I love grits.
Mix it with 2 golden eggs over easy, some thick sliced bacon fried crisp, a couple of golden brown biscuits dripping with butter, and it’s a meal fit for a king.
My Grandma used to fix grits for us when we were kids. She’d fix the grits, pile it on a plate, dip a spoon in the center of the pile to make a little crater, then she’d fill that crater with bacon grease. Next, she’d close the crater, then she’d lay on top of the pile of grits, two eggs cooked medium so the yoke was still runny. Then, she’d take a knife and fork and cut up those eggs into the grits and mix it all together, flavored by the bacon grease she’d put in earlier. Finally, she’d take a piece of crisp bacon, break it up into little pieces and sprinkle it across the pile of grits and eggs. Gran would shove the plate over and I’d grab a biscuit, butter it, spread some jam on it, break a piece of bacon in half and make a sandwich.
I’ve eaten hundreds of such meals as a kid and many more as an adult.
Now, my dear Grandma loved us kids and would never have done anything to hurt us. But, she didn’t realize she was laying a foundation that would one day send her oldest grandson to the hospital on the brink of death. Now, those grits may have even been organic, and the bacon may have been organic meat, but it was killing me and we didn't know it.
In November of 2007, I nearly died. I was rushed to the hospital after I came into the Emergency Room complaining of extreme discomfort. I was on the edge of a major heart attack. They discovered I had two arteries with a 98% blockage and two more with over 80% blockage. I underwent immediate open heart surgery.
Lots of mothers and grandmothers and wives who sincerely love their children, grandchildren and husbands are killing them, slowly, one plate at a time. They cook these delicious meals without comprehending the health hazards of those meals. My dear grandmother had no idea how bad that bacon grease was for me. Further, she did not realize that creating an appetite in a child for greasy, salty, butter-laden foods would train me to eat in the manner in which I grew up eating. I ate all manner of fried food, breads, butter and tons of bacon throughout my life.
I paid a heavy price for it.
In America, we’re paying a heavy price for our out-of-control eating habits. (Compounding the problem is the manufacturers who have infused our food with so many preservatives and dyes and foreign ingredients that the affects on the health of the nation are incalculable.) We are an obese nation plagued with heart disease. Every 20 seconds, a person in America has a heart attack, and 250,000 of them die before they reach a hospital. In approximately 33 seconds from now, someone in America will die from cardiovascular disease. Currently, over 6 million Americans are hospitalized with cardiovascular disease, which has been the number one killer of Americans since 1900 (excepting the year 1918).
We are a rich nation and have been for many long years. We’ve had bountiful tables, laden with food. There isn’t a nation on the face of the earth that has the abundance we have. But that abundance is killing us. We’re getting fatter by the day. It is a medically established fact that obesity contributes to heart disease. And, eating to satisfy appetites that have been trained to enjoy all the wrong kinds of foods, contributes to obesity.
We’re committing suicide, one bite at a time.
Copyright 2008 -- Voyle A. Glover
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