We All Need A Fix

"That is a good idea, but it is a new one, and we fear it, so we must reject it." - Lothar of the Hill People
There are few things on heaven and earth that I am an expert on, and I will not suppose that health care is one of them. However, since the rest of the country seems to be weighing in on the subject with much the same credentials, I figured the time is right.
Perhaps this is no true coincidence, falling squarely on the day we all take a break from our work to go buy mattresses: Labor Day. National health spending is expected to reach two and a half trillion dollars in 2009, accounting for seventeen point six percent of the gross domestic product. Here are some more fun figures: Sixty-two percent of all bankruptcies filed in 2007 were linked to medical expenses. About one and a half million families lose their homes to foreclosure every year due to unaffordable medical costs.
Anecdotally, the company that I used to work for, an employee-owned corporation, had one of the most incredible health care and benefits package you can imagine. They would pay for your gym membership. They paid for acupuncture. They paid for substance abuse and rehab programs for a number of our employees. They picked up the tab for my son when he was born. We even got cookies every Friday. It was awesome. Now they're gone.
It would be simplistic to say that the cost of those Friday brownies and gym memberships were the only thing that did us in. But I know that, as my teachers' union continues to negotiate a new contract, the cost of health insurance is right at the top of the pile. Just as it is with just about every labor negotiation for the past twenty years.
Back when I owned a corporation, or a part of it, there seemed to be an obvious connection between the relative health and happiness of the employees and the bottom line of the company. Sick and injured employees aren't as productive as the healthy ones. Keeping them healthy is just getting too darn expensive.
Like many of our legislators, I have not read the entire health care bill, and even if I did I suspect that I would still need a certain amount of clarification and tutelage before I felt comfortable saying that this is the solution to all of our problems. But I don't think that I would feel comfortable crossing my arms and holding my breath and hoping that the whole mess would go away. I understand the reticence of some who would rather not pay for other's tumors. I can remember grumbling about the second time we all had to pony up and pay for one guy's second trip through rehab. I can also remember the relief I felt when I got food poisoning and had to go to the emergency room for rehydration after consuming "the last piece of lasagna." It's good to know that when you fall, there's somebody there to help you back up. America's Health Care System is broken. We need to fix it before the "death panel" shows up and pulls the plug on all of us.

Now We'd Like To Do "Hark The Angels Come"

I know that the Beatles Renaissance is nigh. I know that Entertainment Weekly can't continue to put vampires on their cover forever. But why, oh why would they choose instead to canonize the Fab Four in this way: "We Rank Their 50 Best Songs (and 5 worst)?" My own reaction was simple enough explanation. I immediately turned to page thirty-seven to get to the heart of the matter. What heresy could they possibly print on this "worst" list?
If you're not going to buy the magazine or swing past my house and see if it's still on the coffee table, I will spill those beans for you. Under the disclaimer "Oh, come on. Nobody's perfect - not even the Beatles" is the list. "All You Need Is Love," followed by "Wild Honey Pie," "Dig It," "Don't Pass Me By," and "Flying." The immediate problem I have is that the fiftieth best song is also the first song on their worst list. "All You Need Is Love" is a "catchy but thoroughly maddening novelty song." Not unlike Beethoven's Fifth Symphony.
I know that the editors of Entertainment Weekly would love to stir up a little mail for their letters page, but this seems more than a little contrived. I say this primarily from the standpoint of a person who grew up watching and experiencing the way that the Beatles revolutionized pop music and the culture around it. My parents liked the Beatles. My mother was very open-minded when it came to the music that her kids listened to, but she liked the Beatles. She wasn't just putting up with the Beatles. Even "Dig It" or "Wild Honey Pie." These songs were connective tissue on albums that were designed to be listened to as a collection of songs, an album if you will. The sequence of songs was a primary concern of the lads as their career expanded beyond the shrieking din of Candlestick Park.
I am sure that somewhere another list is being generated. This one will be more focused on Ringo, the easy target. Or maybe George's sitar technique. Why not point out Paul's silly love songs or John's misanthropic rants? Here's why: When I read the list of "Best" and "Worst" I had immediate access to the sounds they made in my head. Would it be fair to say that every song that any person or group recorded was a golden moment, worthy of being preserved forever? I have only recently forgiven Mister Springsteen for "Human Touch," and this is from a guy whose career has spanned nearly three times that of the boys from Liverpool. The magic of the Beatles is the way they delivered world-changing music consistently for less than a decade. I acknowledge that there is a spectrum upon which listeners can feel free to rate the relative greatness of any piece of music. I'll take the worst of the best any day.

