March 2002

Howes Things
Paws for Reflection
A Mensan in France, part III
The First Time

Howes Things
LocSec Carl Howes

By the time this issue gets to your mailboxes the 2002 RG will be history. As I mentioned last month, it is time to be thinking about next year's gathering. For now we will be considering locations and should be negotiating and signing a hotel contract by summer. If you want to take part in running an RG or you are just curious, get in touch.

Coming up in the April issue will be either a ballot, if we have contested offices, or an announcement of the makeup of the 2002 - 2004 Executive Committee. Since the Special Business Meeting is still in my future I can't say which it will be.

Paws for Reflection
RVC1 Betsy Burke

Beware the Ides of March! Remember that March is renewal time for Mensa membership. This year you should be getting a form from the National Office on which you need to update your personal data. Please take the time to read it, fill it in and actually remember to send it back. This form is used to keep accurate records of your address, birthday and your interests. It's also been revised to protect your privacy. There have been some instances where members are complaining that their own newsletter no longer has their correct address or doesn't acknowledge that they've gotten a year older. Well folks, if it isn't on this form then it isn't available to your local group. You can limit who has access to specific information if you're concerned about privacy issues but please remember that one of the purposes of Mensa is to foster an interchange of ideas between members.

The National Office has had some letters from members expressing pleasant surprise at the financial benefits of being a member. Please take the time to read about member benefits.

I'm off to Texas later today for the budget meeting. I'll report about that next month. Stay warm and healthy.

A Mensan in France, part III
Devin Starlanyl

It was Thursday, our second Thursday in France, and we were on our way to Brittany, where putting on your high hat has a different meaning. The high lace bonnets of ceremonial Breton costume, called coiffes, can rise 15 inches above the head. This would make it very difficult to ride in a car. You would have to keep your head sideways for the whole trip. Might this be why the Bretons were thought of as a stiff-necked people by the rest of France? We would soon find out.

We arrived in Saint-Brieuc in the early evening, and were met by the President of the Association Fibromyalgique de Bretagne, Jeanine Filbing, her translator Marie-Pierre, and husband Jo. That was the beginning of a remarkable experience and memorable friendships. As far as I know, I have no Breton in my blood, nor so much as an Irish or Welsh corpuscle, but from somewhere deep inside I felt at home here from the beginning. Perhaps it was the red carpet that Jeanine and her associates rolled out and dusted off, and that we figuratively danced on for days. We ate the first of a number of rather astounding meals at the hotel, which we were told was not their hotel of choice. A firemen's convention was in town, so they had to "make do", and we often shared dining rooms with groups of these robust and cheerful men. It was a fine hotel, and convenient. We had a bit of time to unpack before dinner, and Rick found that the compressor to the air mattress had failed. There was no hair dryer, so he began the task of huffing and puffing to blow the bed up. We both worked at it, but he did 90% at least. Then we went to meet our hosts. As in other regions, they wanted to know how close we lived to New York and Washington, D.C. September 11^th was never far from their minds, and all of France seemed united in compassion for the U.S. (in spite of their many concerns about our president, which we share). I have never had my allergies so carefully monitored, nor my needs and tastes so carefully attended. Ah, you MUST have THIS wine with THAT cheese, as a digistif! No, you may not taste that, it has onions! It was apparent from their care that these people respected and appreciated what I had to offer, and they didn't even know the half of it at the time.

I learned that there would be about 200 people at the seminar on Saturday, and I would have another translator, Marie-Pierre's cousin Martine, who taught English to the local children. For our conversation, Marie-Pierre was kept busy translating, and we also had the pleasure of dining with some support group leaders from other areas, and even other countries. Helene, the president of the Holland group, was there. They even had an electronics expert on tap, Helene's nephew Jean-Claude, to help Rick with the audiovisual information. Jeanine knew how to ORGANIZE! She knew from our correspondence that we had an interest in all things Breton, and had planned that we see as much of her delightful province as possible before we had to leave. We tumbled into bed exhausted, but were ready to explore after breakfast the next morning.

