The Sentinel July 5, 2020

The Sentinel All the news that's fit to print and some that's not.
Salt, Sugar, Fat We humans all seem to love those three elements. They enhance the flavor of foods, salt and fat are essential for our health when used in moderation. Sugar is introduced to us shortly after birth, sometimes to get an infant to take a pacifier and give mom a little rest. Unfortunately for us we like all three far too much and tend to over consume all of them. Elderly people lose their taste for foods at some time very late in life, but the last taste to depart is sugar. That taste seems to never go away. Many men and women begin to put sugar on all their foods, just so there is some taste. One thing I believe is that all of these artificial sweeteners are very bad for our bodies and should be avoided. There are several side effects from them. One is craving for more food than we should consume, but the sweeteners make many people unable to stop eating.	End of life There are many things most elderly experience as they approach their demise. None seem to be good. Bodily systems begin shutting down causing pain and discomfort, depression, muscle loss, loss of coordination, dementia, and hallucinations. One thing we, Joyce and I both have noticed is when elderly are dying they seem to know the end is near. Few know the day and hour, but they know it is soon. Our experiences showed that they see people who are long dead usually standing in the room about a week before the end. Joyce's mother was under nursing care at that point and Joyce went to see her every day. Her mother began to see her departed sister Betty. Each visit would end with her mother saying, I'll see you tomorrow. But the last day Joyce was there her mother just waved and said goodbye. My father was in his final hospital time. I was working full time 85 miles away so I only saw him on weekends. My last visit I said, see you next week dad. He replied, you won't see me anymore I will be dead. I repeated, next week dad. He died 2 days later. My mother was seeing my father and her father in the corner of her hospital room. Again I was 85 miles away working and had already used all my vacation time being up there with her, so I could only get there on weekends. My sister lived close by and was with mom frequently. One Friday she told my sister to call mom's sister (living in Arizona) and tell her to get into her car and come see mom because she was going to die next Friday. Her sister drove there and left and mom died that Friday she predicted.	Grandma Mickey She was a wonderful woman, good cook, excellent advisor, kind yet noble and generous to all. She had her Indian motorcycle for transportation during WW-2 and her crew of biker women and men. She was 28 years-old before she got married to Joyce's father. They met after his ship was sunk in WW-2 and married Christmas day 1944. She discovered barbecued bacon from one of her neighbors and loved it ever after. One time she was outside in her back yard late at night barbecuing bacon when the local policeman was patrolling the neighborhood and smelled smoke. He got out of his car and walked to the back yard to see if there was a fire there. He saw grandma and asked what she was doing. Her reply was barbecuing bacon. He replied with a question, barbecuing bacon? She answered sure, do you want some? He came into the yard and they sat there eating barbecued bacon. Grandma lost the love of her life to cancer in late 1967. She went for years without a husband. She eventually ended up living with Joyce and me on the farm. That was during the Maintenance Man Superhero days at Litton. She made his super capes for him before she ever met him. Maintenance Man and I had a plan for meeting at a restaurant on Joyce's birthday of 2002. Grandma met him that night and along came the second love of her life. She even said that if she were 40 years younger she would sweep him off his feet and steal him away.