What do you think about the word "Homeland"? I was watching some news show or other and the talking head referred to the United States as "the Homeland" and I felt the wince I always feel when somebody talks about "the Homeland". Why are we using this term?? We never used homeland to talk about ourselves until the current administration started using it in its war on terrorism.
Its connotation is so very nationalistic, so fascist sounding....don't you think? Or is it just me? Doesn't it make you think of Germany during the second world war?
I've been perusing job listings lately....especially after conversations with my two expensive daughters.... As much as I enjoy my present job, at my part-time pace it doesn't keep up, financially speaking, with them.
I got this one job listing from Homeland Security. It described a job as a case manager for immigrants - legal ones, I think. The idea was that the Immigrantion office wanted case managers to help legal immigrants through the various hoops of staying legal - keeping track of them, reminding them about their paperwork...that kind of thing. Job description seemed to say, as I remember it now, that one would work for ICE, under the Department of Homeland Security. A potentially intriguing change from working with the mentally ill, it seemed to me. I told a co-worker about it and she wanted me to forward the posting to her.
So I go to my mail this morning and click on the posting and Lo! and Behold!, the job had "expired" and I wasn't allowed to go the posting any longer (we're talking 48 hours here). I, of course, became curious. I could see on the listing that the company who placed the post was called G4S Justice Services, Inc., so I went to their web site.
G4S is a big, global corporation that provides "security services" of all kinds to anybody that can afford them, including in this case, Homeland Security. They have little graphs of their stock prices.
I clicked around....you can choose your country, for example...and when you choose the United States, guess where you go....Wackenhut!! Long time readers will recall my previous remarks, perhaps, about Wackenhut - it's the company that builds private prisons and psyc hospitals here...
So. The immigration case manager job is part of that extensive web of services provided privately to "our government" (i.e. us - you and me - the taxpayers) by this huge for profit corporation...and a bunch of stockholders are cleaning up....but our national budget deficit keeps getting bigger and bigger...and is held by China.....but that works for a global security company because they can just contract with China if it decides to call in the debt.....
And meanwhile does anybody out there think our state of "homeland security" is better than it ever was?
Haven't we just created a new industry - one that is mostly smoke and mirrors - to provide another path to profit for investors? Wealth through the combination of privatization and fear?
Perhaps if the homeland was, indeed, "more secure", and if the private corporation had actually saved us money I'd feel differently.
Hey! I shouldn't work for them, I should buy stock! I wish I could take the money I pay in Federal Taxes and use it to buy stock in Wackenhut....now THAT would be a retirement plan!
Come to think of it, that's what Bush's idea for privatization of social security comes down to, isn't it?
Ok! That's it! I'm buying stock in G4S - or Wackenhut- or Halliburton!! Retirement here I come! I've discovered the real "social security" - it's buying stock in "Homeland Security"!!
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Friday, August 17, 2007
Them or Us?
Hello Bloggers!! Gosh, sorry for the very long lapse in writing - and for the delays in getting your comments posted. Just noticed this morning that there were a couple of comments left back on the 10th! I'm out of town - therefore more distracted than ususal. But the problem really has been that I've been pondering what to write about....keep changing my mind....
I read that the plan for funding the renewal, expansion of CHIPS (the federal childrens health care program) is to increase the tax on cigarettes by a dollar a pack. Sounds good. Until you realize that if the increased tax achieves the social goal of slowing or stopping cigarette consumption, there won't be enough money to insure the children. So, it becomes important to keep people smoking to pay for our childrens' health. Tobacco companies become our allies in children's health care.... For god's sake, don't stop smoking or our children will suffer! hmmmm.
I have the impression that people aren't clear about the fact that we are already paying for the uninsured....we, the employed, insured backbone of America, are already paying for indigent care through taxes as well as through the increased cost of insurance. We are, in fact, paying way more than we should be because the system funnels the uninsured into expensive ER's - and the funds for that come from our taxes already. .. and because insurance companies have shareholders that require profits. If, instead of sending huge chunks of our health care dollars into the pockets of privateers and middle men (think of the bureaucracy you employ when you use your insurance), we paid through a single payer, we could do much more with much less.
Most other first world countries, and some third world ones, have already figured this out...sure, they aren't perfect...but our system isn't perfect. We have high infant mortality, ever decreasing life span, long waits for all kinds of medical procedures, long waits in ER's - why do we keep saying we have the best health care in the world??? We don't ....we have the fanciest high tech stuff...we have the most luxurious hospitals...but we've got lousy health care, really. My 86 year old mother with Kaiser Insurance waited an hour in the ER just last week...
I agree that the prospect of having the government responsible for the administration of more bureaucracy is anxiety provoking. Government has done a terrifically bad job lately - FEMA and Homeland Security have been awful.
And don't get me started about Social Security. A lady came into my office the week before I left town with her 30-something schizophrenic son. She was distraught. They'd had a terrible time with her son's illness at the beginning. Finally they'd found a med regime that works and got him settled down into a routine and lifestyle that works for them, when they recieved a letter from Social Security. Seems they'd been working through their "backlog", and had finally come to the son's paperwork. They'd concluded that when they granted benefits - seven years ago - they'd miscalculated and instead of being on SSI, he should have been on SSDI. His payments are to go up from $623/mo to $790/mo.