I had read that there are two main regions of Brittany, Armor, land of the sea, and the hinterland of Argoat, land of the forest. The Breton word "goat" means "wood". Some people, mostly in the interior, still speak the ancient language, and the Celtic heritage still spoke through the stonework. North Brittany, where we were, tends to be wilder than the south. That morning we learned that there are actually three biomes, or specific terrain and accompanying ecosystems, in Brittany because there was a Dartmoor type heath that we would visit later in the day. Before we started out on the day's adventure, we caught the firemen's parade, right in front of our hotel.

The Ancient Breton tongue was born in the 5^th and 6^th centuries, when the area was settled by refugees from Wales and Cornwall who were fleeing the Anglo-Saxon invasion. There are now Breton-speaking schools, called Diwan, to keep the language alive. It was a language far removed from French. In French, if you want to say "pardon", you say, well, "pardon". In Breton, it is "fez noz". Goodbye is not "adieu" or "au revoir", but "kenavo". Breton music sounded to me like Morris dancing music. Marie-Pierre had even been to England to play accordion for Morris dancers.

Using generalities to describe peoples is a path fraught with pitfalls. Nevertheless, I found the people of Brittany in general to have a nature that was deeply religious, even those who did not go to church regularly. That day we visited many a "lann", or church. I learned that a parish close was an enclosure of stone walls, to be sure, but to be considered a true "close" it must have a triumphal gateway, a calvary (carved scenes from the crucifixion of Christ), and an ossuary alongside the church. The ossuary housed bones taken from the cemetery, and was considered a "thin place"; a place where the space between the living and the dead was often very thin and could at times be bridged. These closes often had an intact chapel and many small buildings. There were often elaborate carvings, and rich processional embroideries and tapestries.

St. Thégonnec has one of the most complete parish closes in Brittany. Many parish closes had parts of the church complexes in ruin, destroyed throughout the ages. These large closes, or religious monuments, could take 200 years or more to complete, and many in Brittany were built from the 15^th to 18^th century. St. Thégonnec itself was covered by scaffolding. It had survived the conquests and battles of time, only to be struck by fire in recent times. A giant restoration effort was underway. Those areas that we could visit were rich with intricate carving and colorful figures. People from all over the country were supporting the effort to reconstruct this masterpiece.

We also visited Guimiliau, which took its name from its patron saint, St. Miliau, an 8^th century martyr. Prayers to him were said especially by people with ulcers and rheumatism. Since rheumatism was often a word used to describe fibromyalgia and myofascial pain, the visit was especially apropos. There were towers and spires in Gothic and Renaissance styles, but the Breton influence was unmistakable. Rick was especially entranced by the roof trusses, which bore faint resemblance to our own post and beam home. We lack the latticed balustrade and carven canopies and statuettes, and the finely worked pulpit depicting moral and theological values. For which I am grateful, but it was majestic to see in the church. There was also a separate funeral chapel with an exterior pulpit at one of the windows. The weather was cooler than in the other regions we had visited, and it changed with more abruptness and frequency than we were used to. Since we were used to northern New England, that says volumes. That exterior pulpit was good sense. At this church, Jeanine and Jo opened some of the wall compartments, revealing rich tapestry for processionals.

One of the churches we visited had an intricate cavalry. The good thief had an angel on his shoulder, and the bad one had a little demon. Remarkable details. It wasn't unusual to see more "modern" figures, such as Louis XIV, alongside the early saints. This juxtaposition had occurred in Provence as well, with "santos" nativity figures sometimes including the likes of Elvis Presley and such. Thank you very much.

We were kept busy taking video and photos, and we purchased a number of postcards to ensure that the intricate details of some of these sights would be refreshed. Even the rugged stone cottages of Brittany were memorable. Marie-Pierre and Martine had lived in two of them and refurbished them for resale, recycling and restoring precious historical dwellings. The sense of history lived in Brittany.

We stopped for lunch at Pleyben. Brittany is known for its crêpes and cider, and I wanted to try that for lunch. "No, no", Jeanine said (in French). "We must eat at the Blanche Hermine". I am so glad that we did. The White Ermine was true Breton, heart and soul. I have been a member of SWIG, the special interest group for wine making (and beer too), for many years, and have been making wine for about 18 years. I wanted to try the Breton cider, and also wanted to try chouchenn. "Le chouchenn" is "Hydromel de Bretagne", also called "La boisson des Dieux" (the drink of the Gods). It was made of fermented honey, but not just any honey. It had to be honey with the crushed comb, and I had a feeling I could find farm style, raw apiary honey at our food cooperative in Brattleboro, Vermont. This honey has never been heat treated or filtered, and retains the beneficial traces of pollen, propolis and beeswax. I wanted to taste this drink of Brittany. Rick was content with a selection of the numerous Breton beers. I ordered breast of chicken in chouchenn.

