THE EVENING BEFORE VOTING

   The day before voting in British Columbia's recent election I had a phone call from my sister Esther and her husband Lloyd Howard,  in Kamloops, telling me that my other sister, Helen (who lives in a care home in Kamloops) had fallen when an aid was helping her during a bath (Helen weighs just under 110 pounds) and they had phoned for an ambulance that took her to the Kamloops hospital.  With uncertain results and crowded hospital space she was returned to the care home.  I was trying to telephone Helen to see what I could do for her but another voice that sounded like Christi Clark was on my telephone line making puzzling, negative and disparaging suggestions about the leader of the NDP, her opposing party.  I went downstairs and got the night watchman to help me get my own telephone line back.  I do not know who was speaking on my private telephone line.  Just across the street is a police station.  I went there the following morning and told them about it since someone had taken over my telephone line and how this could happen.  The election held the next day took a surprise turn when this development had strongly suggested otherwise from the media reports.

Hi Everyone. HAPPY FATHER'S DAY.

 

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY

The United Church of Canada sent a student minister to small towns in western provinces to help them learn how to conduct a service and carry on other church duties. Our family did not own a car so most families walked the mile plus to attend church at the one-room school heated by a pot bellied stove that also heated our cocoa on winter days. Mother had finished getting the noon meal after we arrived home and she soon realized her new baby wanted to join our family. Telephones were not in use and unexpectedly company might arrive. The day I was born my mother's sister came into our yard with her family driving their horse drawn wagon. There was still no telephone service in Orion in 1923. Our two room home made entertaining company very difficult. Mother got very busy peeling potatoes and making a supper meal while her sister, my aunt, chatted constantly dredging every scrap of neighbourhood news. My mother wished they would hurry home and commented how they had chores to do also. Milking chores needed to be done at regular time or else the cow's milk would drip away on the ground. My aunt finally loaded up her children and left at around 6 o'clock. I asked her one day what time of the day I was born and she said it was around 7 o'clock since the cows needed to get milked by around 6 o'clock. I do not remember being born but when I was nearly two years old my father must have felt like throwing me away. That would have been about a month before my second upcoming birthday in July. Radishes would soon be large enough to eat. I saw our mother often pulling weeds from the garden and apparently decided to do some weeding myself and perhaps she would brag me up as setting an example. I had pulled out the whole row of radishes and my father must have been very angry and was said to have tossed me out of the garden and injured my emerging teeth that then would grow crooked. I do not remember it happening and in my late teens I required dental work.

I decided to go to College but found out that my Alberta high school credits would not be recognized in Canada since I had attended a high school that taught the same subjects but was sponsored by a religious organization - the same text books were used but one book which was called "Ancient History in Bible Light." By the time our elected officials talked and talked that over and they decided deserved to accept these high school credits if all grades were satisfactory. Meanwhile I had applied to a university in the United States. Seattle Pacific College, a church organization. Later our Alberta politicians decided they would recognize these credits but I had applied and had been accepted by this university in Seattle, Washington. It was expensive and I ran out of funds before completion. I thought a baby sitting job might be acceptable and answered an ad in the daily paper. A wonderful lady answered it but I told her my plight and said I might be in trouble accepting any money for it, since I had entered the U.S.on a student's visa. Later I found I was living in the home the family who had started Sternoff Iron and Metal Works. They were very kind to me and I was very grateful to them. One day when I answered the door two policemen in uniform were standing there asking me why I was no longer registered at the university with only a student's visa. They said they would give me ten days to get back to Canada or I would be arrested and never again allowed to cross the U.S. border. I had not taken any money and had enough left for one Greyhound bus ticket. I had been assigned to take care of their second son, 5 year old Ricky. His mother was helping other immigrants get started in the United States. I phoned Ricky several decades later when going through Seattle and asked him if he remembered me. He had become president of the entire metal works company whose huge printed sign towers high from the main highway when driving through Seattle. I asked him if he remembered how the breakfast routine went. If he didn't eat his plateful at supper I was asked to put it in the refrigerator to keep it safe but serve it (cold) for his breakfast. We laughed together about it and I learned the lesson also, and find it very hard to see food wasted. We had a nice telephone visit.

BUILDING HEALTH

  Diet and exercise along with advances in medical care and choices of lifestyle, will determine how to increase the life span.  A fourteen year review of more than 44,000 adults by researchers at the National Centres for Disease Control and Prevention showed that only two percent of people achieved all of the healthy habits like not smoking , staying physically fit, keeping blood pressure healthy, and cholesterol numbers in check, maintaining a healthy weight and eating a healthy diet.  A 76 percent lower risk of dying from cardiovascular disease and a decrease in death from all cancers when compared with those meeting only one of those health parameters.

   Happily, there is still time for everyone to experience the lifesaving effects of being healthy.  Adopting a good-for-you habit - even past your seventh decade - can add quality years to life.  If you are a diabetic, the sweet stuff we call sugar, as well as carbohydrates in general can raise triglyceride levels while lowering concentrations of healthy HDL cholesterol.  A person should consume at least two to four servings of fruit and three to five servings of vegetables each day.. This reduces the risk of many causes of premature death, such as cancer and diabetes.  The more colourful your selections, the better.  Red, orange, yellow, green, purple and white fruits and vegetables each contain different and important groups of phytonutrients, including antioxidants and other disease-fighting substances.

   Regarding the colour of bread to use, many people wrongly believe this is an indication of whole grains and think darker bread is healthier.  Instead, pay attention to the ingredients and not its hue.  Bread, pasta and  cereals should be "whole grains"  rather than refined.  The refining removes the bran and the important germ, the important parts for complete nourishment.

   The American Journal of Public Health, tells us that alcohol - a known carcinogen -accounts for up to 21,000 cancer deaths annually  (more than melanoma or ovarian cancer), resulting in approximately 18 years of life lost in each case.  Approximately 30 percent of those deaths occurred with a consumption of less than l.5 drinks per day.  Reducing alcohol consumption improves health in addition to reducing cancer risk, according to Consumer Reports on Health, volume 25 Number 6.  Drinking six to eight glasses of water or other healthy juices like some teas and coffee helps lubricate and cushion joints and protect tissue.

    Having fun and developing a social network helps preserve cognition.  If you are a loner keep the mind active by reading, writing, completing puzzles, making art and being kind to all will also help keep dementia at bay.    Most of us already know how important it is to be cautious about maintaining the proper weight, and taking care of any dental work needed.  Purposeful walking, bicycling, or swimming helps prevent the decline of muscular strength and adds years to your life as well as life to your years.  Condensed from Consumer Reports on Health.