For those of you who don't know, when someone qualifies for SSI, they automatically get Medicaid. However, if you get SSDI, you don't. After two years on SSDI, you qualify for Medicare which does not come with prescription drug coverage. If you want prescription drug coverage, you must buy Medicare D. The Mom in my office was freaking out because her son's medications cost well over a thousand a month (and that's ridiculous in its own right, but I'll rave on about that another time). Medicare Part D will cost a couple of hundred a month and will only cover 5 of his 6 meds at best, and will have a hefty co-pay. She's worried that the stability they've achieved is about to go down the drain with a loud, gurgling sound and her son's brief run at a livable life is nearly over.
The Mom asked Social Security if they intended to reimburse the son the seven years of back pay they apparently owe him; the Social Security lady told her that she should be glad they aren't charging her for the past seven years of Medicaid.
So government bureaucracies aren't running well. But I've been asking questions and it is abundantly clear that Social Security's problem is a woeful lack of funding to hire sufficient staff to do the job. Social Security says they're ..."working through the backlog, and we've just gotten to your son"......who's been on benefits for seven years.....and has a last name that's only half way through the alphabet...
Brings to mind another client who tried to tranfer a payeeship from one Mental Health Center to another, got lost in the backlog, and hasn't had Medicaid since - it's been about 8 months. Staff there assure me that she's eligible, but they can't fix the problem because "she's in the backlog, and others are just as desperate as she is, and she'll just have to wait until they work their way down to her".
The local (for me) Social Security office has 4 "intake" staff - i.e. people taking initial applications for benefits - but only 2 "post eligibility" staff - i.e. people dealing with everything that happens after someone gets benefits.
Talk about "crazy" - who's crazy here? And where is the money to hire the needed staff? It's being dropped on Iraq.
Halliburton's making out great, though.
Do the American people really prefer war to health care? Do we? We could all...each and every lousy little one of us...be "insured" i.e. have reasonable health care, if we could decide to let the insurance companies go hang and invest instead in our own citizens. We could opt to pay for our own quality of life as a society.
Iraq IS a mess. And we certainly did make it; we do bear responsiblity there for at least getting the power and water back on if nothing else. So perhaps we can't "afford" healthcare. Still ...
-I'm convinced that we're paying for it already - just stupidly. The current Republican administration with it's focus on "smaller government" has gutted the infrastructure that is required to do a good job at administering something like universal health care (or FEMA).
We need to make some serious decisions about which direction we want to be going here.
Let's see - War? or Healthcare? - Democracy in the Middle East? or Meds for the Mentally Ill?
It's a tough decision...Them? or Us?
I read that the plan for funding the renewal, expansion of CHIPS (the federal childrens health care program) is to increase the tax on cigarettes by a dollar a pack. Sounds good. Until you realize that if the increased tax achieves the social goal of slowing or stopping cigarette consumption, there won't be enough money to insure the children. So, it becomes important to keep people smoking to pay for our childrens' health. Tobacco companies become our allies in children's health care.... For god's sake, don't stop smoking or our children will suffer! hmmmm.
I have the impression that people aren't clear about the fact that we are already paying for the uninsured....we, the employed, insured backbone of America, are already paying for indigent care through taxes as well as through the increased cost of insurance. We are, in fact, paying way more than we should be because the system funnels the uninsured into expensive ER's - and the funds for that come from our taxes already. .. and because insurance companies have shareholders that require profits. If, instead of sending huge chunks of our health care dollars into the pockets of privateers and middle men (think of the bureaucracy you employ when you use your insurance), we paid through a single payer, we could do much more with much less.
Most other first world countries, and some third world ones, have already figured this out...sure, they aren't perfect...but our system isn't perfect. We have high infant mortality, ever decreasing life span, long waits for all kinds of medical procedures, long waits in ER's - why do we keep saying we have the best health care in the world??? We don't ....we have the fanciest high tech stuff...we have the most luxurious hospitals...but we've got lousy health care, really. My 86 year old mother with Kaiser Insurance waited an hour in the ER just last week...
I agree that the prospect of having the government responsible for the administration of more bureaucracy is anxiety provoking. Government has done a terrifically bad job lately - FEMA and Homeland Security have been awful.
And don't get me started about Social Security. A lady came into my office the week before I left town with her 30-something schizophrenic son. She was distraught. They'd had a terrible time with her son's illness at the beginning. Finally they'd found a med regime that works and got him settled down into a routine and lifestyle that works for them, when they recieved a letter from Social Security. Seems they'd been working through their "backlog", and had finally come to the son's paperwork. They'd concluded that when they granted benefits - seven years ago - they'd miscalculated and instead of being on SSI, he should have been on SSDI. His payments are to go up from $623/mo to $790/mo.