We enjoyed the salad and other courses that were part of a French meal, and the Morris-style Breton music played in the background. Suddenly, a disheveled man with a rakish cap popped through the door. I don't know what he was shouting, but he certainly was excited about something. He expounded for several minutes, punctuating the rapid fire language with gestures and heartfelt expressions. After pouring his heart out, he popped out of the restaurant as fast as he had entered. "Ahhh", the waiter explained with a sigh and a shrug, "an old Legionnaire!"

The chicken arrived, swimming in the best sauce I tasted during our trip to France, and I was happy to tell the waiter so. For dessert, I ordered a crepe AND a cheese, which was most unusual, but it was explained that I was "an American". I managed to obtain some postcards with rough ancient recipes for chouchenn, and for "Le Far Breton" a native dessert I wanted to try. I did miss the chocolates of Pleyben. This is known as the best place in France for chocolates, so that alone requires that we make a return visit some day. We were well fortified for our trek to Mont St. Michel. We overlooked the heath and heather landscape, and the windswept sight reminded me of the moors of England. We also visited the Mariners shrine, a monument to the men who lost their lives in ships. There were great boulders to visit that afternoon, and chasms that remind me of Chesterfield Gorge at home, minus the waterfalls. The pine cones were huge, and would have made perfect Christmas decorations. We never did get down to the tidal area. Saint-Brieuc has one of the longest tidal reaches on earth, and the shells are said to be interesting and varied, but you must be careful not to be caught in the tide. Next time.

That evening we met with Martine, who had concerns about translating the medical aspects of the talk. I had already made up a few copies of my presentation. Rick would follow one, so that he knew when to put on slides or overheads. Jeanine had made a copy for Martine. After another sumptuous but late dinner, we discussed the next day's event. It would take place at the nursing school amphitheater. The projectors were in place, and all was ready. It was a late night, but later for Martine. Rick was sending a message from Marie-Pierre's computer to our relatives and my house-sitter at close to midnight. There was a war on, after all, although we seemed far removed from it. I know that Martine reviewed the presentation into the wee hours.

Fortified by breakfast, that Saturday I began to explain the nature of fibromyalgia and myofascial pain to an audience hungry for information. With Martine's expertise, there was no language barrier, and the complicated concepts of a neuroendocrine dysfunctional pain processing system (fibromyalgia) versus a neuromechanical disorder of the myofascia (myofascial trigger points) were revealed to eager minds. Each hour, we had a five minute bathroom and stretch break. By the end of the first hour, I knew that the people were grasping the difference between hyperalgesia, or amplified pain sensation, and allodynia, or pain from usually non-painful stimuli. The second hour I taught about the myofascia _ that sticky translucent covering that binds the muscle fibers, bundles of fibers, and the muscles themselves. I was showing the slides of specific myofascial trigger points, and explaining each referred pain pattern and symptoms that went with the trigger points. Martine moved her microphone aside and whispered intently in her lovely British accent, "Look at their eyes!". I turned my head from the projector screen, and even in the dimly lit amphitheater I could see many eyes glisten with tears of recognition. Many of these people had been misdiagnosed. They were being treated for fibromyalgia, when in fact they had myofascial pain as a main pain generating condition. Myofascial trigger points are very treatable, IF you know how. During that break, a doctor rushed up to me and confided in broken English, "My God! I know these patterns. My patients have been describing them for years, and I've been misdiagnosing them! I will see your website. Now I must return to my office and put things right." I reminded him that some patients have both, but he knew that he had to learn to treat myofascial pain.

