Sunday, November 30, 2008
Almost As Bad As The Day After Christmas
You remember that, don't you? Every possible package has been opened, colorful paper and ribbons are strewn all about the common areas, and everybody seems to have sunk a little deeper down in their chairs. It happens each time we have a family holiday involving gifts. It's just a riff on the old theme, "what have you done for me lately?" You can't get rid of it. Don't try. Ignore it. Eat more. Get sick. Take a nap. But don't let the letdown let you down. Happy Thanksgiving!
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Give Thanks
Here it is Thanksgiving Day about 4 A. M., and I'm temporarily awake. Today we share our first Thanksgiving meal with our new community here at Ebenezer Tower Apartments; I hope there are many more to come.
On Wednesday I received news that I had been approved for Minnesota Medical Assistance, which means that I'll be covered even better than I was with Medicare. It also allows me to choose a new prescription drug plan better than anything Medicare offers. This is truly a big deal for us, as we're now living solely on our social security income, though my wife is going to try to work here in the senior building helping set up meds, cleaning, and taking non-drivers shopping.
For so long, we've had a run of lousy luck, mainly health problems, which resulted in extreme financial problems. Since 1999 I've had two heart attacks, two stents put in my heart, spinal surgery, and a near deadly lung infection, which left me using oxygen in order to have any quality of life. And because of the spinal surgery, I walk with a cane and can walk only short distances. As I have, my wife has also suffered clinical depression, fell on her face with an acute kidney failure attack, and undergone emergency dialysis. While in hospital, she was discovered to have congenital heart failure and underwent robotic heart bypass surgery.
During none of this have we been offered any real or lasting assistance by our children, so living in a community as we do now makes such a difference. Because of contacts we've made at both senior group therapy and in the senior tower, I wound up with the aforementioned aid from the State of Minnesota. I must say that Minnesota treats its seniors better than most places, and my wife and I are very grateful. The case workers have been tireless and unrelenting in getting all the paperwork done, and I've expressed my appreciation to them.
Of course, the ideal is not to have to use any of these wonderful services, but that's not realistic. At a certain age, one's health generally declines, even if it's just a little. Mine and my wife's has jumped and begun rolling down a hill. But fortunately we're in a location that doesn't abandon its old folks. It feels funny when I say "old folks," as I just don't feel old. My mind feels much the same as it did 30 or 40 years ago. Well, that's enough pre-holiday blather. All of you have a wonderful time with food and family. And be well.
On Wednesday I received news that I had been approved for Minnesota Medical Assistance, which means that I'll be covered even better than I was with Medicare. It also allows me to choose a new prescription drug plan better than anything Medicare offers. This is truly a big deal for us, as we're now living solely on our social security income, though my wife is going to try to work here in the senior building helping set up meds, cleaning, and taking non-drivers shopping.
For so long, we've had a run of lousy luck, mainly health problems, which resulted in extreme financial problems. Since 1999 I've had two heart attacks, two stents put in my heart, spinal surgery, and a near deadly lung infection, which left me using oxygen in order to have any quality of life. And because of the spinal surgery, I walk with a cane and can walk only short distances. As I have, my wife has also suffered clinical depression, fell on her face with an acute kidney failure attack, and undergone emergency dialysis. While in hospital, she was discovered to have congenital heart failure and underwent robotic heart bypass surgery.
During none of this have we been offered any real or lasting assistance by our children, so living in a community as we do now makes such a difference. Because of contacts we've made at both senior group therapy and in the senior tower, I wound up with the aforementioned aid from the State of Minnesota. I must say that Minnesota treats its seniors better than most places, and my wife and I are very grateful. The case workers have been tireless and unrelenting in getting all the paperwork done, and I've expressed my appreciation to them.
Of course, the ideal is not to have to use any of these wonderful services, but that's not realistic. At a certain age, one's health generally declines, even if it's just a little. Mine and my wife's has jumped and begun rolling down a hill. But fortunately we're in a location that doesn't abandon its old folks. It feels funny when I say "old folks," as I just don't feel old. My mind feels much the same as it did 30 or 40 years ago. Well, that's enough pre-holiday blather. All of you have a wonderful time with food and family. And be well.