For those of you who don't know, when someone qualifies for SSI, they automatically get Medicaid. However, if you get SSDI, you don't. After two years on SSDI, you qualify for Medicare which does not come with prescription drug coverage. If you want prescription drug coverage, you must buy Medicare D. The Mom in my office was freaking out because her son's medications cost well over a thousand a month (and that's ridiculous in its own right, but I'll rave on about that another time). Medicare Part D will cost a couple of hundred a month and will only cover 5 of his 6 meds at best, and will have a hefty co-pay. She's worried that the stability they've achieved is about to go down the drain with a loud, gurgling sound and her son's brief run at a livable life is nearly over.
The Mom asked Social Security if they intended to reimburse the son the seven years of back pay they apparently owe him; the Social Security lady told her that she should be glad they aren't charging her for the past seven years of Medicaid.
So government bureaucracies aren't running well. But I've been asking questions and it is abundantly clear that Social Security's problem is a woeful lack of funding to hire sufficient staff to do the job. Social Security says they're ..."working through the backlog, and we've just gotten to your son"......who's been on benefits for seven years.....and has a last name that's only half way through the alphabet...
Brings to mind another client who tried to tranfer a payeeship from one Mental Health Center to another, got lost in the backlog, and hasn't had Medicaid since - it's been about 8 months. Staff there assure me that she's eligible, but they can't fix the problem because "she's in the backlog, and others are just as desperate as she is, and she'll just have to wait until they work their way down to her".
The local (for me) Social Security office has 4 "intake" staff - i.e. people taking initial applications for benefits - but only 2 "post eligibility" staff - i.e. people dealing with everything that happens after someone gets benefits.
Talk about "crazy" - who's crazy here? And where is the money to hire the needed staff? It's being dropped on Iraq.
Halliburton's making out great, though.
Do the American people really prefer war to health care? Do we? We could all...each and every lousy little one of us...be "insured" i.e. have reasonable health care, if we could decide to let the insurance companies go hang and invest instead in our own citizens. We could opt to pay for our own quality of life as a society.
Iraq IS a mess. And we certainly did make it; we do bear responsiblity there for at least getting the power and water back on if nothing else. So perhaps we can't "afford" healthcare. Still ...
-I'm convinced that we're paying for it already - just stupidly. The current Republican administration with it's focus on "smaller government" has gutted the infrastructure that is required to do a good job at administering something like universal health care (or FEMA).
We need to make some serious decisions about which direction we want to be going here.
Let's see - War? or Healthcare? - Democracy in the Middle East? or Meds for the Mentally Ill?
It's a tough decision...Them? or Us?
Thursday, July 05, 2007
SICKO
I went to see Sicko on the 4th of July...good way to beat the heat.
The audience applauded at the end of the movie.
If you haven't seen it, I encourage you to go. There wasn't anything in that movie that I didn't know already...having participated in our health care system as a reciever, a giver, and a concerned family member. It'll all be familiar to you, too. I guarantee it. Nothing new. But when you put it all together like that, in one coherent thought...well. ... How can we NOT change things???
I especially liked the line where Moore says, "In France, the government is afraid of the people; in America, the people are afraid of the government." I think that's true. I think we could have universal health care...and all the other things the French have...or the British have.....or the Canadians have....if we weren't too afraid to insist.
My daughter called me today and said she'd had an unfortunate encounter with a horse in which she might have broken her thumb. She wasn't sure. She is also not insured. To find out if the thumb is broken would cost hundreds of dollars....that she doesn't have....so she can't find out. She's hoping it's just sprained and will heal up....if not, well she's not too far from Cuba.
My other daughter tore her ACL a couple of weeks ago. She stepped backwards off a flower planter in some weird, wrong way and boom! rip! oooops! torn ACL. She's just finished 4 years of a five year degree in Architecture....and we cannot afford a torn ACL. Thank the good lord, she was at work when this happened. Workmen's Compensation will buy the surgery and the PT and she gets to finish the degree.
Several governments, in the last 10 years, have been overthrown following mass demonstrations by their citizens. The populace just simply went out and stood in the street until the current government fell. No shots fired. Sometimes took a while. But the point is, all they did was stand there...all of them.....until the goverment gave up. Commerce, transportation, banking, everything ground to a halt while the people stood in the streets and demanded change...this has happened in at least 4 or 5 countries lately. After a while, if you're the government, what are you going to do?....how are you going to proceed when all your citizens are just standing there...not participating....not working, not buying, not paying taxes.....just all standing there. It makes governments fall....and get replaced.
We surely could demand universal health care...and get it. We surely could determine to vote only for candidates who support it. This is election season, people!! If we were to make universal health care the deciding factor in how we choose our candidates, our representatives, our government, we could have it...(Imagine: my daughter could have her thumb checked out!...my other daughter wouldn't have to risk her education and career daily!!) And if those we voted for failed to produce after the election...well I say, let's just all go out and stand there in the streets 'til they fix it. Period. Why not? Scared?
Go see the movie.
The audience applauded at the end of the movie.
