We celebrated the election of Obama not so long ago. On inaugaration eve the Republican leaders deciced to be a Millstone around his neck. For what reason would politicians make this decision that would harm the country at a very vunerable juncture. Only for power of the few at the cost of life and liberty and happiness of the many. Instead of working with, compromising with, and negotiation with an elected President, they doggedly held to the failed policies of an unelected President. And as the first term of this good President comes to an end the Republicans still have the same dried up moldy bone clutched in their jaw. They have fought every positive move to bring about the reforms that would end, or at least limit, the excesses of Big Banks, Wall Street, Predatory Corporations, and Environmental Polluters. The Republican Party seems to have morphed into a heridatary remnant that must still remain in thier DNA, the Know Nothings of the 20′s,
Martin Brashir on MSNBC had a reflection for Easter on his show. With the political discord we see today it was an apt piece of history to revive.
He reflected upon a sermon that was delivered in 1630, when a group of Puritans arrived in the Massachusetts Bay colony on board the Arabella.
The sermon was preached by John Winthrop who was the Puritans’ leader and it was entitled, “A Model of Christian Charity.” Winthrop told his shipmates that it was their responsibility to create a “city upon a hill” that would light up and be the envy of the world.
But how to light a city like that? Would it be the shiny stardom of celebrity or the blinding light of ostentatious wealth, or the endless power of political influence and control?
No, this is what John Winthrop said that such a community would need to do in order to become a city upon a hill –
“We must love one another. We must bear one another’s burdens, make others’ conditions our own. We must rejoice together, mourn together, labor together, suffer together. Always having before our eyes a community where we are all members of the same body.”
This sure sounds like a political agenda for today. The ”City on the hill” part of the prayer has been used by both parties in elections at various times.
Lets Reflect:
Do we love one another? Sometimes. This is such a hot one we cannot even define love. We use the word to define certain kinds of love as ok and others not acceptable because of the books of the three major religions. And we do have this pretty well confused. The early Christian Church blessed marriages between two men!
Do we bear one another’s burdens? Poorly. The safety net is full of holes and in need of a complete reconstruction and expansion. Unfortunately we have one party that just wants to demolish the remains of the net and drop more people into poverty and degradation.
Do we make other’s conditions our own? Poorly. The poor and prison population increases and that is great for the prison industry which is booming. We make sure that there are better conditions for some and worse for others through our social and tax policies. Recently our Supreem Court gave lifeless corporations full citizenship with the right to spend unlimited funds to shape our political landscape. There is a constant fight by people of good will to make this better, but they face a strong head-wind.
Do we rejoice together? Yes when we kill an evil leader-Osama Bin Ladin. No when we elect our first American President of Color.
Do we mourn together?: Sort of - There was a loud outcry from a broad section of the population when Trayvon Martin was killed. But there was a good segment of the population who wish the story would have gone unreported. After all it was a mixed race person killing a black teen. We have not shown much concern for that type of crime historically. Neither side is much in favor especially with the Right today. Second for the 10+ years of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq the caskets of our servicemen and women have been unloaded off the huge air transports with out the eye of the press and the subsequent video on air. After all it is only a volunteer military and only 1% of the population is making the sacrifice.
Do we labor together? No. We have reached a class structure in the United States that would be the envy of any 19th, 20th, or 21st Century Dictator. One hundred and sixty people have provided 80% of the money that goes to secret unlimited fund accumulation groups that sway our current Presidential election. Union Rights are being canceled in Republican dominated states. Minimum wage, fair wage and equal wage laws are being ripped up as if corporations will treat their employees fairly without a heavy hand on their ledgers. More than half of our population is at or below the poverty line and all remaining social supports are under threat of elimination to make the situation worse. There is a two tiered tax system, low for the rich, and high for the middle class.
Do we suffer together? No. We have the highest percentage of our population in prison of any developed country. A disproportion of those people are people of color. A disproportion of the convictions for illegal drug use falls on people of color even though the white population consumes the largest amount of illegal drugs by far. How can this be true? Just economics they have more income to dispose of on drugs. Women suffer from lower wages and more demeaning job availability. Children bear the worst brunt of the countries poverty and abuse. This list could go on for ever.
Are we a community where we are all members of the same body? No. “The United States of America” Unfortunately we cannot seem to shake our DNA. Our Revolution brought about an amazing country, but division, separation, segmentation has been a big part of our growth to greatness. It did not take long to change an accepting native population into disposable enemies. Wholesale destruction of native populations as we moved west was accomplished with the full military might of the United States Government. Land rights disputes by The Native American Population continues to this day in our courts. We have grown so much that we voice loud our cries when repression and extermination of native populations happen in other countries. It seems that the Whigs and Tories never buried the hatchet when you look at our current political stalemate. How many different ways do our most radical citizens on each side divide this country? Race, Religion, Nationality, Economic Class, Health Care, Women’s Rights, Tax System, are just some of the ways we are divided and if you think about it you can add more to my list.