Game On

Autumn is in the air. I know this because my wife and I are preparing for that fond farewell that occurs just before our relationship goes into cryostasis. I am talking about football season. To be completely fair, she has become very patient and even participatory in most respects. Yet, she and I both understand that while she has made a concerted effort to care about one game a week, and even manage her own Fantasy Football team called "The Tutu Ponies," I still care way too much about all the games, college and pro. And from whence does this fanaticism spring? To be honest, I wish I knew.
To say that I grew up watching football would paint too simple a picture. I watched football as much as I watched PBS. I knew who Alistair Cooke was long before I could recognize John Madden in a lineup. That didn't mean I lived in a vacuum, either. My parents had season tickets to the Colorado University Golden Buffaloes home games, and my brothers and I were in regular attendance, either sitting next to my parents, or in the "Knothole Section" behind the north goalposts. When my brother was in the Boy Scouts, he volunteered to be an usher: Wear your uniform, stand around for a couple hours before the game and then you're in. From there, it was a short hop to working concessions, and all three of us took our turns at learning just how unforgiving a job trying to sell cold hot dogs to drunken college students can be. Still, it was another way into the stadium.
Then there was the year that I played "organized" football. In fourth grade my parents bought me cleats and a pair of padded pants, and even though I didn't wear it as often as I should have, my first athletic supporter. These pieces of equipment were no match for the item that held the most fascination for me: the mouth guard. I remember standing in the kitchen and watching the water boil, waiting for the right moment to drop the hard rubber U briefly into the intense heat. Then just as quick, you popped it into your mouth to get just the right fit on your upper plate. Mine had a special minty-flavor. Clamping my mouth shut around it with the tab hanging out became a mild fixation. I hoped that it would protect my teeth as well as keeping my breath kissing fresh.
I assume that Young American Football was a lot like Little League. I never played Little League, so I can only extrapolate. Being one of the slow, thicker kids, I was ready to play the football equivalent of right field: Right Guard. I thought it was pretty cool that there was an anti-perspirant named after my position. I understood that my job was essentially to push the kid across from me around as best I could until the more coordinated and speedy kids behind me could run, pass, or punt around me. I kept shoving until I heard the whistle. That was my job. I don't remember how many games we played that year. I don't know how many we won. I do remember that my parents came and watched, much in the same way that they watched the Buffs. The games were on Saturday mornings, so I'm sure they had to rush around when CU had a home game.
I only played one year of Young American Football. It was another four years before I got up the nerve to play again. Bought a new pair of cleats. New pants. This time, the coach would check to be sure we were wearing our supporting undergarments. And I got another mouth guard. The games were on Friday afternoons, so my parents didn't have to schedule around them quite so much. I don't remember how many games we won back then, either. I do remember I had the same job, having managed to grow enough to be considered a "middleweight," but without gaining any particular speed or talent, I was back shoving the kid across me until the whistle blew.
In high school I saw every game, mostly because I was in the band. The Pep Band even went to the away games. Don't ask me how many games they won. Not many is my memory of it. But the cool air of approaching Fall, the bursts of action followed by the seemingly endless strategizing, the smell of popcorn and hot dogs. Friday night high school, Saturday afternoon college, and Sunday the professionals. That was the rhythm of my youth, and today it begins anew. Game on.

The Kids Are Alright

When I was ten years old, I know how I would have responded when asked about being addressed by the President of the United States: "No way." I had no interest in hearing anything that Richard Nixon had to say. That went double for Ronald Reagan when I was in high school. I suppose if Jimmy Carter had a speech prepared for my junior high school ears, I might have lent a sympathetic ear. It has everything to do with the fact that I made my party affiliation at a very early age. And it stuck.
That is why I can understand the reaction of some parents and students to Barack Obama's planned address to students across the country via the White House web site. Next Tuesday, our current president will be talking to kids "about the importance of staying in school; how we want to improve our education system and why it’s so important for the country." Those were his words in an interview last month with journalist Damon Weaver. Damon is eleven years old. Damon was very enthusiastic about the upcoming speech.
Jim Greer, the chairman of the Republican Party of Florida who is not eleven, had this to say: "The address scheduled for September 8, 2009, does not allow for healthy debate on the President's agenda, but rather obligates the youngest children in our public school system to agree with our President's initiatives or be ostracized by their teachers and classmates."
As I said, I understand how kids might have trouble making up their minds about their personal politics. No one is forcing kids to watch. Schools are encouraged, not required to air the speech. Still, there are those who consider this brainwashing, especially when you add in the curriculum that is being sent along with the words the president will speak. The Department of Education has a guide, with questions for students to consider as they listen. Questions like: "What is the President trying to tell me? What is the President asking me to do?"
We teach third and fourth graders about persuasive writing. We teach them the difference between fact and opinion. We teach them right from wrong. I sat with a library full of elementary school kids last January watching the inauguration of our country's first African-American president. We teach them history. Now maybe we can see what they've learned.