If you haven't seen it, I encourage you to go. There wasn't anything in that movie that I didn't know already...having participated in our health care system as a reciever, a giver, and a concerned family member. It'll all be familiar to you, too. I guarantee it. Nothing new. But when you put it all together like that, in one coherent thought...well. ... How can we NOT change things???
I especially liked the line where Moore says, "In France, the government is afraid of the people; in America, the people are afraid of the government." I think that's true. I think we could have universal health care...and all the other things the French have...or the British have.....or the Canadians have....if we weren't too afraid to insist.
My daughter called me today and said she'd had an unfortunate encounter with a horse in which she might have broken her thumb. She wasn't sure. She is also not insured. To find out if the thumb is broken would cost hundreds of dollars....that she doesn't have....so she can't find out. She's hoping it's just sprained and will heal up....if not, well she's not too far from Cuba.
My other daughter tore her ACL a couple of weeks ago. She stepped backwards off a flower planter in some weird, wrong way and boom! rip! oooops! torn ACL. She's just finished 4 years of a five year degree in Architecture....and we cannot afford a torn ACL. Thank the good lord, she was at work when this happened. Workmen's Compensation will buy the surgery and the PT and she gets to finish the degree.
Several governments, in the last 10 years, have been overthrown following mass demonstrations by their citizens. The populace just simply went out and stood in the street until the current government fell. No shots fired. Sometimes took a while. But the point is, all they did was stand there...all of them.....until the goverment gave up. Commerce, transportation, banking, everything ground to a halt while the people stood in the streets and demanded change...this has happened in at least 4 or 5 countries lately. After a while, if you're the government, what are you going to do?....how are you going to proceed when all your citizens are just standing there...not participating....not working, not buying, not paying taxes.....just all standing there. It makes governments fall....and get replaced.
We surely could demand universal health care...and get it. We surely could determine to vote only for candidates who support it. This is election season, people!! If we were to make universal health care the deciding factor in how we choose our candidates, our representatives, our government, we could have it...(Imagine: my daughter could have her thumb checked out!...my other daughter wouldn't have to risk her education and career daily!!) And if those we voted for failed to produce after the election...well I say, let's just all go out and stand there in the streets 'til they fix it. Period. Why not? Scared?
Go see the movie.
Saturday, June 16, 2007
Hooray for the Auditor!!
It's summer...almost...and blogging seems to have fallen down a ways on my priority list. But, gosh darn it! Things have been happening our there at the Madhouse that have reached even my ears.
The announcement last week that there will be an audit of the two facilities was so delightful! I'd written a request for one last fall...then gotten a call from Sally herself this spring...and apparently I wasn't the only one to ask! When we spoke on the phone, her biggest concern seemed to be the fact that DYC youth are being treated with non-adjudicated youth on the same units...I hope when they get there, they also look at the practice of providing treatment for a patient with MRSA in the general population on an adult unit...with no separate bathroom...no separate anything, sounds like.
Speaking of MRSA, a co-worker at my new job came to me to ask about "Area 2"...he thought it might be appropriate for a patient on his caseload. "Area 2?" I said....and then it dawned on me that he was asking about the behavior mod team. Area 2 is a great name for it, don't you think?...the way it evokes thoughts of mystery, aliens and cover ups..."This guy needs the treatment in Area 2".... I advised him to hold off until after the audit.
And the changes in management! Keith's boss, Steve, retiring, I hear? And the "Assistant Director, too"...and - very exciting - the minimalist Director of Nursing going to what sounds like a much more appropriate job. People above him, people below him...what about Keith himself? Isn't he inspired to go to greener pastures, too??? They're all getting out before the audit...he'll be all by himself for that if he doesn't get a move on. Come on, Keith! For the good of the place! For your own good! Fly! Be Free!!
The announcement last week that there will be an audit of the two facilities was so delightful! I'd written a request for one last fall...then gotten a call from Sally herself this spring...and apparently I wasn't the only one to ask! When we spoke on the phone, her biggest concern seemed to be the fact that DYC youth are being treated with non-adjudicated youth on the same units...I hope when they get there, they also look at the practice of providing treatment for a patient with MRSA in the general population on an adult unit...with no separate bathroom...no separate anything, sounds like.
Speaking of MRSA, a co-worker at my new job came to me to ask about "Area 2"...he thought it might be appropriate for a patient on his caseload. "Area 2?" I said....and then it dawned on me that he was asking about the behavior mod team. Area 2 is a great name for it, don't you think?...the way it evokes thoughts of mystery, aliens and cover ups..."This guy needs the treatment in Area 2".... I advised him to hold off until after the audit.
And the changes in management! Keith's boss, Steve, retiring, I hear? And the "Assistant Director, too"...and - very exciting - the minimalist Director of Nursing going to what sounds like a much more appropriate job. People above him, people below him...what about Keith himself? Isn't he inspired to go to greener pastures, too??? They're all getting out before the audit...he'll be all by himself for that if he doesn't get a move on. Come on, Keith! For the good of the place! For your own good! Fly! Be Free!!