Monday, November 10, 2008
The Smoke Starts to Settle
Nothing yet seems different, but it's very, very early. The whirlwind of activities around President-Elect Obama are surely going on, and we learn about them through intermediaries and assorted aides who tell only that part of the story they want us to hear. Of course, news streams day and night, and we have to then decide what to cut off or what to listen to. Even still, some of the relentlessness of the campaign has settled, and some of us entertain some questions of how things will be. I'm certain that they'll be better! How could they get much worse!? We, of course, think about how much better things will be specifically? Will more people get to live in a 1 family dwelling? Will the economy return to even a portion of what it once was? Will we make progress in the War on Terror? Will we be able to send our children to the many fine but expensive colleges and unversities in our nation? Yes, we are wondering.
We know that dedicated people are working very hard right now to bring these positive change about. They come from a wide range of education, a wide range of competence, and a wide range of intelligence. Let us hope that Barack Obama wants around him the best and brightest he can get, not just cronies and college chums. And I also hope that these people will see public service as an honor, a chance to serve, a chance to give back to this country some of what it has given to them. Let's hope. I believe that Barack Obama wants these good things for us. So, in addition to hope, let us do what we can to bring about this better society that he talked about during this longest campaign in history.
As far as I'm concerned, one's political preferences say as much about him as anything. I know, without hesitation, that I couldn't live with a conservative, as their basic attitudes have everything to say about their attitude toward people. And it's not an attitude I could live around, much less live. I used to joke that I won't fly on an airplance if it doesn't have two left wings. While that elicited chuckles, even laughter, it's not far from the truth. I know that the television show, The West Wing, was fiction, but I could hope. And depending on what happens in real time politics over the next few years, I just might find my policitical life totally satisfied.
As Thanksgiving approaches, we can all be satisfied enough to give thanks that our government will no longer be run by unprincipled thugs and hacks and know-nothings. If nothing else, Barack Obama can bring intellect and intelligence and curiosity back into the White House and the working of government. He will surround himself with very capable people, all of whom have minds of their own. And this President will encourage their use, rather than hide from an answer he either disagrees with or from a question he doesn't understand. This is going to be a thinking man's government. It's about time.
We know that dedicated people are working very hard right now to bring these positive change about. They come from a wide range of education, a wide range of competence, and a wide range of intelligence. Let us hope that Barack Obama wants around him the best and brightest he can get, not just cronies and college chums. And I also hope that these people will see public service as an honor, a chance to serve, a chance to give back to this country some of what it has given to them. Let's hope. I believe that Barack Obama wants these good things for us. So, in addition to hope, let us do what we can to bring about this better society that he talked about during this longest campaign in history.
As far as I'm concerned, one's political preferences say as much about him as anything. I know, without hesitation, that I couldn't live with a conservative, as their basic attitudes have everything to say about their attitude toward people. And it's not an attitude I could live around, much less live. I used to joke that I won't fly on an airplance if it doesn't have two left wings. While that elicited chuckles, even laughter, it's not far from the truth. I know that the television show, The West Wing, was fiction, but I could hope. And depending on what happens in real time politics over the next few years, I just might find my policitical life totally satisfied.
As Thanksgiving approaches, we can all be satisfied enough to give thanks that our government will no longer be run by unprincipled thugs and hacks and know-nothings. If nothing else, Barack Obama can bring intellect and intelligence and curiosity back into the White House and the working of government. He will surround himself with very capable people, all of whom have minds of their own. And this President will encourage their use, rather than hide from an answer he either disagrees with or from a question he doesn't understand. This is going to be a thinking man's government. It's about time.
Friday, November 7, 2008
Mr. President
Barack Obama's election this week to the highest office in the land and the most powerful office in the world was near earth-shattering. It just hasn't been that long ago when such a proposition was unthinkable, even laughable to some. But it happened, and we are so much the better for it. I was born in 1940 in Alabama and grew up (some would allege otherwise) there. The living conditions for black people was abysmal, and I don't hesitate to compare the Alabama I grew up in to South Africa and its system of apartheid. Whites in much of the American South simply had the power of life and death over black people.
I was fortunate to have had a role model, my grandfather, who never judged a human being by any measure but the content of his character. He taught me that people are pretty much the same all over, and he treated everybody with respect. But I never could have wildly imagined that a man of African descent would be elected president in my lifetime. Unless you know how horrible life could be for a black person back then, you can't know what a wondrous thing has taken place. It feels like my beloved country is getting its soul back.
I was fortunate to have had a role model, my grandfather, who never judged a human being by any measure but the content of his character. He taught me that people are pretty much the same all over, and he treated everybody with respect. But I never could have wildly imagined that a man of African descent would be elected president in my lifetime. Unless you know how horrible life could be for a black person back then, you can't know what a wondrous thing has taken place. It feels like my beloved country is getting its soul back.
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