Please comment. Yes opposing views are welcome.
I’m really trying to understand what type of America we will have in just a few years if Republicans and the Far Right gain more influence then they have already won.
Economic Hero meets Social Issues
Henry Ford’s factory was a dysfunctional and costly as people quit within weeks of signing on to the repetitive crushing assembly line work. It was expensive to replace and retrain workers. At the time he did not think of the option to take his production to China. He increased the pay so he could select and keep better and more loyal workers who were suited to the work. He was then able to produce cheaper cars, more people could afford them and by accident he raised the standard of living of millions of Americans. So Ford did not raise the wage so his few thousand workers could afford his cars, he could care less. But in effect he created a higher minimum wage for millions. Even though Ford was a tight wad from youth I don’t think he was in the 1% untill he realized a manufacturing dream in combination with an economic reality that changed our Social Contract. A man who was as cheep, tight, and cranky as any millionaire on the planet today realized that the best product idea was worthless without a good mix of product, price, and people. Henry started the unheard of $5.00 a day pay for his workers. That simple example launched one of the most successful product introductions up until the I-Phone. The political disconnect today is that there does not seem to be a realization that the Social Issues of the day are the Economic Issues of the day.
Why can’t our Republican Limited Resource Radicals not comprehend that the Social Contract is the Economic Contract with the American People?
So lets not follow Ford, and solve the problems of today’s evolving society with solutions of benefit everyone. Where in the image of ”America the Shining Example on The Hill”, is the concept that if some of our people do really well it has to be on the backs of a mass of suffering citizens. We certainly want the current situation made worse by elimination of the minimum wage (Social Issue to the Right) which currently will not allow a person working 40 hours a week to rent a two bedroom apartment at fair market rates in any state of the United States (read Economic Issue). God only knows what that person does for food and clothing for his children, and spouse. No the last statement was not a sexist slip. In the Republican world women are back, bearing children, barefooted, and aproned, where they belong. Not to worry we will take away their right to protest and vote to make this policy easier on all of us. Perhaps the minimum wage, once a good idea, is outdated and we should look for a new model (Social and Economic) that takes care of those citizens we want to be invisible and just go away. God forbid that we find a way to raise the unwashed millions to the level of customers. Mayberry here we come, back to the future.
Lets eliminate Social Security. Replace it with what? ( Who cares Social Security has Social right in its name it must be a Social Issue.) A system backed by Wall Street investment community? Really? Really? After their stellar performance in bringing the nation to her economic knees. Seniors with social security checks still coming in were saved from complete collapse (an Economic Issue?).
Lets not have a National Health Care system because all of the other industrial nations of the world must be wrong by providing a sensible system that costs half of what we pay. Health care is not a right guaranteed by the constitution (read Social Issue). When the constitution was written there was no health care as we know it. Things have changed wake up look around the virus, microscope, cat scan, and transplant surgery have been discovered and are in common use in spite of no authority written in the constitution. As I write this our Ex-Heartless Unelected Vice President from Hell hath receive his first heart from an unknown (asked to be anonymous) donor. None of these medical items and events are mentioned in the Constitution not one. Our system is a form of indentured servitude where the employer and employees are entrapped in a plan controlled by a huge insurance industry. When an employee signs up to build widgets he has no knowledge of his new employers expertise in health care. The Employer has no expertise in healthcare because it is not their core business and if they could get out of providing health care they would in a minute. We have by accident allowed a huge middle man the insurance industry get between the patient and the service and syphon off millions of dollars of revenue that could go to actually making life more healthy for real people (Economic Issue anyone?).
Lets not provide child care or family leaves for adoption, pregnancy, birth, and illness. (totally Social Issues). Well since the Republicans are hell-bent on eliminating abortion you would think they have a plan for the huge crop of children that are going to arrive over the next twenty centuries of their new Reich. Even Hitler had a plan to support women and all those blond and blue-eyed offspring he encouraged though his youth sex camps. In reality our workforce really depends on women to function, no longer is it a luxury for women to work. We already have a very fair system that pays them less than men, well since they are stronger they can take the hardship. We have a system that weakens families so many women and children are deserted by the males (Social Issue) who feel impotent after fathering children they cannot afford to support (Economic Issue).
