Balsamic Vinegar

By G. E. Shuman

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, Jews and Gentiles, just and unjust, men, women and children of all ages, sizes, races, creeds and even political persuasions, step right up to see the ultimate culmination of the accumulated knowledge and wisdom of the entire history of mankind! Yes, men and women, boys and girls, feast your eyes on the miraculous essence, the healing balm, the bountiful blessings of the fortuitous fluid within the bottle before you. Why, never has there been and never will there be a medicine, a tonic, a potion more able to cure what truly ails you, the person standing beside you, and all others on the face of God’s green earth! I now present to you, for the paltry sum of only a few dollars, the healing, blood pressure reducing, diabetes controlling, fat melting properties of the elixir of the angels themselves: balsamic vinegar.

Yup, balsamic vinegar. Pay no attention to that man behind the preceding paragraph, but balsamic vinegar really is what we’re gonna’ chat about today. It’s important. In fact, I think it’s very important. Balsamic vinegar is something I have known of for years, but only personally discovered over the past few months. Listen, (or more accurately,) read closely, dear friends, because this just might save your life. Yup, again. It’s true, and nope, I’m not kidding. Not even a little.

You see, or you will see… that several months ago, yours truly was diagnosed with the common but dreaded and irreversible disease of diabetes. Previously to this I thought that this malady was reserved for older folks than myself. That was before the day I happened to look in a mirror. And so, weeks ago, with no fanfare, newspaper headlines or interviews by the press, it was announced to me that I am now, officially, a diabetic. In deference to my mutually Christian, obviously scholarly friends, I should not mention that my first reaction was an audible, less-than-gentlemanly exclamation to my physician of “Oh… Crap.” But, I guess I did just mention it. Since that time I have been getting used to my brand new, tiny diabetic meter and the annoying little prick that came with it. (Can I say that?)

Shortly after the dastardly diagnosis was made, I happened to be on a phone conversation with my daughter Cathy, discussing the problem. Cathy is a very accomplished pediatric nurse, and, although I probably should have been talking more to a geriatric one, she had a wonderful bit of advice for me. You see, a big part of controlling diabetes is in the act of controlling weight. My weight was, at that time, at an all-time high, and I’m sure that was a contributing factor to my recent high sugar numbers. My doctor had told me that carbs, more than anything else, brought on the ‘D’ disease. So had Sylvia G., my very patient and helpful diabetic councelor. (Before this I hadn’t had a councelor since teen summer camp.) Cathy’s wonderful advice was to eat less bread and pasta, and substitute whatever my evening meal was with a big green salad of my choice, (Now listen carefully.) and use just balsamic vinegar AS the dressing, not IN the dressing. She and my councelor had both suggested adding protein by putting some chicken strips or tuna on the salad. I’m telling you, friends and neighbors, that that wonderful balsamic stuff is simply delicious. Yum! My biggest meal of the day is now loaded with vitamins, minerals, protein, and is almost totally fat-free.

Less than two months after my conversation with Cathy, and with few other adjustments, my blood glucose numbers are down, almost to normal, my tri-glycerides (Those are bad things.) are less than half what they were, and I have PAINLESSLY lost nearly twenty pounds, so far. Another great thing is that I’m not tired of what I’m doing. I still love those salads!

I have since been reminded by my wife that her grandmother always drank a juice glass of vinegar-water every morning. I remember seeing her do this. She had been told it was good for your arteries. She lived well into her mid-nineties.

If you’re overweight, (If you’re in America, and eat food, odds are, you are.) then, sorry, Pudgy. Don‘t pout… you’re just one of us. Lay off the ‘Lay’s’, forget the fries, and deny the McDoubles for a while. Step right up and get yourself a big bottle of balsamic vinegar. It just might save your life.

I Knew a Man, Who Had a Friend, Who Was a Friend of Abraham Lincoln

By G. E. Shuman

I knew a man, who had a friend, who was a friend of Abraham Lincoln. I guess that makes me pretty old. But, facts are facts, and facts are often strange things. That one fact happens to be true. And, no, this is not a riddle, with some strange twisting of words like the old brain-teaser “I’m my own ‘grandmaw‘.”, or anything similar to that. Neither am I writing here about some clairvoyant or supernatural experience of someone, supposedly, speaking with the dead. I don’t believe that that is possible. The simple truth is, I knew a man, who had a friend, who was a friend of Abraham Lincoln. And, yes, I mean THE Abraham Lincoln. I have thought of this fact during times when my family has visited Washington DC. Standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, looking up at that famous statue of my favorite president, it is difficult for me to believe that someone I knew well, knew a close friend of his, well. Read on, if you’d like to learn how this strange fact is possible.

It is strange, to look down the imaginary, or not-so imaginary tunnel of time, into the dusty past. Such a sight, to me, is of a well-worn, dry-leaf scattered path, into years of yesterdays, and decades of things which no longer are. In the mind’s eye, there is a thread, which somehow connects us to that past, as long as consciousness continues. It is a fiber of reality, of the physical, tying us to what once was. Something about the fact that the memory of this cord will be broken at my own death is why I write this now. For some reason, it is important to me that the dusty, mildew-y, musty years of the ‘back then’ and their connection to the ‘now’, are not forgotten.

The truth is, I have always been fascinated by the idea of time. Another truth is that I’m not quite sure that time actually exists, other than in our own observance of the endurance of the things and people around us. I am reminded of the old riddle: “If a tree falls in the woods and there is no one around to hear it, does it make a sound?“ Likewise, for instance, in deep space, where there is nothing to wear out, or get old and dirty, and no clock to measure the moments, does time exist, or need to? I guess I’m not sure. Things happened ‘in the past’ we say, or will happen ‘in the future’. Things are thought of as being either behind, or ahead of us, as this is how our minds work. I have always wondered where those things ‘really’ are, right now. (So, have I given you a headache yet?)

And now for my slight thread of a connection, only three people ‘back‘, to President Lincoln. You might have heard of a very diminutive man with the stage name of Tom Thumb. You may wish to ‘Google’ Mr. Thumb, if you have not heard of him. Being a famous performer, Tom Thumb, who’s real name was Charles Sherwood Stratton, and his little wife, the former Lavinia Warren, were good friends of Mr. Lincoln, and were frequent guests of his at the White House. Mr. Thumb died in 1883, at the age of 77, but Lavinia lived on until 1919. During her later years, around the turn of the century, Mrs. Thumb frequented the small town of Palermo Maine, and happened to stay there at the Shuman House, a small hotel which was operated by my great grandparents. My grandfather was a young boy of about ten at the time, and was in charge of caring for the guests’ horses; a chore he disliked very much. During this time, he and his mother got to be good friends with Lavinia (Warren) Thumb…

And then the thread of time extended out, all the way to us, and to now. Gramp Shuman lived well into his nineties, and I knew him for many years. Therefore, and without trickery or exaggeration, I knew a man, who had a friend who was a friend of Abraham Lincoln.

That old thread of time is, indeed, a strange thing. If only it were, instead, a wire over which we could communicate. I would love to hear some of the conversations that must have taken place in the parlor of the old Shuman House. I guess I’ll have to work on that.