The summer between my sophomore and junior year of college, I went to Oslo for three weeks to accompany a friend on a camping trip and ended up backing out at last minute. There I was, stuck in Norway, with several skeins of yarn and an apartment at my disposal, but no food. I went to the supermarket to pick up some ingredients so I could make dinner and after hitting the fruits and vegetables, quickly became lost when I entered the land of cartons and cans.

Some people enjoy keeping book reading a solitary activity, but I've always been more of the book club sort. I don't like reading in a vacuum. I want to hear what everyone else thought and how they processed the same words.

It seems a tad strange to begin a new column in medias res as if I've been blogging on BlogHer for years and this post is just like every other post. Sort of like walking into a stranger's house and taking a place at the table and digging into the mashed potatoes without so much as a door knock. So before I start eating your dinner, let me introduce myself as Melissa, the author of Stirrup Queens and Sperm Palace Jesters, and the new contributing editor for infertility and pregnancy loss. And now we can jump right into the salad course.