The next hour was a talk on perpetuating factors, as I taught the people what conditions could be perpetuating or aggravating their symptoms. These ranged from metabolic imbalances, such as insulin resistance (treated by diet), hypothyroid conditions and fibromyalgia, to mechanical asymmetries and posture problems. I also gave them many things that they could do for these perpetuating factors, and for the symptoms of both fibromyalgia and myofascial pain. During the break, it was sobering to meet some of the people in wheelchairs _ people who actually had less severe problems than I. Some of them simply had combinations of trigger points that caused weakness and buckling of the ankles and knees. With the proper treatment, they could be walking again in a short time. One woman I had spoken to in the first break was scheduled for carpal tunnel surgery that next Wednesday. She described the pain pattern, which she had had for over 15 years, I checked a spot in the subscapularis muscle, and there was her pain! She didn't speak much English, but I gave her a tennis ball and showed her how to compress the trigger points during the talk. By the third break, she came to me crying. The pain was gone.

Janet Travell was the founder of myofascial medicine. She was also JFK's White House doctor. She was the only doctor who could take care of JFK's back pain without pills. She used "spray and stretch" technique, a form of physical therapy which requires elaborate training and is specific for myofascial trigger points. She also used trigger point injections with local anesthetic, but this technique also required training and a knowledge of trigger points and their referred patterns. Most people know about the rocking chair that she designed for JFK. They don't know that ill-fitting furniture is a key perpetuating factor of myofascial trigger points. Janet wrote the definitive texts with her co-author (my mentor), David Simons. Doctors are still discovering these very large, detailed and well documented texts. They are still being daunted by the amount of work it takes to master myofascial medicine. The symptoms can range from dizziness and projectile vomiting to muscle weakness, with the autonomic nervous system supplying some of the symptoms. Proprioceptors, receptors which tell us where we are in relation to the world around us, as well as where one part of the body is in relation to the others, are also affected, sometimes profoundly. If doctors don't know this, they often misdiagnose, spend a lot of money for neurological consults, inappropriate physical therapy which can make things worse, or even send the patient to psychiatric specialists. It can take 10 years or more to get the proper diagnosis, and by then the patients are exhausted physically, emotionally and financially, and have often been left without the support of the medical care community and their companions. Fibromyalgia and chronic myofascial pain are invisible chronic conditions, and the lack of training in the diagnosis and treatment of these conditions is one of the greatest shames of current medical care. There is no easy diagnostic blood test, although care providers who are trained in diagnosing and treating them can make easy and inexpensive diagnosis with proper history and palpation, even when both of these conditions occur in the same patient. Unfortunately, a lot of misconceptions about these illnesses abound. Too many people think fibromyalgia is a muscle ailment, which it is not, or that all widespread pain is fibromyalgia, which it is not.

A question and answer hour wrapped up the talk, and there were lots of hugs and happy tears, and many people wrote down my website with the knowledge that even if it was in English, there was a lot of information there, and even some links to French sites.

There followed more wonderful meals, and a very late, hands on helping some support group leaders with their own specific trigger point identification. We had tried to make it to a seed store to get some French varieties for my vegetable garden next year, but they were closed except during the seminar hours. We discussed setting up a multilingual section on my website, with good translations of some of my handouts. The next day, as we were bundled off to the TGV, Jeanine and Jo presented me with a large package. There was a bottle of Jo's homemade red currant wine, an assortment of French packaged vegetable seeds, and a perfect pine cone, as well as four hours of tapes with my talk and translation. Wow! That night, we sat at a small café on the rue de Rennes in Paris with our crêpes, thinking about the BBC broadcast we had just seen. American jets were bombing Afghanistan. We were flying to the U.S. the next day.

We returned to our hotel, shared the bottle of tasty currant wine (they would never let us on the plane with an unlabelled champagne-type bottle), and packed up. We hoped that the pine cone and the seeds would make it through customs. They did. Our only purchases had been two small liquors (one from Provence and one from Brittany), many post cards, and some gifts of soaps and other small items (early Christmas shopping). Our most precious memories, and our photos and videos, and the friendships we forged were the real treasures, as well as the peace of mind that comes from knowing that you have completed your mission successfully, given knowledge of great worth, and changed lives for the better. People in France knew that they needed to learn about fibromyalgia. Now they understood that they needed to learn about myofascial trigger points even more. The President of France has a wife diagnosed with fibromyalgia. I hope that she learns something about both of these conditions through the newspaper articles, newsletters and tapes that will be made available, as well as through my website.

