The practice runs in my family. It's our culture. It's what we do.

The money is good, but the job is not always easy. It pulls a lot out of you when you hear things you don't want to hear, or see things you don't want to see.

My mom never pushed me into it. In fact, she didn't want me to do it all. This was my choice - my obligation. I was called to push people in the right direction.

Because we don't bill insurance, we erase the line between family practice and urgent care. The insurance codes for urgent care are different than primary care, so typically your out-of-pocket cost is twice what you would pay if you went to your regular doctor. But we charge everyone the same.

I remember the rules, rules that were never spelled out but every woman knew: Don't open your door to a stranger, even if he says he is the police. Make him slide his ID under the door. Don't stop on the road to help a motorist pretending to be in trouble. Keep the locks on and keep going. If anyone whistles, don't turn to look. Don't go into a laundromat, by yourself, at night.

I think about laundromats. What I wore to them: shorts, jeans, jogging pants. What I put into them: my own clothes, my own soap, my own money, money I had earned myself. I think about having such control.

Now we walk along the same street, in red pairs, and not man shouts obscenities at us, speaks to us, touches us. No one whistles.

There is more than one kind of freedom, said Aunt Lydia. Freedom to and freedom from.

The whole concept of the supremacy of the family unit in the Italian culture... That's all based on the relation of the mom and the children and the bambino.