A prayer for these times

Dear Lord,

I know that I don’t talk to you that much,
but this year you have taken away:
– my favorite visionary Steve Jobs,
– my favorite author Ray Bradbury,
– my favorite children’s author Maurice Sendak,
– my favorite American Bandstand guy Dick Clark,
– my favorite hairdresser Vidal Sassoon,
– my favorite musician Earl Scruggs,
– my favorite Monkee Davy Jones,
– my favorite 60 Minutes guy Mike Wallace, and
– my favorite singer Whitney Houston.

I just wanted to let you know that my favorite radio announcer is Rush Limbaugh.
And my favorite Presidential candidate is Mitt Romney.

Amen.

Nora Ephron, thank you!

A hat tip to my friend Brian who surfaced this excellent quote by the late, great Nora Ephron:

“Reading is everything. Reading makes me feel like I’ve accomplished something, learned something, become a better person. Reading makes me smarter. Reading gives me something to talk about later on. Reading is the unbelievably healthy way my attention deficit disorder medicates itself. Reading is escape, and the opposite of escape; it’s a way to make contact with reality after a day of making things up, and it’s a way of making contact with someone else’s imagination after a day that’s all too real. Reading is grist. Reading is bliss.”

-Nora Ephron, 1941-2012

my mama told me: you better shop around (Health Insurance for the Healthy)

Dear Group Health: it might be time to start seeing other people.  I mean, I love you guys and all, but the relationship’s getting a little strained.

And then you sent me that letter telling me, after several plan changes and rate increases, that my plan, on average will go up 14.5% beginning like immediately or something, and I started thinking: Hmmm.  You takin’ me for a ride, love?  Cuz you’ve rearranged the furniture so many times, I’m starting to feel like I’m on the Titanic.

But then, then! I go in for my extremely expensive once-a-year exam, an exam that I feature costs more than a few thousand dollars since I have no chronic issues, no health problems, and basically never even see you guys and how am I treated?  Haphazardly, that’s how.  Carelessly.  Poorly.  And, worse? Incompletely.  I’m going to be 59 tomorrow, do you think it might be time to do a cholesterol test?  Maybe?  I haven’t had one in recent memory. And don’t get me started on that Pap smear, my friend, don’t even get me started.

I’m going to take my feedback to the young fresh doctor directly, but Group Health collectively?  You’re on the verge of losing a subsidizer.  Subsidizer–that’s me.  I pay and pay, use phenomenally little, take extremely good care of my own health, and though it’s a fact that my good health/good fortune could turn on a dime, for now: I’m a subsidizer.

So, I’m officially shopping around, if anyone should stumble on this blog.  I’m looking for a new relationship.  Here are my particulars:

• Cost-conscious but certainly willing to pay my share–and I will likely be a subsidizer for your pool of subscribers.
• Very healthy, regular exercise and activity, no known risk factors, no chronic anything and scant history of any concerns, pretty healthy and long-lived family history, no smoke/no drink/vegetarian with fondness for dark greens.  Gravest risk to my health is a fondness for ice cream and coffee.

What about you?  Asuris?  Premera?  Someone else entirely?  Really, what I want to know is this: is there insurance out there for people like me who want to take the majority share of responsibility for their health, and check in with you every once in a while?  Cuz it all seems so focused on bad health, chronic issues, the cash cows…know what I mean?

If you read this and have ideas, let me know.  It seems like a high water mark complex-and-bad out there, and I’m hoping I can get on some kind of better track.

Thanks!

Running Past 50…and without injury ;-)

Ida Keeling, 95 yo–Fastest running nonagenarian: kick it sista!

So, I’ve got another birthday coming next week which will officially make me an old lady…sorta. It’s all in one’s mind, right?  I’m going surfing for my birthday, so I’m guessing my mind is unawares of the milestone before me.

I got to thinking the other day during a quick morning run that I’ve been running now for about six years, steadily. Some days more, some days less.  Some days hills, some days flat waterfront.  All days involve an attuned awareness that I ain’t no spring chick, and if I want to run again tomorrow, I need to pay attention to my path today.  I’ve got a weird chronic thing with my feet, it’s not fasciitis, and as bad as it gets, it’s always back to normal the next day, but that’s about all.  So, pushing a little, paying attention, pacing…it’s works for me.

I don’t know many runners who haven’t had injuries of one kind or another.  I know a lot of runners that have stopped running because of injuries.  So, on the eve of another milestone,  I just want put it out there: First, do no harm and Second, live to run another day.  Anyone else out there balancing runs with the goal of running injury-free same time next year?  I’m sort of tempting fate by even writing this, and if I do injure myself, it will be an interesting path to deal and heal, yes?