lEAD POISONING

 

MARK HAYTER                   936-537- 0918                  hayter.mark@gmail.com

                                                           

Hayter article for May 19, 2024

“Getting the lead out”

 

 

              For the life of me, I don’t know how I’ve survived as long as I have. I’m learning too many things that I would be perfectly happy not knowing. It reminds me of one of Bob Seger's song lyrics, “Wish I didn’t know now, what I didn’t know then.” Yes, the more I learn, the more I feel as if I’m runnin’ against the wind.

 

              Kay is the person who generated the idea for this week’s article. Last Sunday a friend from church said to me, “You’re wife is very smart.” I wisely agreed, but didn’t have a follow-up. I was tempted to ask him to give me an example, but instead, chose to agree with him. I believe my reply was, “Yes, Kay certainly knows what’s what.” 

 

              My recent example of Kay’s intelligence took place two weeks ago.The girl walked up next to my recliner and said, “We have to get new dishes.” I thought the comment odd, so I said, “Darling, we’ve had our dishes for decades and haven’t even broken one yet. why don’t we keep the dishes until we have only four left?” Yes, the girl’s sharp, but I’m the wise one.

 

              She then explained to me that our dishes have lead in them. Lead’s bad for you. I knew that. At the age of 20 Beethoven went deaf due to lead poisoning. The genius composer was adding lead to his wine to improve the taste. A lot of the well-to-do drank lead lace wine for the flavor. Somehow, it adds a hint of sweetness to the wine. I doubt it does anymore, so don’t try this at home. 

 

              Regardless, Ludwig became the only deaf musician in the world. Being able to write music without listening to it can’t be easy. Nor is living long after drinking a lot of lead-laced wine. Beethoven died of lead poisoning at the age of 56.  

              After establishing the danger of lead in one’s diet, I can now explain the information Kay shared with me about our plates. She told me that we bought our dishes in 1986. If you do the math, that’s 38 years of having our food placed atop lead-coated plates. Following Kay’s news, I immediately understood why I never learned to play the piano. It affected Kay too, because unlike her party friends, she is still unable to play the accordion.

 

              I chose not to challenge Kay’s dish appraisal until doing my own research. I did. She was right. Our Correlle Ware dishes have a rose pattern along the edges. The paint from the pattern has lead in it. I imagine it took till 2005 for the FDA  to ban the sale of dishes containing lead. Possibly some stores sold off their pre-2005 stock of plates instead of destroying them. It took me 19 years to get the 2005 news about lead in Correlle Ware plates.

 

A ban was put on all lead-tainted dishes made before 2005. It could be a line around the edge of the dish or any design of any kind painted on the dish. The lead-based paint was coated with a sealant, but over the years of dishwashing, the sealant could wear off, allowing the lead to mix with your meal.

 

Like I said, Kay and I have been eating off of plates decorated with lead-based paint for 38 years. In all of that time, all I’ve noticed is damage to my brain. I always thought my memory loss was due to age, but now I’m thinking I may be experiencing Bettoven’s curse. By the way, who among you knew that lead had a sweet taste?

 

The Brits discovered from the bones of centuries-dead citizens, that well over half of them died from lead poisoning. They figured it was derived from the lead used in their weapons, jewelry, food, drink, pipe smoking, and golf. I’m not sure ‘golf’ was really included, but I read something about it somewhere. It’s the lead dishes doing this to me..

 

Back in the old days, the poor likely were less affected by lead. They didn’t have money to buy wine or lead. Issues with their lead jewelry were rare. Of course, the miners who dug up the lead were just glad to have a job. Even if they knew about the dangers of lead poisoning they couldn’t afford not to take the job.

 

I would gladly select our lead dish situation over anything those born centuries before had to deal with. Lead poisoning is way back there on my list of concerns. At the moment, Kay and I have some lovely leadless Corella Ware plates. Our old ones weigh 13.1 ounces each. The new ones 12 ounces each. The old ones may have weighed 13.1 ounces when we bought them. Kay didn’t think to weigh them immediately after our purchase, The FDA had yet to decide on lead-based paint. I sure never thought about it.

 

Kay and I did receive our new plates a couple of days ago. All is well at our place, at least it is until lead is discovered in cashew nuts. If it is, I’ll be long gone before the announcement is made.

 

 

end

hayter.mark@gmail.com