Centro de Salud was sort of closed. Warnita, Prairie and I worked. Most patients thought we were closed, so we had very little work. This allowed us to walk all over town to do our other errands.

We had decided to participate in the pray and fast for peace day sponsored by several organizations in the United States--organizations that, like us, understand that you can't end violence with violence. I wonder why that is so hard to comprehend!

It was suggested to do a dawn-to-dusk fast and we did. We got up early and ate breakfast before dawn prayers. (A nice hearty breakfast, I might add.) Mondays are a big calorie-burning day, so we were aware of the sacrifice of fasting that day. We drink plenty of water on fast days.

We did our running around and hitched a ride earlier than usual. Walked home, stopping along the road for unprogrammed worship. Whenever we have a fast day, we replace the meal skipped with a spiritual practice. Makes sense--feed your spirit instead of your body at this time.

We arrived home earlier than usual and had time for rest after baths and afternoon prayers. We did special prayer services for all three of our usual prayer times. It was very helpful to us.

We ate our dinner after sunset. I suppose I don't need to say it, but we ate with much gratitude.

be well,

beth