Lets eliminate Unions (read Free-loading Social Clubs-Pure Social Issue right?), those radical Communists who think they deserve a portion of the success that their companies enjoy as a result of their labor. Unions who brought you, benefits, sick days, child labor laws, vacations, weekend cook outs, time to watch the NFL, NASCAR time, going camping and fishing with your children, retirement plans, pensions, and yes employer supported health care, oops time to watch the NBA can’t forget the hoops. (Well the government has not gotten it right in over 200 years some one had to act.) Really you want to stand up alone against a monstrously large insurance company and negotiate your benefits (read your Economic Issue) all by yourself. Really! Who do you think you are, Clint Eastwood or Bruce Willis, or perhaps Jimmy Stewart? Now that you lost the battle with the Insurance Mogul and you realize that your hourly rate will not cover your childs care for aggressive cancer treatment, you put on your super hero costume and get ready for the next battle. Dressed as Super Daddy you brace your boss and demand he triple your wages or you child will die. Feel you balls already tight in you super suit, pull all the way up into your stomach, as Boss Grinch tells you to clear out your desk because alternative dress day left with the Union that the Republicans destroyed.
Lets eliminate the Department of Education (read Social Issue) because a more complex world needs a better trained work force and we have already found those people in China, Ireland, Mexico, India, Indonesia, and all over South East Asia. Those people appreciate education and American children do not seem to have that drive any more. X-Boxes will keep them entertained into the next millennia (might this cross-over into an Economic Issue). No sense trying to tackle a difficult problem. Our Legislators would rather have a hearings on drug testing of over millionaire professional athletes (Read real citizens since they make a lot of money). Our government has abdicated its responsibility to do the tough things like getting along with the opposition, making reasonable deals, compromise, think critically, and act in the best interest of All Americans. Just forme it would be nice if I could believe that some Republican Legislators would leave the fine heritage of the Know Nothing Party behind (subject of a future blog) and accept basic science as a fact of life, not just a good idea that they can deny.
Lets eliminate the Environmental Protection Agency (read Social Issue). I spelled out the name because three letters don’t really get the message across that we only have one environment to live in and we have historically done a bad job of managing it. We forget the Great Dust Bowl that devastated the mid west, was man-made. We have barely gotten the ozone hole repaired by a world-wide accomplishment of eliminating CFC’s and we turn around and try to destroy it more effectively with the release of gasses from the thawing permafrost - not so perma anymore. , and destruction of the rain forest. Let’s get our straws out and suck up every bit of precious oily fluids from below the surface of this planet. When we have removed all the lubricants God only knows what friction we will have created. And straws are really too ineffective. Lets pump toxic chemicals into every crevice in the ground to bring up all the trapped explosive gasses to the surface to be burned in a headlong race to extinction (could this also be an Economic Issue).
Most important of all we want to include as much religious thought (Social Issue?) into our governing as possible. Remember how well Martin Luther got along with the Pope? What was that Inquisition about? What was the ratio of women to men accused of witchcraft in Salem MA? How many states were the Mormons driven out of until they met friendly seagulls in Utah. Are the Israelis and Palestinians fighting of some distant religious difference? Why was Hitler so disturbed by the Jews? The Crusades made a great under story for the Robin Hood movie, didn’t it? I think our founders were profound in separating religion from any official requirement for office. Better your religious petitions to God be taken to a closed room and talked out with your particular creator in private, and should your petition be righteous you will be rewarded in public. (This paraphrase was a suggestion by Jesus and I don’t think he would be offended if it were carried out by copy cat believers of any faith.)
There is no separation between the Economic climate and the Social issues of any era. Class strata eventually brought down Empires and their Rulers. Agriculture brought about a new social order. Growth of industry changed the social contract. The information age shifted the social order. Hand in hand the economy and the social contract have in the past and will into the future march or slink or crawl down a difficult path together, it is not a choice.
“NO, WE ARE NOT HAPPY!”
“STOP RESTATING THE MYTH THAT WE ARE!”
Every time a pol or a TV talking head states with authority that the majority of people are happy with their employer supported health care I hear a scream from my wife. “Who are they talking about?” One year we were faced with seven changes to our health insurance plan by one employer. The employer was apologetic each time a change was forced by an insurance company who arbitrarily changed their rates upward sometimes by as much as 30%. And I was not employed by some small mom and pop business but a large employer with thousands of employees all over the United States. In spite of their size the employer was forced to go into the market and negotiate a new policy.
Several of the changes of course upped our co-pays and out-of-pocket, and annual expense limit, “three phrases that insurance companies use to describe the exact same thing”, money that you have to spend on top of any premium. Some of the changes caused us to change our health care providers from one medical group to another. In our location there is a duopoly of two health care systems so we got to know providers in both of them pretty well as we went back and forth.