Since You've Been Gone

I had to break up yesterday. It was odd, since I've never really been on the breaking part. I've always been more of the broken. I wasn't fully prepared to deal with the hurt feelings and disappointment that I generated with my personal choice. But that's the way it goes in relationships sometimes. People grow apart. They want different things. It just wasn't working out, and we could either continue to cling to one another needlessly and hope that things would somehow work out, or maybe we would both get used to the dysfunctional way we had of dealing with each other. I had to tell the lady who was handling my retirement account that I was switching my account to someone else.
The truth is, I should have pulled the trigger a few years back. That was when my wife started taking an active interest in our collective finances with an eye toward actually retiring one day. That sort of thing requires long range planning, something for which I am ill-equipped. Part of me has always bristled at the notion of "socking away" money when we never seem to have enough to do all the things we really want to do anyway. As a numeric grown-up, I understand that 401Ks and portfolios and investments are a good idea, but after that first pie chart, my eyes start to glaze over.
That's why I was happy to let my money sit where it was for all those years. Every few months, my financial advisor would drop by my classroom for our appointment, and I would smile and nod until she closed up her folders and notebooks and asked if I had any questions. "Nope," I would smile and say through my haze, and then it would be another quarter before I had to go through that again.
The problem was me. I can admit it now. I should have cared more. I should have been more attentive. If I could have been a little more aggressive, or willing to take some risks. But that's not who I am. I'm the kind of guy who likes to be told by his wife that we should be making money instead of losing it. I'm the kind of guy who wants somebody else to take over the reins of my empire. Such as it is.
When she left, she asked that I remember her fondly, or at least would recommend her services to some of the other members of our staff. There wasn't a lot more for us to say, except "goodbye."

Lucky Thirteen

The new year started without any fireworks. There was no parade. There might have been a party or two, but I wasn't invited. That's good news. That's the way a school year should start. Compared to last year when I was flailing around trying to get my bearings back in a computer lab that was familiar but still brand new to me this seemed, in the words of George Tenet, a "slam dunk."
And while I was standing there on the yard watching students trickle in the front gate for the second day of class, I was caught up in a reflection on my thirteenth year of public education. I have now been employed by that system for the same number of years that I once attended. Last year's Kindergartners are today's first graders. The first graders have moved on to second. And so it goes. Sometimes it feels a little like an escalator.
That's when I looked up and saw a lanky figure striding toward me. I've had this feeling many times before: Who is this approaching me and wasn't he or she much smaller the last time I saw him or her? The answer to my quandary was Gary, and he was once very small. Now he stood in front of me at just about six feet tall, with a trace of a beard poking out beneath his chin. It helped to have his brother Mark moving in his wake. Mark was now a fourth grader. I tried to remember when Gary had roamed the halls of our little school.
"How's it going?" I asked him, offering up my hand.
I got a firm handshake back, "Okay. A little tired."
"How's school?" Considering that some of our students are on their way to finishing their education shortly after middle school, this was a bit of a conversational gambit.
"All right I guess. I'm changing my major." Turns out to have been a good bet.
"Really? What are you thinking of changing to?"
"Social work, something like that. I liked business okay, it just didn't suit me I guess."
Gary and Mark's dad is a minister. This made sense. I told him how proud I was to hear this. "The world has plenty of businessmen. Your neighborhood could use a good social worker."
He smiled. "What about you, Mark? Still want to be a rocket scientist?"
Mark rolled his eyes and sighed. "No. I wanna be a soccer player."
"How about a soccer playing rocket scientist?" I suggested.
Another eye roll. Gary looked around the yard that used to be his playground, shrugged his shoulders and told me that he figured he should be getting home. "I had to get up at three this morning to take my dad to the airport."
The bell was going to ring any minute to start the second day of school. The second of many.

WTNFL

"Did U C that?"
"OMG!"
"U R so crispy."
"U will B so 2 next time."
"What was the snap count?"
The NFL said Monday it will allow players to use social media networks this season, but not during games. What sort of advantage or disadvantage would one achieve by tweeting, blogging, or texting from the field? While the pigskin is in play, no updates will be permitted by the individual himself or anyone representing him on his personal Twitter, Facebook or any other social media account, the league said.
I suppose this makes sense, since players are kind of busy doing thoe things that football players do: punting, passing, kicking, drinking Gatorade. But that's just eleven guys at a time. What does Roger Goodell expect the rest of the team to do while all that football is going on without them? Has he ever pondered the eternity of a TV timeout? The commissioner himself was tweeting from the draft. That's precisely the kind of thing you need to fill those great big empty pauses that are such a part of the professional game. "This Bud's 4 U."
Certainly, all of this raises the question: Where are these guys sticking those electronic devices when the actually do get around to playing? I M 2 gross.