Quackery

     It is sad to say, but the fact is that when one discovers he has a disease, one of the first things he learns about life thereafter is that no one really gives a damn.

     You discover for the first time, or at least more clearly than ever before, how completely enclosed people are within themselves.  Your disease will get a lot of lip service from casual acquaintences.  It will be a conversation starter, yet will cease to be the subject as soon as the conversation gets off the ground.  They will show their concern by asking after your disease, as if it had been an estranged child or a sickly mother, but will quickly change the subject as soon as things threaten to become specific.  One wants to reveal himself as a caring people without having truly to care.  Perhaps they have been praying for you (they say).  Perhaps they saw something on TV.  Perhaps their cousin's friend ran the last race for the cure. 

     Very often they will have a suggestion.

     Mangosteen, they will say.

     Fish oil.

     Exercise.

     Vitamins and minerals.

     Or worse yet, they will have a cure.

     Stem cell therapy!  It's done wonders for my arthritis, and at 50 bucks a bottle, it still beats the money these pharmaceuticals and your doctors want.  Kickbacks, that's what they're all about.

     They are all well intentioned, of course.  Just trying to help.  Or are they?  Perhaps they are really just selling something-doing good, while putting a few bucks in their own pockets.  Ya think?

     I heard on the radio the other morning that if people would consume 30 percent less fat in their daily diet they could add perhaps 25 years to their lives.  You could, for instance, live to be 115 instead of 90.

     Is that a depressing thought or what?

     In any case, I'm adding fat, not cutting it.  It is the natural balm, or so I hear, for most all illnesses, especially MS.  Fish fat, that is.  Ever wonder why you don't see so many fat fish around anymore?  It is because MS has made a fish-fat-sucking industry out of the poor critters.  Involuntary liposuction. 

     And then there is the fat from flax seeds, which I also guzzle.  I have never seen a flax seed in person, but I am picturing that it must  be a heck of a big seed for any significant amount of oil to be sucked out-maybe something the size of a tomato, or even a watermelon.

     I wonder what the flax itself looks like?  Seems like all you ever hear about is the seed of the flax and the oil thereof. 

     The apostle Paul, speaking in II Corinthians regarding the resurrected body, does mention that the fruit will bear little or no resemblance to the seed (like the zucchini seed as opposed to the zucchini or the pumpkin seed as opposed to the pumpkin), and so I imagine that if the flax seed looks like a tomato, the flax itself may look something like a space station or an alligator.  Who knows?