Connecting health care to employers is a flawed system that came about through an accident of war-time economy. Wages were fixed at a time of competition for workers during WWII, and employers somehow hit on providing health care as an incentive to attract workers. During a time of relatively low-cost it worked fairly well, but as our health care system became more complex and expensive the employer model started to shred. I don’t know the history of the “pre-existing condition”, but that was the spring that closed the trap on the employer and especially the employee. You say why would the employer care? Well, a person in his employee comes down with some expensive ailment as the insurance company starts to pay and total the cost of this individual they are looking to see how long are they tied to their contract before they can raise their rates to the employer. The employee is the rabbit in the trap, because with a difficult condition no other employer will take him on, even if he sees a much better opportunity in another location or employer he cannot move. Unhappy employees who are hanging on to a job only for health insurance are not the most productive. Both the employee and the employer lose. The country loses big time as rates climb and productivity heads for other countries who have solved this problem.
If you don’t have access to Health Care you really do not have the right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. So if you are a talk show host of a Politico of some stripe I and my wife will state that most people if they really think about the trap they are in will tell you that our Health Care System is not something to be happy about. One of the biggest problem is that we have a giant in the room that has a big booming voice in the discussion who should not exist at all. The Huge Middle man in the room that provides no medical care whatsoever is the Insurance Industry and their very expensive lobby. For every dime that goes to an insurance company at a minimum two to three cents go to playing golf. Playing golf is my expression for huge marble tiled building with plush executive suites, trips to exotic places for legions of sales people and executives, perks that are well beyond the reach of the average citizen who is denied coverage for their sick or disabled child.
“You have to be taught to be afraid of people whose skins of a different shade.” From South Pacific by Rogers and Hammerstein
To establish a system of class strata in the United States, radical right-wing “Christian” conservatives are busy hammering wedges into our law.
Why do 26 States now have Stand Your Ground, Shoot to Kill laws?
Why have the League of Women Voters ended their voter registration drives in Florida after over 70 years of bringing the democratic process to millions of Americans?
Why are we going full speed ahead with no controls on hydraulic fracturing for gas production?
Why is evolution and science in general under attack in the United States?
Why is an organization trying to separate gays and black Americans over the push for expanding the right to marriage?
Why are so many conservative against access to health care for all Americans?
Why are women in America under attack on issues of Health Care, Reproduction, Employment Equality, and Protection against rape and abuse?
Why are the same people who are proposing anti Sharia Laws legislation, implementing laws that parallel Sharia Law?
Why are the descendents of immigrants doing all they can to stop immigration from becoming a fair process?
Why are some people supporting the two class tax system that we have?
Why is the minimum wage, child labor laws, food stamps, and unemployment insurance all under attack?
Why do some people want to end Medicare and Social Security?
What ever happened to “We have nothing to fear but fear itself!”?
Look left and right and try to see who around you is promoting fear and inequality. When you recognize the individuals who are promoting these things you will have found where the destruction of America is coming from. Living in gated communities, with private police, armed to the teeth are some very fearful, weak, sad people. Since they have money they think they are in control. They live in fear of the poor and the poor rightfully live in fear of them. Unfortunately for the rich they have made a fatal mistake. The poor never revolt against the rich in all of history it has never happened. The rich have misplaced their fear. The rich have slowly over a forty plus year period, and now with increasing venom attacked the middle class. The middle class have been wounded, and having done nothing to provoke the attack are slow to react to the pain. Occupy Wall Street was a rifle shot across the bow. Now since the rich are attacking the very democratic process of one vote for each person with voter suppression laws they have closed a safety valve which will increase the pressure to strike against them. I pray that the guillotines are not brought out into the public squares for Wall Street moguls, sold out Legislators, and religious bigots, but the middle class has been told “if there is no bread let them eat cake.”
Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. Are there any barriers to the pursuit of happiness in the United States. Are there any barriers to Life and Liberty in the United States?
Our minimum wage law adjusted for inflation is inadequate for a basic standard of living in the United States. If you work 40 hours a week at minimum wage in Missouri, the low-cost housing state where I live you will not be able to pay for a two bedroom apartment at the prevailing rents. You would have to work a 68 hour week, and then with shelter taken care of what will you do for food? Sue and I lived in Maryland before coming here 12 years ago. In Maryland a person would have to work 168 hours to afford the apartment if he was making minimum wage. With out proper shelter and food do you even have a life let alone the ability to pursue Happiness?
