The Road to Wellville/Chapter 1
Come, Join the Happy Throng
t is a glorious thing to be well. For health is joy. It makes of the simplest things of life a pure delight. To walk, if there is spring in the step; to eat with relish and good digestion; to lie down at night to refreshing sleep—these things are joyous, if one has health.To escape without pain is a low ideal of health. That is not enough. We want every sense to be keen to serve us with pleasure; every nerve to be a swift, Mercury-like messenger between the outside world and us; every muscle eager to “fetch and carry,” pull and push; every cell quickened for the constant work of renewal.
Yet, too many are careless with precious health so long as actual illness does not emphasize its loss. Too many take health for granted and neglect the simple precautions which safeguard this priceless possession. Especially is this true with regard to the foods we eat—the materials upon which the body must depend to build and repair its tissues, to regulate its vital processes, to promote its growth and health, and to provide energy for its activities.
The right choice of foods is the first rule of healthful living. This does not mean one must undertake a limited and distasteful diet. Quite the contrary. When the body’s food needs are understood and the composition of the various foods is known, it is possible to enjoy even a greater variety of palatable dishes.
The human body must have food materials of various types and amounts if it is to be kept brimming with health. It needs certain food elements to make it grow, others to furnish energy, others to regulate its functions, and still others to build new and repair old tissues.
Not only must the body have the right food for each requirement, but it must have each type of food in proper amounts. The meal must be balanced—that is, it must contain energy-giving, tissue-building, function-regulating, and growth foods in right proportions. What these right proportions are depends upon the age, size, sex, and activity of the individual.
Food for a nutritious diet must be chosen carefully and in the right proportions. Just because we do not become violently ill immediately following a meal does not mean we have had food which will keep our bodies healthy. The bad effects of wrong food selection show themselves in more subtle ways. But science has established beyond a doubt that wrong eating, slowly but surely undermines the health and leaves the body easy prey to disease.
Every mother has seen how what she eats affects her nursing child. Science has established also that her food before the child is born has just as definite effects. If the expectant mother’s diet is lacking in minerals, vitamins, and other materials which are needed in building teeth, the first teeth of the infant show the bad results.
But knowing the importance of right food selection and the functions of food in the body does no good unless this knowledge is used in the selection of each meal. Malnutrition is not found exclusively in children from poor homes. Examinations of thousands of school children have shown that many poorly nourished children come from well-to-do families.
The woman who sees in her profession of feeding the family only a drab routine has never seen the “spires of Wellville shining in the sun.” She has strayed from the pleasant road that leads to this capital of Health. To build the body right, to make it receptive and expressive, vital, responsive, joyous—surely this is no mean or petty piece of routine work.
The selection of the fundamentally right foods, the preparing and serving of them so as to make scientific living a pleasure—these things are vital. There is no efficiency without health. It is as necessary to the success of work as to the joy of living.
Thousands are marching down the Road to Wellville. Come, join the happy throng!