Healthier at age 76 than at age 7.

This is my story from illness to wellness, shedding lifelong ailments, 30 pounds, and seven prescriptions. Last week, I recollected age 64; this week, I ponder how and why my illnesses first appeared.

By posting Healthier and Happier at 76 than 64 last week, I began with the end in mind. This week, I continue my journey with recollections of childhood, living on a farm where we grew everything we ate. The mood is always gratitude for what is while longing for what isn’t and what wasn’t. The tone is matter-of-fact and non-judgmental.

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From Farm to Table: Field Crops

Wheat

ages 6-9: 
riding with Daddy, my hero,
in the cab of our combine 
that cost more than our house in 1955

powerfully mastering golden acres of wheat in an afternoon, 
mowing and shucking what we had planted four months earlier, 
transforming stalks into individual grains, 
and when the grain tank was full,
meeting the trucks at the edge of the field,
when I got to climb higher than the trees, 
teetering atop the rim of the bin,
sun-warmed grain tickling my toes, 
as it was augered out from under me, 
the vivid golden color, the aroma, 
and I was in love with life on the farm.

Mostly, we hauled directly to 
Archer Daniels Midland Processing Plant
13 miles to the west,
smokestacks belching the by-products 
as our crops became
bread and fodder,
Karo Corn Syrup, 
and ethanol,

but sometimes, we just drove a few miles 
to Clarkson's Grain Elevator
and stored it, 
if Dad reckoned that 
grain futures were better than cash delivery,
depending on the weather and the Farmer’s Almanac.
*******
Soybeans

ages 9-14: 
learning to “walk” beans, 
holding my hoe horizontally,  armpit level 
as if I was ready to turn my grip 
and hoist it overhead in a power lift, 
being responsible for four rows to my left 
and four rows to my right, 
crossing over and through the itchy leaves
to cut down any milkweeds 
or volunteer corn leftover 
from the previous year’s crop rotation.

But my job became obsolete
as farmers spent more per acre 
on chemicals that controlled pests 
than they did on seeds that grew crops,
and weeds were controlled invisibly
without the sweat of teenagers.
*******
Field Corn

ages 15-16: 
a badge of honor to secure a coveted job
at Van Horn’s Hybrid Seed Corn Company,
perched atop a highboy, a machine
resembling a giant praying mantis, 
as it munched through fields of maize, 
humidity pouring from your pits,
sticky leaf blades slashing your sunburn,
proving I was tough enough to
reign over acres of cornstalks
by ripping and discarding 
the tassels from 
only the male plants,
but don't blame me,
just the rules of hybridization,
it wasn't personal.

From Farm to Table: Garden Crops

“Mama, my tongue breaks out
when I eat tomatoes”.
“How bad is it?”
“Not too bad.”
“This is what we grow.  Please eat the tomatoes.”

And that’s how it happened: a well-meaning, practical parental suggestion, said without malice, was how I learned to disregard the mind-body connection and that caused decades of grief and illness. 

Have you ever seen that chalky white powder 
sometimes sprayed on plants to keep the bugs away?
We called it “bean dust”
But we put it on all the vegetables, 
because the alternative was to have
 pink, chubby, naked worms
lounging and munching
on leaves, leaving holes, 
as unconcerned as if they were posing
for a new edition of Alice’s Through the Looking Glass.

From Farm to Table: Childhood Illnesses

Beginning in the fall of third grade
my parents suffered with me 
For over a year, enduring
viruses and infections,
chickenpox
measles
tonsillectomy
adenoidectomy
pneumonia
 and two hospitalizations.
In those days, they didn't know that antibiotics ruined gut biomes
and that the gut and the brain were connected
and they didn’t have a name, let alone initials, for ADHD.
Sick in my twin bed with the pale yellow chenille spread,
I would pretend to be sleeping 
but would instead be reading,
Just So by Rudyard Kipling
and All About the Stars.
When I returned to school, 
I couldn’t see the chalkboard 
or the wall clock from my front-row seat.

bifocals 
leg aches
nosebleeds
constipation
ADHD
insomnia
chubbiness

There was a chance I would have had them anyway; 
there was a chance I would not have suffered. 
There was a chance. 

I could have been normal, growing up on a farm where we ate everything we grew until one day, we were spending more on the white dust we put on green leaves than we did on seeds that grew into green leaves. Perhaps it was the white dust; perhaps it wasn’t. Perhaps DDT and glyphosate caused my illnesses; perhaps they didn’t.

I could have gotten leukemia or some obscure auto-immune disease.   I could have gotten something comedians didn’t joke about.  I could have gotten something people took seriously. 

RLS didn’t kill me. but when everything FDA-approved didn’t work, doc prescribed methadone, and then, the Grim Reaper stood outside my door and seductively crooked his finger. I was advised to stop taking methadone, and of course, I did. The RLS returned, but at least I no longer thought those darkest thoughts. Of all the side effects of all the medicines that I took, that was the worst. No, that’s not true.  Others were worse, but I’m not yet ready to tell those stories.

Serotonin imbalance
Low Dopamine
Poor iron metabolism
Chronic/long-term inflammation 

Dozens of night crawlers inside my thighs, 
from 8 p.m. to 3 a.m., 
slithering, moving to a circadian dance, 
freestyle, foxtrot, 
salsa, samba, 
tango, tap dance, 
waltz, watusi.

Thanks for reading or listening. Last week was only the second time I didn’t attach a recording, thinking no one would miss it, but someone did, and mentioned it. Do you read my stories or listen? If you want to encourage me to always attach a recording, please leave a comment.

If you live in SoCal, and either want to write your own stories, are already doing it, or just like reading or listening to mine, please come to the Ginger Elliott Center adjacent to the Garner House Thursday, March 28 at 6:30 p.m.

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