You’re born with a terrible illness to parents who have been laid off from their jobs. Yes they had insurance through employers just months ago. They had the option of COBRA but the rates are way over the budget of someone trying to live on unemployment insurance. They and their child will never know liberty in America again. Thousands of dollars a day are run up by hospital room charges and tests and operations to save the child’s life. If and when the child is able to come home where he will need special care for life there is no outside support for his family, and the months in the hospital will have incurred hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt. No abortion for a severely challenged fetus was ever considered in a conservative controlled country where abortions are only performed in back rooms under horrible conditions or in private hospitals quietly for the rich. There will be no provision for further care since the couple are virtually bankrupt for life. Food stamps have been severely restricted. No company insurance policy will ever take this couple on since they would have to take on the care of child also.
Norma Jean is connected to people and she recognizes the difference between people and other objects on this planet. If Sue is the one to take the dogs out into our fenced yard and I am the laggard they will disperse, all ten of them into various activities around our fenced yard. Finding a ball to get tossed is one of the favorites, and who can pick up the biggest stick and drop it on a human toe comes in second. If one of them is in a solitary mode, often that is Bailey; then taking a plush toy, or dead tree limb blown out of our shingle oaks to the shelter of the ivy bush for a quite session of observing and chewing. Chase and hide can break out at anytime with Tess, or Noah in the lead tearing around the whole perimeter of the yard until the leader dives into a safety zone which are a spaces under one of our sculptures, or below the deck swing. The three to five chasers in the game take the play and bark position, urging the leader to breakout of the hiding place for a second round of chase.
No matter what the level of hilarity, confusion, and activity is when I step out of the garage into the yard, Normas Jean will spot me and come romping across what ever space exists between us. Happy tail wagging, running, flying, and leaping over any barrier including one of her siblings should they dare to get in the way, her aim is for my chest. She is a mass of jumping wiggles as I try to protect my self from muddy feet and re-connect her with the ground. Norma Jean would just rather be in the company of people. We are her most important obsession. So what does this have to do with justice?
If a dog, a pet, one of our four-footed furry friends can be so attached to people why is it that we are less so occupied. If we are rich we have no affinity for the poor, and the poor no affinity for the rich. If we are perceived to be smart we show little love of those less so. There is even a group within society that is proud of being undereducated and therefore disconnected from the “elite” over educated “snobs”. My wife spent some time as Syracuse city dweller where she frequently rode the public transit busses. Sue is a private person who loves to read, and a book can be a source of information, enjoyment, and a shield to hide behind at times. She was amazed at the number of people who felt the need to interrupt her reading by stating that they had not read a book since leaving High School. She thought many of those people were trying to save her from the pain of reading a book. They were so wound up in their ignorance that they could not believe a person would enjoy the experience of reading.
In allocating our national resources the current trend says they should all be the treasures of a few; very-very few, by the statistics that scroll across all kinds of news programs, blogs, and posts. Norma Jean does not know if I am college educated, or a high school drop out; whether I am rich or poor, and I don’t know if she has a concept of short and tall. She values my presence, a hug, pat, scratch, and love. And Sue has some great pictures of the dogs gathered around me as I read out loud. Seems since we like books the dogs think the process of reading is pretty important and they participate enthusiastically. The unconditional acceptance is not from just from Norma Jean, she is just a representative of a species that gives a lot more than it takes from a relationship.
Walking along the highways and byways of America today in increasing numbers, it seems, men and to a lesser extent couples with all of their possessions wrapped in canvas and strapped to their backs, march along, or stand begging at crossroads with a companion dog or two. There on the side of the road is a little isolated community, separate from the larger community of man. Are we so undomesticated that we throw scraps and occasional hands full of change out of a moving car window to our fellow-man. He should clean himself up and get a job says one candidate, and another says there is no concern since we have a safety net for them so we can patch the net if necessary. Certainly it is no longer the mission of man to include into his society any who have fallen off the track of success. Commerce is the new god, impersonal, who will reward any who just work hard enough. We value every life until it comes into the full reality of a new-born screaming infant, I want food, shelter, love, comfort–reality and then we turn our collective backs. It is not my nor my government’s responsibility. We are not a brotherhood of man. We are a competitive group of cogs in a machine that recently has been given personhood courtesy of the Supreme Court. No more nine months of labor to produce a citizen–just a sheaf of paper, a few stamps, an official embossed corporate seal,and about a hundred dollars and you have a brand new American with the ability to buy elections. Not just Justice, but Supreme Court Justice.
