No Blue Feelings Here

Thought for the day: People are like stain-glassed windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed. Only if there is a light from within. [Elisabeth Kubler-Ross]

Our daughter Sunshine is definitely one of those people with a bright shiny inner light. That's her in the photo, being assisted by her cat Mrs. Flinn. It seems the kitty thought it was time to get out of bed and start the day. (i.e. Feed the cats.)

Anyhow, tomorrow is our baby girl's birthday. Somehow or another, and I have NO idea how this could've POSSIBLY happened, our youngest kiddo has the unbelievable audacity to be turning forty. I know! Crazy, right? Seems like Smarticus and I just hit that milestone a few years ago.  (sigh)

She mentioned something a couple weeks ago that I thought would make a pretty nifty blog post, so what better time to share it than in honor of her birthday?  It's about some... blue people. Yeah, really... blue. Not the kind of blue as in Billie Holiday's song Am I Blue, but blue as in the color blue. (Then again, being blue may have made them sad, too...)

In 1820, Frenchman Martin Fugate settled in a remote area of the Appalachians near Hazard, Kentucky called Troublesome Creek, and he married a local gal named Elizabeth Smith. As it turned out, both of them carried a recessive gene for a rare condition known as methemoglobinemia. (Which, understandably, is most often referred to as met-H.) Some members of a nearby clan also carried this recessive gene.

As I already mentioned, this was a verrrry remote area, so as you might imagine, the gene pool was, shall we say... extremely shallow. Familial inbreeding and crossbreeding with that other clan became the accepted norm, which meant that the shy retiring recessive gene became much more bossy and caused an inordinate number of met-H cases... the infamous Blue Fugates of Kentucky.

[image courtesy of Walt Spitzmiller]

Why were they blue, you ask?

When there's too much methemoglobin in the blood, the hemoglobin's ability to carry oxygen gets seriously screwed up, which leads to purple lips, blue skin, and chocolate-colored blood.

In the twentieth century, when transportation out of the area was more readily available, many of the Fugate descendants moved away, and thanks to their access to a more diverse gene pool, the bizarre predominance of blue-skinned people came to an end. The last known member of the family born with this condition was Benjamin Stacy, who was born in 1975 with skin so blue, his nurse feared for his life. Luckily, as he grew older, he lost the blue tint. His current whereabouts is unknown.

Although this unusual Smurf-like condition can be deadly in the extreme, the Fugate clan only had one symptom... they were blue.

While we're talking about Kentucky and the color blue, how about... bluegrass?

[image courtesy of Morguefile]

As you can see in the photo, Kentucky bluegrass looks just as green as every other kinda grass, so how'd it get that name?

[image courtesy of Morguefile]

Because when that grass isn't cut, and its seed heads are left alone to grow unhampered, their bluish-purple color will make a springtime or summer field of Kentucky bluegrass truly look blue from a distance.

Cool, huh?

[image courtesy of Morguefile]

One final thing about bluegrass... and I don't mean the grass. The music!

That wonderful music born in the Appalachians, just like the Fugate clan. With mixed roots in Irish, Scottish, and English traditional music, and later influenced by African Americans and jazz, it's hard to imagine anyone listening to this music without tapping a toe.

So, in honor of Sunshine's birthday, I'm gonna share a fabulous bit of bluegrass... a song she and I both happen to love.

Happy birthday, sweetie.

                                            Y'all keep smiling. No blue feelings allowed.

                                   Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.