Of Health and Heroics #T

Grandma was a tiny little thing, barely four foot, eight with her shoes on, with her cotton hose and shoes on. If she ever weighed over a hundred pounds it had to be in 1912 when she was carrying the twins.

Grandma and Grandpa were holiness people, not pentecostal, but saved, sanctified and pressing on to glory. They were modest in attire, truthful to their word, and they would literally give someone in need their last cent, if they had a cent at the time. Grandma bore eight children and raised seven of them to adulthood. Foolishness was not high on the list of approved activities in their household.

This couple and their children were faithful attendees at the little local holiness church, and it is true that virtually never a service was missed. One spring Sunday morning as the minister was reading his selected scripture that would serve as the basis for his message, something skittered up Grandma's left leg, up the hose and under the skirt. Alert of wit and quick of hand, Grandma slapped her left hand on the offending intruder and clenched it in her grasp. Some forty minutes later the preacher concluded his sermon and invited the congregation to stand for the "invitational." Following three verses of "Just As I Am" the minister pronounced the benediction. Grandma released her grip on the critter, and poor mousie dropped to the floor, quite dead of suffocation!

The grandparents, as you might well surmise, were teetotallers, and were known from time to time to inveigh against Demon Rum. Grandma, though, thought it important that she maintain good health. There was one particular elixir that she asserted was vital to good health and of which she partook on a daily basis for years. Just a tablespoon a day, mind you. The product was called "Viti-Ore." The name certainly implies that it contained necessary ingredients, vitamins and minerals. Indeed, it surely did.

Many years after Grandma went on to Glory at the age of ninety-eight, just for fun I thought to research Viti-Ore. I discovered that it was indeed a wonderful pick-me-up for the frazzled housewife of the day. The contents betrayed the fact that it was fifty-proof alcohol.

I loved Grandma and Grandpa and have many wonderful memories. But sufficient unto the day are the snippets related here.

If you have not read Grandma's birthday post, please take a minute to go here.