I doubt that Norma Jean my Portuguese Water Dog, or the poor couple by the side of the road would recognize the new American Citizens. It does not pass the smell test, nor can you look a corporation in the eyes and determine which way the ball is going to be thrown. My dog Norma Jean and the poorest citizen traveling the by-ways of this country can recognize who a person is: Why can’t our Supreme Court collectively be as smart as a dog. Perhaps they could use some guide dogs in their future decision-making process.
This is the first commentary from the Potato Heads, Sam and Sheila, whom I expect will pop up from time to time here, as their complicated navigation of the U. S. health care system begins.
When it finally came down to it Mr. and Mrs. Potato head had to accept that they were a gay couple. Wikipedia had been very revealing to them on sexual matters. After viewing all the various diagrams and going a step further to visually experience sex on a series of sex video sites they could see no similarity with their idea of reproduction and what was called heterosexual interaction. They would occasionally get the feeling that the weather conditions were right and they would lay down in a field of ploughed earth with some of their eyes making contact with the freshly turned soil. They could feel excitement as shoots would grow out into the ground starting new life. Once a few shoots had established themselves and Sam and Sheila found that there was a strong pull of resistance when they tried to turn over, it was time to help each other rock back and forth to pull away from their new offspring. For them the separation was the final climax in their procreative process. Their family would spread out in shoots and runners, and at the end of season there would be a bushel of their offspring.
For the Potato Heads eye-care was an important medical consideration. Unlike humans with only two eyes each, Sam and Sheila had a total of 43 eyes between them. Standard health policies that humans had did not even cover their two eyes for each person. In their search for eye-care they came up against another wall that seemed to be prejudicial. Since insurance companies considered the eyes of Sam and Sheila to be sexual organs, not organs of sight they would allow certain prescriptions for Sam that excited his eyes, but denied prescriptions for Sheila because they might be used to stop the growth of shoots and new life. Humans had another problem, since their health care policies did not cover vision care at all and they had to get specialized policies for vision care. Both Sam and Sheila thought it strange that insurance companies would treat one part of the same body different from another part.
Morgan went off the rails. We thought she was in pain, but her actions were anything but a show of physical distress. Leaping from the floor to the top of the washing machine. Put down on the floor, she sprang right back up on to her perch. She had a desire to be at the highest point possible in any room in the house. When we wanted to go out we confined her to a bathroom for her own protection and to have less destruction in the house. On returning home she would be in the tub or sitting in the sink having turned the water on full. We had a week of this, leading to an appointment with the vet to see if he could come up with an explanation. It was a morning appointment and I dropped Morgan off at the vet, an had to leave on a business trip.
I drove away from home in Springfield to do a presentation at a High School in Kansas City. The vet could not come up with an explanation that was of any help to Sue and she saw that Morgan was still not acting herself. She is afraid of storms and reacts before they get close, or before they are forecast on the weather channel. Her heightened and alarmed behavior continued even though there was no impending storm, and as the day progressed there was no forecast of a storm to come. Morgan did forecast correctly, she was aware of a storm that humans do not seem to have the ability to predict. The storm was going on in my mind and apparently had been brewing all that week of her bizarre behavior. Sue did not get the normal check in call from me. Sometimes I would forget, but she grew more worried as the sun set and it was long after any High School would have students in attendance. When she could not raise me on my cell phone, the next step was to call the police. They checked my schedule and checked with the contacts at the High School where I was to speak. No connections, no helpful knowledge about where I was came from all the calls they could think to make.
Morgan was connected and disturbed. Too bad she could only sense something wrong, but was not be able to talk.
My first memories were of driving on ice-covered development roads and sliding around. At some point I drove into the Technical High School Parking lot. I took my materials for presentation out of the car and walked haltingly to the office to sign in. The secretary looked at me like I had landed off another planet. “Your wife has been looking for you Robert, are you ok, you don’t look so good.” The director of the school came out of his office and had me sit down.
I could hear that phone calls were made and an ambulance called. I was whisked off to a local hospital admitted and soon was the subject of every scan known to man. Some twenty-eight or so hours were unaccounted for in my memory banks. Those hours are still gone from my memory. No recollection has popped up in the six or so years since the incident. Tests were inconclusive. Medical science had no real answers.
My wife told me some weeks later that she had a credit card bill from a motel that was on my route. That news did not jar any memories other than some survival instinct had me go to ground as it were during my black out period.
Morgan was very happy and complaining at the same time when I was permitted to come home from the hospital. I was ordered to stay off the road for any reason for some time. Since then she is my companion, close companion, if I even exhibit the signs of a common cold. Where I go she goes if my absence is going to be more than a couple of hours. When Sue and I go out the stores and have lunch and come home a couple of hours later she is there at the door, barking and complaining about our short absence.