Monday, May 28, 2007
Love Your Nearest War Veteran
Maxine Hong Kingston was on Bill Moyers Journal this week.
Here's a picture of her
Quite a woman! She'd written a new book, Veterans of War, Veterans of Peace ...she really hadn't written the book - she'd edited it. It is a collection of stories written by vets about their experiences in war. Many of them had carried these stories with them, silently, for as many as 30 years. She has a writer's group of vets, apparently, and helps them, in the group, to write their stories. The vets interviewed on the Moyers program attested to the healing properties of the exercise.
It was touching to watch the healing vets - and Maxine Kingston was inspiring to watch, as she explained why telling the story you'd been keeping sealed up allows for a reintegration of the personality, and the dissolution of the numbness, alienation, or shame that stunts the veterans lives after they return from war.
War is insane. It's mass insanity. Handfulls of men in power throw thousands or millions of people into violence in order to continue in power. That violence is horrific, insane, destructive. It traumatizes many (if not most) who experience it. Those it doesn't traumatize, it changes. The societies involved loose whole sections of the fighting generation...
We all know this.
But we keep on doing it. And all those vital young people continue to be taught the tools and rules of war. What would they be doing if they weren't fighting? What would their families be doing?
Listening to Maxine Hong Kingston made me want to take my developing expertise in our nations' benefits system and try to help some veterans with their benefits problems. One wants to reach out to these young people and try to make them whole again. They've been through a lot - based on the society's injunction to them to serve. Society surely owes them some nurturing.
Wouldn't it be cool to start a volunteer organization that assists veterans through the medical/benefits systems when they return? Anybody interested?
Quite a woman! She'd written a new book, Veterans of War, Veterans of Peace ...she really hadn't written the book - she'd edited it. It is a collection of stories written by vets about their experiences in war. Many of them had carried these stories with them, silently, for as many as 30 years. She has a writer's group of vets, apparently, and helps them, in the group, to write their stories. The vets interviewed on the Moyers program attested to the healing properties of the exercise.
It was touching to watch the healing vets - and Maxine Kingston was inspiring to watch, as she explained why telling the story you'd been keeping sealed up allows for a reintegration of the personality, and the dissolution of the numbness, alienation, or shame that stunts the veterans lives after they return from war.
War is insane. It's mass insanity. Handfulls of men in power throw thousands or millions of people into violence in order to continue in power. That violence is horrific, insane, destructive. It traumatizes many (if not most) who experience it. Those it doesn't traumatize, it changes. The societies involved loose whole sections of the fighting generation...
We all know this.
But we keep on doing it. And all those vital young people continue to be taught the tools and rules of war. What would they be doing if they weren't fighting? What would their families be doing?
Listening to Maxine Hong Kingston made me want to take my developing expertise in our nations' benefits system and try to help some veterans with their benefits problems. One wants to reach out to these young people and try to make them whole again. They've been through a lot - based on the society's injunction to them to serve. Society surely owes them some nurturing.
Wouldn't it be cool to start a volunteer organization that assists veterans through the medical/benefits systems when they return? Anybody interested?
Friday, May 18, 2007
Owen's Fine Trajectory!!
In the Rocky Mountain News this Friday morning:
Bill Owens is off to a job where they privatize the infrasture for profit...."Owens will work with the bank's infrastructure group as it tries to capitalize on the trend of governments selling off their assets to the private sector..." - this totally fits my picture of Bill...
...and there's a new Federal Immigration Bill trying to get through Congress - the details are very nicely laid out in columns of rules that would be implemented if the bill were to pass...4 columns of 5 or 6 rules each....a totally new or vastly expanded bureaucracy is envisioned.....
(I have all this up close and personal experience with our Social Services bureaucracies....it's with me as I read the paper.)
And I think about the 5 computer systems that Colorado bought that don't work....under Bill's astute leadership.....
And I think about Bill capitalizing on a private company - complete with profit seeking investors and share holders - to implement the new immigration rules....
And I feel kind of tense all over; my stomach aches.
I think, "He's made an effort - through bad management - to make government infrastuctures operate so badly, governments want to get rid of them......then he goes and gets a job in which he will make bundles of money with those same bureaucracies.....or ones just like 'em...only run right...which he could have done as governor (run them right), for the benefit of taxpayers ....but would rather do for himself, for his own benefit...." ....I don't like these thoughts.
It makes me think I'm a conspiracy theorist.
Am I the only one who thinks these things?
What is this privatization thing about anyway??? Why does a private company make money doing the same thing that government looses money at??? Please, somebody, explain it to me.
Selling off our roads and bridges.....the idea disturbs me...I think, "What's next? Should we sell the legislature, too?" Oh, right. We already did.
Sometimes I wish Americans could stop thinking about Anna Nicole Smith and that Hasselhoff guy long enough to think about how we're taking care of the things we all share - the systems that make the rest possible....or to at least observe the trajectory of the changes occurring.
Forwarned is forearmed.
