In 1957, we lived in military housing on top of a hill at Camp Pendleton, California.  Ken was the air officer for the 7th Regiment and had to travel miles and miles to get inland to work.  If I wanted the car, I had to drive him in.  Then make the trip back, and go get him in the evening.  We were broke, so the gasoline was a huge consideration.

As a result, I learned to plan meals so that I wouldn't have to go to the commissary but once a month.  I could barely cook, so it was a challenge.  But with time, I was able to do it.  I froze milk, meat and bread.  Everything else was up for grabs.  As a result of all that planning, I always had enough to go to the cupboard and come up with something for dinner.

But the downside was that through the years, as the price of gasoline wasn't so critical, after we had two cars, my habit of buying by the month continued.  But it was worse than that.  I kept the pantry stocked with every imaginable thing I might ever need should Ken ask for something special.  Every spice, every kind of pasta, every canned fruit and vegetable known to man, flour, sugar, etc., etc.

So when I decided to move a few of months ago, I began to clean the pantry and the freezer out and made a pledge that I would never again have so much stuff in my kitchen.  The freezer is going to my brother--with all the okra I put up last summer and couldn't possibly eat in my lifetime.  And the asparagus.  I put up package after package and never ate a stalk of it.  I just like to grow it and pick it.

I don't like change, so this has been difficult for me.  I am eating only what is in the kitchen--which makes for some interesting meals.  I refuse to go the grocery store unless I run out of milk or bread.  It has been cathartic.

John 6:47b-48, 51a "He that believes on me has everlasting life.  I am that bread of life...I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever..."