Over the years Sue and I have witnessed the senses of our pets that have gone far beyond our limited abilities. Did we once have these abilities? Did we lose the connections as we became mor “civilized”? Why have we not lost the desire to kill as efficiently?
“The tornado sounded like a freight train as it roared through, and when we climbed out of the wrecked bathroom we were amazed we were alive. We lost every thing we had, but it was only material things. God must have been with us.” Tornado survivor anywhere. A swath of Joplin, Missouri was wiped off the map and we saw many interviews where we could substitute any of the couples names and attribute the dialogue above to them. Over the years I have heard the same interview taken in the rubble of all kinds of disasters all over the globe. We are alive, we have our health we will be alright everything else is just material things. Yes there are tears for the album, the prized collection of something, the house built by a grandfather, an inheritance gone forever. The tears are always followed by the, “ but we are alive…and….”.
Office crew is a little light today, little not, so more that half the crew is out. Martha started coughing on Tuesday and I tried to get her to go home, but she took a couple of cough drops and said she would tough it out. Next day she came in to work and the cough was deeper in her chest and her eyes were red. Henry started with a little catch in his voice later that day, and before the closing bell, Norma, Lila, and Christie were complaining to extend their breaks. Everyone showed up on Thursday, morale was not up to par and if I could I would have sent the whole crew home. Monday left me with just two out of eight people showing up for work. With six out we did our best to help our most urgent need customers. Three weeks later this office was back to full strength after a loss of hundreds of work hours and thousand of dollars of economic loss and one major customer who went to a competitor.
Smoke rose over the small frying pan as a single egg went up in greasy flames. When she reached for the handle her arthritic hand reacted to the burn throwing the flaming metal saucer wavering in an arching flight across the room. Hitting the little kitchen table it flipped on to the seat cushion on the one chair and a small flame started as the pan continued to the linoleum floor which ignited about 15 seconds later. Confused and frightened Lacy tried to smother the chair cushion with a kitchen towel, but that flamed up also and was dropped to the already flaming floor. Spinning around and catching her sturdy mid heeled shoe on a raised seam in the worn floor covering, she fell and lost consciousness as her frail hip snapped. Accidental death, was the coroners finding. Lacy had been a wife, a mother, a secretary, a member of the local garden club before her memory started to fail. Judy her oldest daughter only lived a mile away and checked on her every day. When her mother started losing her memory two years ago, and her normal routine became chaotic, Judy and Charles her husband visited several assisted living facilities. They found out that since Lacy has some money and a house almost all of that would go to the state, and federal government before any Medicaid support would come to help them. Six thousand dollars a month was not in their range of possibilities. Lacy was furious that they even suggested an assisted living facility, but was even more adamant about wanting to leave the small inheritance her and her husband had saved to her grandchildren. She would stay in her home.
Good strong lungs, the attending nurse half laughed as she wrapped the newborn in white cotton blanket and brought her to Angela a mother for the first time. Angela took the tightly wrapped bundle that had a tiny nose showing and looked into the small face not with love but scorn. There was not an abortion option anywhere in her county or her state, or the five surrounding states. After being raped in her own apartment by an intruder who had not been apprehended yet she wanted an abortion as soon as she found out that the violation had resulted in pregnancy. The morning after pill had been banned, and all the abortion clinics closed. A friend knew someone who could perform the abortion outside the law, she went to see him and the conditions were horrible. She ran away from one horror hoping that it was possible she would develop that natural loving maternal instinct. In the end, there was no fairy tale. Her mind and heart would not accept a rapist as a bearer of a great gift. In the end she had arranged a blind adoption. There was no way she wanted to know where the child was going. How was she ever to feel whole again, and the thought wasn’t for the child, it was for a loss of an intimate part of herself. She had been owned by the state for the last nine months impressed into a sentence of forced maternity. Inside she felt more like a criminal, tried and sentenced for a crime committed against her. Meanwhile two floors below the maternity ward a small child was passed into a brave new world. He was born. We can only hope his adoptive parents would care.
Life: when all else is stripped away we say it is our most precious possession.
There had been a large loss of life during the tornado’s six to seven mile path through Joplin, Missouri. A huge effort has been made to bring back the destroyed schools, ground has broken for the Mercy, Hospital, Rangeline Road is filling in with fast food, Home Depot, Wal-Mart, and other businesses that were completely destroyed. Lives were lost, but life is coming back with a huge influx of federal and state disaster aid. On the material side, the City of Joplin has said it will come out of the disaster without a huge debt. We as a country have responded to the disaster and helped a city rebuild itself. Even the High School Prom attendees will not have the expense of renting tuxedos, buying gowns, at the largess of some charitable groups. When you see the good that has been done in the aftermath of this disaster you cannot help but think of the generosity of our people.