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Kaiser is Peanuts
Arches near Moab, 2007 Standing in the lunch line at work yesterday, someone comes by handing out paper plates. She's giving two to each person because the plates are flimsy and it takes two to keep your sandwich off the floor. My companion takes two from her and carefully separates them and hands one to the lady behind him. He's helping the paper plate lady. She notices and hands him two more to give to the next person, which he does. She tries to give the lady with just one another one and he intercepts it to give it to someone else. Now the paper plate lady has three people with just one plate each. She tries to explain...pushing plates at him. My companion peers sincerely at her through smudged spectacles, and hoists his sagging blue jeans up with his empty hand. He has no idea what she's talking about. There's no point in explaining it anyway...the line ahead has shortened - we put out our plates for our sandwiches and move on.
I love my job. I love these people with the saggy pants and the good intentions.
They have a heckuva time in the world we've created, though. I've been trying to help one woman, for example, who moved from the Denver catchment area to ours, and needed to have her medical records and payeeship transfered. Her therapist had filed the necessary paperwork, followed-up, followed up the follow-up and months were going by without results.
So I started in - I followed-up the previous follow-ups...Social Security here told me the woman was out of the country, so her case had been suspended. "She's right here in my office", I said.
"We show she's out of the country. You'll have to talk to the central office," they said.
So, of course, I did. "Oh!, said the central office. "That's just a code we use to suspend - we can't issue the check until we have the payee paperwork."
"But we've sent the payee paperwork", I said. "We've mailed it and then we've faxed it twice."
"Oh" said the office, and after a lengthy phone interview with the woman, who was, indeed, right there in my office, and an even lengthier pause while they determined the payee paperwork was located in the backlog - the suspension was suspended; and, after a call back to the original office, we were all told to wait for develoments.
That was a month ago. The woman now cannot pay rent, cannot buy food, cannot buy medications...and, after a follow-up to the follow-ups of last month, I'm told that requests to get it out of the "back-log" and processed will be dispatched marked urgent. This is the maximum best they can do. We are told to wait for developments. So it goes.
A few days before that, I was told by the phone company that, due to privacy laws, they couldn't tell my client her own phone number ...my client, they said, would have to wait until her phone bill arrived to know what her number is.
At my new job, I have Kaiser health insurance. I used to have Kaiser, years ago, and hated it. At this job, they'll buy your insurance for you - if you agree to take Kaiser....the "other insurance" offered - which you can buy if you wish - is prohibitively expensive. So, tightwad that I am, when the choice boiled down to Kaiser-for-free or something-else-for-lots-of-money, I naturally picked the Kaiser. I pretty much won't use it, though. Haven't gone to a doctor since I got this job. Feel great. Wouldn't have gone if I'd had the other insurance, either. I think the only safe time to approach doctors is when you're bleeding and broken in some obvious way- or maybe if you have an infection or something...I'll grant that there are times when doctors are necessary, but those times are very rare...and remain rare as long as you don't go in there looking for trouble.
When people ask me why I hate Kaiser so much, I tell them the truth: it's their phone system. Whenever you contact them, they take the opportunity to waste your time telling you in detail about things you're not interested in, before allowing you to complete the business you've called about. I can't take it. I refuse to call them. Period.
So it's not just people with schizophrenia who're having trouble with our "systems"...
We have a guy with schizophrenia, though, who has just been denied benefits for the second time - which, given his current position in life, means that he will be homeless, without medication, without anything at all starting next week. Compared to that, my Kaiser issue is peanuts.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Fiddling While Rome Burns
Where I work now, nobody talked about Virginia Tech this week. We were busy, I guess. In one meeting, I blurted out, "Who wants to talk about the Virginia Tech incident?"...nobody did. Later a member of the group said, "You know this place was really involved in Columbine...I think maybe everybody just doesn't want to deal with it again."
I know that the information about the shooter - that he'd been identified by his community as a 'disturbed' person - caused a kaleidoscope of images for me...all the disturbed people I've seen - the ones I'd 'evaluated' and deemed 'dangerous' or 'not dangerous' in the years I've been in public mental health, flashed before my eyes. How many times have I been wrong? What if I'd been the evaluator for this guy? What if I'd turned him loose after his hold expired. yikes.
I tried to inspire interest, at that meeting, by considering our response in a case I'd been involved in there. Recently we had a guy who'd traveled the road from aggravated robbery and drug possession to prison, to state mental hospital, to assisted living facility in the community. We "held the cert" on him - by which is meant that we had a piece of paper that stated he was ordered by the court to receive mental health treatment from us...which made us responsible in some sense for him. In about a week and a half he was staying out all night, taking drugs, and pounding on his mother's door in the middle of the night, demanding money.
I said, "We've got a cert! Put him back in the hospital." The agency said, "this behavior doesn't rise to the level of requiring hospitalization. The guy is making choices. Those choices will have consequences. You can't hospitalize someone for making choices. This is the Recovery Model!!"
The consequences were that within another week, he was evicted from his assisted living home. His social security benefit - which would have paid for the assisted living, was in that awkward moment betwixt in hospital and out, when payments haven't started yet. Our agency was the payee. So our guy had nowhere to live, no money, and a raging drug craving. I felt pretty confident in predicting that given how he'd spend his formative years, his choices would not be helpful ones.
