| Compared with the way things used to be, we have it | | | | rampant. (Note that the cause of the great plagues |
| so very soft today. It's easy to take our modern | | | | and epidemics was not the disease agent, but the |
| conveniences for granted. We can fill our days with | | | | fragile or non-existent immune system of the starving |
| leisure, bustle around in comfy autos, work only 40 of | | | | and poisoned host.) |
| the 168 hours in a week, chat with therapists, read | | | | The church would help allay the pain by harnessing |
| philosophy, shop for unnecessary stuff to clog our | | | | hunger to spiritual purposes. Lent made virtue of |
| closets and garages, climate control our dwellings and | | | | necessity, coming as it did in the final months of winter |
| complain about the softness of our mattresses. | | | | when barns and larders were growing empty. Feast |
| In the year 1000, even when agriculture had been | | | | and famine were linked to spiritual purification and gave |
| around for some 10,000 years, life was entirely | | | | meaning to hardship as well as hope for better times. |
| different. In Anglo-Saxon society, a precursor to the | | | | July was particularly tough since the spring crops had |
| modern West, the possibility of famine was | | | | not matured and the barns were empty from the |
| ever-present and memories of the last one made | | | | previous year's harvest. Starving was common in the |
| dread and fear a part of everyday life. Looming | | | | balmiest month of the year when so much toil in the |
| natural disasters were constant specters. | | | | fields was necessary. |
| Domiciles were not the neat and clean hygienic | | | | Every single hour of the August harvest month was |
| environs we experience today. They did not smell of | | | | filled with urgency, since everyone knew from the |
| disinfectant or exhaust from engines wafting in the | | | | pains of July what was in store for them next year if |
| windows, but the exhaust from every manner of farm | | | | they did not fill their larders now. Work was not a right, |
| creature and humans always hung in the air. Manure | | | | a place to lobby for benefits and ease. It was a life |
| was everywhere with each one having its | | | | and death struggle. |
| characteristic bouquet of fragrance. The human nose | | | | The contrast between then and now is astonishing. |
| in the year 1000 could certainly not be so prissy as | | | | They were on the verge of starvation; we are fighting |
| ours today. | | | | an epidemic of obesity. They might have to subsist for |
| Latrines were located at or near the back door and | | | | months on potatoes or stale bread; we have a glut of |
| moss was toilet paper. Flies filled the dank and earthen | | | | food options at our instant disposal. They had |
| floor homes where there were few if any hard | | | | shortened life spans and were highly vulnerable to |
| surfaced utensils and there was no understanding of | | | | injury and disease. We live longer but suffer cruel |
| disease vectors or antiseptic. If you dropped food on | | | | lingering degenerative conditions. |
| the filthy floor, you picked it up and ate it with relish. | | | | It is clear from a realistic view of times gone by that it |
| Five baths a year for monks was thought to be | | | | was not the advent of modern medicine that brought |
| fanaticism by Saxon standards of personal hygiene. | | | | relief, it was, as I mentioned in a previous article on |
| In time of famine, their law code permitted fathers to | | | | SARS it was the plumber bringing public utilities and |
| sell their sons aged seven or above into slavery. | | | | with that the possibility of hygiene and the trucker |
| Infanticide was not a crime. Communities of 40 or 50 | | | | distributing food supplies that brought us our present |
| starving emaciated people would join hands at the | | | | long lives. |
| edge of a cliff and jump. Some chronicles report that | | | | For them it was a daily struggle for survival. Necessity |
| "men ate each other." They would comb the forests | | | | and muscle ruled the day. It was the physical stress of |
| for beechnuts overlooked by the wild pigs and would | | | | enduring cold, harnessing 8 oxen to a plow to break |
| grind acorns, beans, peas and tree bark into a flour to | | | | new soil, hand harvesting and making their own way |
| bake as bread. Hedgerows were scoured for paltry | | | | every moment of the day. It was the true helplessness |
| herbs, roots, nettles and grasses. "What makes bitter | | | | and victimization (unlike modern day contrived social |
| things sweet?" asked a Yorkshire schoolmaster. | | | | "victims" clamoring for rights and handouts) from |
| "Hunger." | | | | floods, droughts, winds and rain that could wipe out |
| A "crazy bread" of ground poppies, hemp and darnel | | | | their only hope to avoid starvation in the coming year. |
| gave our poor starving ancestors some relief with | | | | For us it is a surfeit of choices requiring intellectual |
| visions of paradise. Molds that laced the rye that was | | | | decisions - decisions that make the difference |
| aging contained a variety of mycotoxins (and lysergic | | | | between whether we experience full health or its slow |
| acid [LSD], the psychedelic drug of the "60s) that could | | | | insidious ruination by mindlessly partaking of every |
| not only make people appear mad but would severely | | | | offering that promises yet more ease and flavor just |
| weaken the immune system, permitting disease to run | | | | because it is there. |