Every year I hear from a good friend at Christmas time. I see her two boys growing older in the photos. I hear of the events in her life over the past year.
In every local congregation of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, under the direction of the Relief Society president, each willing adult woman is paired with another woman and together they are given a list of three or four (or sometimes more) other women in the ward to visit, serve, and care for. This program is called “visiting teaching” and it often includes a monthly visit to discuss a Gospel message, but can also manifest as friendly phone calls, swapping babysitting, meeting up for lunch, bringing over freezer meals after a birth or during an illness, or just having a familiar face to greet in the halls at church.
The city bus gives them the space and time. A 20-minute ride to school among strangers, unknown to each other, they are silent with each other for a week.