Over a month has passed since we returned home. My body is still recovering from the travel, but the cost was small compared to the benefits. I asked a lot of my body and mind, and with the help of many, especially Rick, we accomplished what we set out to do. We learned as much as we taught. I now have volunteer translators working on French, Spanish and Dutch versions of some of the handouts on my website, and need to find other native language speakers. Last night, my publisher and I discussed condensing and readying a form of my last book for translation purposes, and I expect to start on the editing soon. We had chicken breast in chouchenn for dinner last night. I have my own batch of chouchenn working in the basement. The garnish from the Blanche Hermine, a fuzzy toy bee on a stick, now adorns one of my favorite plants in our greenhouse. I have purchased, and used, my own crêpe pan, and I picked up a number of good French cookbooks at the church tag sale. I had a serious talk with Henry the Cheeseman at the Brattleboro Co-op, and have found some cheese to approximate what we had in France. I still need a source for Valhrona chocolate and Págo juice, and the jambon de Bayonne, the cured prosciuto-type ham I love, remains elusive. We have tried to adopt a slower pace of lifestyle, with more cheese and wine and attention to "digestifs". I am still in frequent communication with my friends in France.

I am profoundly glad that we made this trip, in spite of terrorists, other dangers and health concerns. It has been life changing. We no longer look at life from the same perspective, and our lives have been greatly enriched by the view. Terrorists have one goal, to inflict terror. A healthy awareness of possible risk is a positive attribute. When you allow negative forces to alter your life through terror, you have granted them the victory they sought. We won this one.

The First Time
Robert Stone

On December 28, 2001, I attended my first-ever Mensa meeting. It has been a long time coming.

Let's start at the top. I was a junior in high school when I took the SAT. I don't recall when I first learned about Mensa, but when I found out that my score qualified me for membership, it seemed logical to sign up. I'd rather not speculate on the number of years that have rolled by since I joined Mensa, so let's just say that the Beatles had stopped touring, but were still recording together.

My life for the next few decades was probably pretty typical: graduated with an English degree and teaching certification, began a career as a CNC machinist and programmer, drove my VW camper from the Atlantic to the Pacific and Canada to Mexico, started a family, spoke to Ringo Starr - the usual stuff. Lingering in the background was Mensa. I would periodically let my membership lapse, then re-enlist, if only to prove to myself that they'd still let me in. "One of these days," I said to myself, "I'm gonna check out this group."

Not only had I never attended a Mensa function, I had never met even a single Mensan, as far as I knew. I'm sure I must have met a few, but they tend to travel incognito, passing themselves off as "normal," so it's hard to say.

Well, the first year of the new millennium (for the purists, at least) was rapidly drawing to a close when I decided to make my move. Perhaps it had to do with my recent departure from the security of teaching for the scary but exciting world of the entrepreneur. Perhaps it had to do with a nagging feeling of guilt upon discovering that Maine Mensa had given up the fight and been absorbed by (the very accommodating) New Hampshire Mensa. Whatever the reason, I found my way to the events calendar. The "Appetite for Discussion" group was meeting in Newington.

I emailed my intentions and got a nice reply from Laurie. I showed up a few minutes early and met my first Mensan, Louis. Louis is a retired professor, so we had teaching in common. He was, if memory serves, a fellow "newbie," also attending his first meeting. This was a lot less intimidating than walking into a roomful of Mensa veterans. At 7:00 p.m., the main group arrived. Introductions were made all around, and I found myself very much at ease in the midst of 16.5 Mensans ranging from preschoolers (that's the 0.5) through retirees. We enjoyed a sumptuous buffet, complete with cool libations sporting these clever little paper umbrellas. Our conversations were varied and interesting, and we laughed a lot. We stayed long enough to watch the beginning of the karaoke competition. Fascinating.

In short, I had a great time, I'm glad I went, and I fully intend to continue, a newbie no more! So, how about you? Isn't this the perfect time to shake things up a little in your life? Why not try "Appetite for Discussion" the next time around? And could I get some Mainers down here, too? (You might want to arrive just a few minutes early...)

We look forward to seeing you on March 22nd at 7:00 p.m. in Newington. Don't wait as long as I did!