What? Venrick, I thought you were going to write all about GOODNESS and such GOOD things? Well, hang in there and keep reading...

PAIN

The good in pain is the obvious signal it gives our brain when our body is hurting. It is equal to or better than a traffic light that tells you “a car might be coming” -- when you hurt, you know something is wrong.

A pain in your mouth or jaw indicates there is something wrong. When you find you had an infected tooth you really discovered your body has a use for pain -- it was a red light warning. People with advanced diabetes (and other diseases like leprosy or Hansen's disease) could suffer severe burns or advanced infection simply because they have lost the necessary senses of pain (or even feeling) to alert them they have a problem.

The presence of pain is a signal or locater as to where a problem exists. Our bodies are so meticulously designed that when we get a splinter in our hand or foot we don't have to wonder where to look because our body's sensory abilities literally tell us to put the affected part of our body in front of our eyes so we can look for the problem. A person with the dreaded leprosy disease is so disadvantaged that they are unable to sense pain when it otherwise would be obvious to a person unaffected by leprosy.

Victims of leprosy often have toes or finger missing completely from their body. A very practical doctor, Dr. Paul Brand, in his studies of leprosy in India, thought this problem through and learned in a particular incidence, rodents (rats) were present and when a patient was sleeping and their arms were hanging relaxed from the bed and a rat would nibble at the exposed digit. If the patient did not jerk back, the rat simply stayed and had a meal. Dr. Brand arranged to have cats present in the area where the patients were and that problem was virtually solved.

Victims of advanced diabetes need to be careful around a fire. The sense of feeling is weakened in advanced diabetes and whereas a healthy person would feel their feet getting hot would recognize the pain and move away from the fire, a diabetic might allow their feet to become burned and seriously injured.

POISON

David Kline, in “Scratching the Woodchuck” passed on the advice, “It is said there are young bold mushroom eaters but no old bold mushroom eaters. The careless ones eventually come across the beautiful but deadly destroying angel (Amanita virosa) -- which has some similarities to the common and edible meadow mushrooms -- fry it, and eat it. The amanita can kill its consumer within twelve hours.” Now isn’t it good that you know there are poison mushrooms but you can know how to avoid them if you want to continue in good health?

I once heard it said that whenever there is a poison plant, within a few feet or short distance you will find its antidote. Can we credit that to chance? Or would you have a lot of mental trouble writing that up to a providentially minded Creator God? Me, I will choose on the latter. Some would never enjoy the special taste of a fried catfish if they were afraid of the possible pain in getting stuck by their spines while taking the hook from a catfish’s mouth. And back to David Kline, some would never enjoy or appreciate the delicacies of the giant puffball mushrooms because they didn’t know when they were fit to eat. Or the profitable knowledge that enable you to recognize the non-poisonous from poisonous mushrooms.

The chicken mushroom, for example, is a rare delicacy that you might never experience if you're afraid of mushrooms. Once again David Kline* writes about this sulfur shelf (Laetiporus sulphureus), one of which he found at the base of an old ash stump. There it was, a bright orange (above) and a rich sulfur yellow below. But David suggests the best way to be able to tell the poison from the non-poisonous is to take an expert with you or separate yourself with whatever it takes to buy a copy of a good field guide like "The Audubon Society field Guide to North American Mushrooms" -- that is a must. By the way the old Amish tale (or local lore) about the dust of a puff ball causing you to go blind if the dust got in your eyes (from a too eager boy stomping on one!) -- even if the young boys didn't believe it they could be found to only stomping on the ripe puffers when they faced the wind. *These stories and many more are to be enjoyed when you purchase David Kline's book, "Scratching the Woodchuck" (ISBN 0-8203-1938-4)

POISON FOR GOOD?

Poison can be removed from the bad column in the chart of GOOD and BAD items. Poisonous snake venom has been used in medicine for thousands of years and the technique of milking poisonous snakes to collect or harvest venom has changed very little in that time. Venom collected in this manner is then dried (freeze dried) and processed in serum laboratories

In Australia, poisonous animals have always posed a hazard to humans but because of improved technology the notorious death adder's collected venom has been used to produce lifesaving snakebite antivenins. Lifesaving medicines have been produced for more than fifty years.

PAIN AND POISON

Both are beneficial because they make us think and find the reason for their presence and further solve problems through research. Useless is a word that cannot be used to describe pain. Without pain we could not tell something is abnormal or needing attention by a physician or some kind of medical doctor. So, in our world of wanting everything to be “perfect”, specific education is a must or else useful anti venoms would never have been discovered. As pain is useful, so is poison of use in our world – we just have to know what we're dealing with. Surf the Internet and learn more about poisonous animals and their venoms—use these key words: poisonous snakes

THE WORDWRIGHT