So in the meeting I said, "Isn't this a discussion we need to have? Why do we make these decisions? How do we know we're right?" The evaluators in Virginia were "right" at the time - 2005 - he didn't kill anybody in 2005, after all. But if they'd "treated" him for a while...brought him in, got to know him ... had some human exchanges with him over a period of time ... might not that have changed 2007?
You ever watch "House" on TV? In House, there's 4 doctors who spend days thinking about, talking about, experimenting on, etc. a single patient. The patient's illness is the mystery, and the 4 (or more) doctors are the investigating team, who's sole mission in life is to figure out what's wrong and how to fix it.
If House had seen the shooter in 2005, he and his team would have devoted all their considerable talents to understanding his behavior. They would have dispatched someone to the family home, would have spent extended time with the parents and sister; would have examined the speech problem, diagnosed and treated it; would have CAT scanned his brain; would have observed and interacted with him with concentrated interest for as long as it took. Whatever happened next, the trajectory of the shooter's life would have been changed.
The idea of doing that with every guy that walks through the mental health door is ludicrous. Ha!
Doesn't happen.
Couldn't happen.
The Organization Stress paper describes in great detail why it couldn't happen...having just read it, the events at V Tech appeared to be the real life illustration ... a brutal movie about society's infrastructure failure, due to Organizational Stress.
Our regulations in this area, our evidence based studies, our Recovery Model...are wallpaper - hiding our lack of attention and resources to do work that doesn't result in profit.
So it goes.
Might not matter, if its true that cell phones are causing bee collapse...especially, if Einstein was right in saying that after the bees go, we've all got only 4 years left ourselves.
Sunday, April 15, 2007
2BR02B
Self Portrait by Kurt Vonnegut
On Saturday Robert Samuelson had a column in the Rocky Mountain News - The coming clash - Tax hikes for boomers will ignite conflict. Samuelson led with Christopher Buckley's idea in his novel, Boomsday, in which the coming entitlement crisis is solved by paying retirees to kill themselves - a program called Voluntary Transitioning. Volunteers for Voluntary Transitioning could receive a lavish vacation beforehand ("a farewell honeymoon"), courtesy of the government, and their heirs would be spared the estate tax. If only 20 percent of boomers select suicide before the age of 70, "Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid will be solvent. End of crisis."
Actually this is not an entirely new idea. Kurt Vonnegut wrote about something much like it in God bless you, Mr. Rosewater. Early on in the novel, we are told about Kilgore Trout's novel - 2BR02B, in which "he hypothecated an America in which almost all of the work was done by machines, and the only people who could get work had three or more Ph.D's. There was a serious overpopulation problem, too.
All serious diseases had been conquered. So death was voluntary, and the government, to encourage volunteers for death, set up an purple-roofed Ethical Suicide Parlor at every major intersection, right next door to an orange-roofed Howard Johnson's. There were pretty hostesses in the parlor, and Bara-Loungers, and Muzak, and a choice of fourteeen painless ways to die."
Kurt Vonnegut died this week. Thank heavens he'd already written a bunch of books...enough, I hope, to keep me going to the end. There's nothing like the comfort of finding a compatible point of view - the feeling of being understood and accepted. Thank heavens for Kurt Vonnegut! and Bon Voyage! Sorry we didn't have either the Ethical Suicide Parlors or the Farewell Honeymoon ready yet. Sometimes good ideas take a while to mature.
I finally got to the end of the article - The Sanctuary Model part - and Sandra Bloom's solution is not nearly so neat and easy as either of those ideas. "It is clear that there is no subset of traumatized people for whom we can build new structures, new institutions that will more adequately suit their needs. The world is a traumatized place, and underlying what we now consider "normal" society are basic assumptions, beliefs, policies, and behavior that if not transformed are certain to doom the entire species - and very possibly all living things - to utter annihilation. Like it nor not, the coming years will determine whether or not reason can harness our biological urges with sufficient power to curb the self-destructiveness that threatens our very survival." 2BR02B, indeed.
Actually this is not an entirely new idea. Kurt Vonnegut wrote about something much like it in God bless you, Mr. Rosewater. Early on in the novel, we are told about Kilgore Trout's novel - 2BR02B, in which "he hypothecated an America in which almost all of the work was done by machines, and the only people who could get work had three or more Ph.D's. There was a serious overpopulation problem, too.
All serious diseases had been conquered. So death was voluntary, and the government, to encourage volunteers for death, set up an purple-roofed Ethical Suicide Parlor at every major intersection, right next door to an orange-roofed Howard Johnson's. There were pretty hostesses in the parlor, and Bara-Loungers, and Muzak, and a choice of fourteeen painless ways to die."
Kurt Vonnegut died this week. Thank heavens he'd already written a bunch of books...enough, I hope, to keep me going to the end. There's nothing like the comfort of finding a compatible point of view - the feeling of being understood and accepted. Thank heavens for Kurt Vonnegut! and Bon Voyage! Sorry we didn't have either the Ethical Suicide Parlors or the Farewell Honeymoon ready yet. Sometimes good ideas take a while to mature.