When Marth first felt the catch in her throat which turned into a nasty cough, she wanted to go home and climb under the covers. What would a couple of days of mean, and the next thought was the rent was due, and the car payment her two biggest expenses. Three days out of her pay check would leave her short, the company had no sick days, and no insurance for its workers either. She had looked at buying health insurance, she event had a friend who would be happy to write-up the policy for her. Not possible to cover the additional expense with her already stretched budget. She was determined to get a full pay check and collapse after paying her two big bills. She would figure out how to make it through the rest of the month with a short second check. Deep down she felt all alone in a very busy city, her little disaster was her’s alone, no one was coming with any support to the rescue. So she hung in there and spread her cold throughout the office, costing the company and her co-workers thousands and thousands of dollars. In the second half of the month out of her short paycheck she wrote a check for the insurance on her car. She had to have the car insurance or the state would take away her ability to drive to work, and there was no alternate public transportation.
Her last seconds did not allow a thought of family, past loves, flowers, or even the damn interrupted breakfast. Pain, confusion, imbalance conspired in seconds to take her to the floor and into an unconscious state, where smoke and flames that consumed her were not of the least concern. Eighty seven years, two months and five days, would have been though to be a good life long-lived. Her traditional family would not have an open casket as they had for her husband just eight months ago. Accidental death, was a very personal tragedy for the family. Friends and neighbors showed up at her daughter and son-in-laws house with all sorts of dishes, even some of them homemade. In a few short days the funeral and grave side service was over. Tears, recrimination, what if’s, and arguments flared for weeks to come around the dining room tables of Lacy’s four children. Why had they not gotten her into the assisted living facility. In reality only Judy of the four children felt any real responsibility. She was the closest in geography, and during her mother’s bad spells she had even taken her into her own home for periods of a few weeks, to a couple of months. Each time mom responded to a little extra attention and rebounded and demanded to go back to her own home.
The police certainly expressed concern when Angela reported her rape. Not too many questions, the scene was a disaster, besides the rape she had been beaten and left unconscious. Hospital staff were a bit cold, but she had no experience with how people were to be treated after a rape. No one offered anything in the way of counseling about a possible pregnancy. After all she had been through since it seemed odd when she thought back over that night, was it really over a year ago. There once was a pill you could take to end the chance of becoming pregnant if you took in soon after intercourse, at least she had heard it existed once. After a couple of weeks she had heard nothing from the police. She worked up until the week before the baby was born at the diner where she was the hostess cashier. She had stopped waiting on tables after five months, and the hourly salary she got was about half what she had made with her tips serving, hash and eggs. Joe the owner had never even had a cashier before and made her feel like he was supporting a major charity by keeping her on. Well wishes from the customers who knew nothing of the circumstances were like sharp shards of glass going down as she swallowed each one with a forced smile. She did manage to avoid the shower that the other waitresses were planning. The baby was gone, she wanted a new apartment and a new city. She did not have the least idea how that was to happen. Alone, depressed, broke, she would have to figure her own way out, find some strength from the inside, no help from the outside was coming.
Four short stories, with no easy conclusions. Weather is a fact of life we can poorly forecast and do nothing about, and people are going to get colds and an occasional bout of flu. Old age comes to more of us as life expectancy grows, and crimes against persons have been documented in the Bible. We are prepared to rebuild the buildings, and send the fire department and police, but we are less able to heal and care for the human element in all of these stories. How many human stories were generated by the killer tornado we will never count. Why should a simple cold or flu take down a business for weeks? Should an old woman live alone and die in pain, with only the support her distracted and stressed family can provide? Should a victim of rape be patched up on the outside with no consideration of her desires about what is growing inside her.
Why should our health system be connected to a person’s job? We really are saying the country does not value each citizen, because many citizens for all kinds of reasons will never have a job in the traditional sense. We value the economic product or service a person can provide and then we will insure him. The human element is really out of the whole picture.
If you are not collecting a pay check you are not really part of the society we care about. Our most precious resource is in the potential of our people. We praise god when a life is spared in a disaster, life we say is precious above all. People are killing abortion doctors because they believe life is so precious [more than a little strange].
If we really looked at life as our most precious resource there would be no question about watching out for the health of our people at every stage of their existence. Health care would not be connected to a job. If our people were less concerned about their access to health care how much more productive and innovative would they be in their lives? The way the right is covering this issue in the 2012 presidential race I don’t see us moving toward a country where life is the most precious resource. Commerce and Profit is our most precious resource.
