worst fears................

ok, so today i trained with the dietitian at the boyle county (local) health department.....who used to have the job i have now before transferring over to our home county............we decided that she has known me for 17 years.........when i had long hair and a new baby (stephan....) granted.......as she saw clients.......4 out of 7 knew me from somewhere...........one remembered caring for my children as little ones in montessori preschool.................another remembered when i spoke to her high school health careers...................another asked for the restaurant's recipe for baked salmon with a mayonnaise/parmesan crust...................and yet another knew my name from when i wrote for the newspaper................that is not the big news..................i discovered what happened to the dietitian who had the boyle county nutrition job for as long as i remember.........who just up and disapppeared....on the surface from that job..........from my church and even from my sunday school class...............she had early-onset alzheimer's disease..............oh my..............in whispered tones i was told about how they still find charts with blank nutrition notes, or with notes that repeat the same few words over and over................and the story goes that she would sometimes stand in the office area with a chart....and ask just what she was to do with it................because she honestly could not remember...............and this went on until my neighbor around the corner was hired to take over...........and he figured out from the first day that something was wrong.....and he called in her spouse (or so the story goes......) and he retired from his job quickly...and they moved back to their hometown..................gentle readers......she could not be over 55............i can remember her heart-wrenching stories about her father's bout with the same condition...and her support of my mother and myself during my dad's senility and ultimate decline..................i cannot recall anything she ever said or did during the sunday school hour that would have led any of us to think that something was wrong........in fact there is a duo (mother/daughter) who come occassionally who i think may be simply crazy...................) but that is different than senile...............and this is my worry......................with a father whose senility came on prior to age 65.....and a maternal grandmother who was senile from late 60's on................i make it my business to do everything....see everything......and eat/drink everything (ha!) now because i might not get a chance to do so later...or at least to enjoy it later....................for the record.....my dad was a happy senile guy (mostly....) and my grandma was a mean senile person..............i could go either way...................our favorite grandma story was when my cousin....the one who inherited her house.....came by on a saturday to find out what they needed so she could go to the grocery.... my grandpa complained that they ran out of grapefruits since she shopped last...............my cousin was in disbelief.....as she had purchased ample numbers.................'where did they all go?'......she asked..................at this point my grandma piped up.......i know where they are..................and she produced them......from their hiding place under the covers at the foot of her bed.............................under c-w standards.............senility is defined as the point at which one hides the grapefruits.......................hopefully i still have a few years..................