Sweet Friday

Lena Winkler lives in Worthington, Ohio, and attends medical school at Wright State University. She studied women's health issues in Georgia in 2005. Before medical school, Winkler taught Chinese and worked with adopted Chinese children in Columbus.

I believe in figuring out my own way to do things.
I believe in the power of numbers.
I believe in barbeque.
Well, I believe in friendliness.
I believe in mankind.
This I Believe.

We invite everyone to write for our series This I Believe. And today's essay comes from Lena Winkler of Worthington, Ohio. She is a 3rd year medical student with 5 young children. Here's our series curator, independent producer Jay Alison.

Many people send us essays about holding on to a belief during times of hardship, times when even the belief itself can be damaged and needs to be restored. That's what Lena Winkler is doing with help from her children and plenty of sugar. Here she is with her essay for This I Believe.

I believe in the power of tradition. I'm a mother of 5 children ages 4 to 10. And I'm in my 3rd year of medical school, I'm also going through a divorce. The details of the divorce, who's right, who's wrong, are not important, because like all divorces, everyone gets hurt. I would be relying on traditions, to pull us through this intact.

Last year I earned medical school credit working with a nonprofit healthcare organization for women and children in the Republic of Georgia. Georgia, formerly a Soviet Country, reminds me of my family, collapsed and worried, but bright with personality, strength and hope.

When I finished my work there, I brought home the traditional dolls, daggers and wine but I also brought home tick believe *, sweet Friday.

It was a tradition of our Georgian office where every Friday at 3 pm, work with a stop for a blissful half hour while we convene in the basement kitchen to feast on cake, gorgeous, fluffy, delights of cream and sugar. The cook, drivers, doctors, office staff and bosses would gather to connect and relax. Then slightly lightheaded, and sometimes even a little nauseous from overdoing it. We would return to our offices to wrap up business before the weekend.

My 5 children and I have instituted this indulgence among our neighborhood friends ever since. Sometimes we baked the night before, huge lopsided layer cakes, outsize cookies are sloppy attempts the parfaits. Sometimes if medical school obligation's overwhelming, I whir through the grocery stores as I raced home, grabbing cookies, bright paper plates and napkins. It's not just the extravagant sweetness of the afternoon, or the regularity of the occasion that qualifies these as a tradition. It's the attention to detail and the anticipation. Always a table cloth, maybe not ironed and always a scent of peace, pie and bouse, a pumpkin, or some flowers from the garden. My children and I fantasize about the event all week long and then walking home from school on Fridays, we round up everyone we pass. "We're having cake today, come by. There's coffee and milk too."

Mother and children linger in the yard on nice warm days, abandoned backpacks and jackets strewn across the grass.

In the winter children squeeze tui to a chair around our big kitchen table and the mother's crammed to the living room.

Sweet Friday, it's now a part of our uncertain and frightening divorce dominated life. I feel a responsibility to keep up with small traditions like sweet Friday and not slip into dread or self-pity. I believe that by stubbornly maintaining this weekly tradition, my kids and I are creating a ritual to carry us into the future. Already we reminisce about past week Fridays and daydream about the one coming up.

Lena Winkler with her essay for This I Believe. In the recording studio where Winkler read, her 5 children sat me other side of the glass, listening. It was Friday and they are on their way to get candy and cakes to bring back to the neighbors. To see the more than 20,000 essays that have been sent to our series or to submit one of your own, visit npr.org. For This I Believe, I am Jay Alison.

Next Monday, on morning edition, This I Believe essay from Wing Coinne, leaved singer of the Rock Group, the fleming lips. Support for This I Believe comes from Kampala University.