I finally got to the end of the article - The Sanctuary Model part - and Sandra Bloom's solution is not nearly so neat and easy as either of those ideas. "It is clear that there is no subset of traumatized people for whom we can build new structures, new institutions that will more adequately suit their needs. The world is a traumatized place, and underlying what we now consider "normal" society are basic assumptions, beliefs, policies, and behavior that if not transformed are certain to doom the entire species - and very possibly all living things - to utter annihilation. Like it nor not, the coming years will determine whether or not reason can harness our biological urges with sufficient power to curb the self-destructiveness that threatens our very survival." 2BR02B, indeed.
Here are some pictures by Kurt Vonnegut -
Thanks, Kurt Vonnegut, and Farewell!! Hope to catch you on the other side! (Plan to wait for the farewell honeymoon, tho.)
Sunday, April 01, 2007
Silent Studying
The silence is deafening, Social Work Fairy, but I can only assume that readers are all taking time to read the "Organizational Stress..." article before commenting. I know that's what I've been doing. I confess I'm going awfully slowly....faster now that I printed a copy...I hate reading long stuff on a computer screen...can't get comfortable....
I've gotten as far as "Lack of Basic Safety"...still have things like "Increased Authoritarianism" and "Impaired Cognition and Silencing of Dissent" ahead of me. It is so amazing to read this description of our very own madhouse in this paper from Philadelphia! Obviously, the problems here are the problems throughout the entire mental health system. We are not uniquely disadvantaged....we are the norm! Holy Cow.
Did you notice the early reference to Maxwell Jones? Maxwell Jones was a prime mover in the founding of the madhouse! And the description of the organization!... how about this: "...unhealthy organizations have a great deal in common. There is a general air of degradation and a sense that everything is always falling apart; one must be very careful to make sure that it does not fall on you. There is a general lack of energy, low motivation, and low morale among the people in the organization. ..... Standards tend to be low and norms are disrupted, unclearly stated, and unmonitored. There is a great deal of individual unhappiness, dissatisfaction, and complaining, but the complaining is usually indirect and frequently takes the form of gossip or rumors that in a circular way tends to lead to more dissatisfaction......The atmosphere of routine boredom and unhappiness is interspersed with periods of crisis....Learning from the past does not appear to happen.....Change efforts are met with a passive resistance that tends to chase off competent leaders, leaving less confident and competent leadership in its wake. There is a lack of transparency and an air of secrecy, even about events that could easily be aired publicly and openly. Ultimately, this is an envionment that leads to dishonesty and ethical deterioration." (pg. 19)
Now if that's not the madhouse, what is?
I'd like to skip ahead in my reading to "Sanctuary: A Parallel Process of Recovery"...but I haven't. That will have to wait until next week. But it does give me hope. Someone has taken the time to think the problem through - to provide a good analysis of what's happened, and to propose at least one possible solution. It helps to overcome my tendency to just be overwhelmed in the face of such complex problems. One doesn't have to be overwhelmed...one can come up with solutions...
I've gotten as far as "Lack of Basic Safety"...still have things like "Increased Authoritarianism" and "Impaired Cognition and Silencing of Dissent" ahead of me. It is so amazing to read this description of our very own madhouse in this paper from Philadelphia! Obviously, the problems here are the problems throughout the entire mental health system. We are not uniquely disadvantaged....we are the norm! Holy Cow.
Did you notice the early reference to Maxwell Jones? Maxwell Jones was a prime mover in the founding of the madhouse! And the description of the organization!... how about this: "...unhealthy organizations have a great deal in common. There is a general air of degradation and a sense that everything is always falling apart; one must be very careful to make sure that it does not fall on you. There is a general lack of energy, low motivation, and low morale among the people in the organization. ..... Standards tend to be low and norms are disrupted, unclearly stated, and unmonitored. There is a great deal of individual unhappiness, dissatisfaction, and complaining, but the complaining is usually indirect and frequently takes the form of gossip or rumors that in a circular way tends to lead to more dissatisfaction......The atmosphere of routine boredom and unhappiness is interspersed with periods of crisis....Learning from the past does not appear to happen.....Change efforts are met with a passive resistance that tends to chase off competent leaders, leaving less confident and competent leadership in its wake. There is a lack of transparency and an air of secrecy, even about events that could easily be aired publicly and openly. Ultimately, this is an envionment that leads to dishonesty and ethical deterioration." (pg. 19)
Now if that's not the madhouse, what is?
I'd like to skip ahead in my reading to "Sanctuary: A Parallel Process of Recovery"...but I haven't. That will have to wait until next week. But it does give me hope. Someone has taken the time to think the problem through - to provide a good analysis of what's happened, and to propose at least one possible solution. It helps to overcome my tendency to just be overwhelmed in the face of such complex problems. One doesn't have to be overwhelmed...one can come up with solutions...
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Writing to Governor Ritter
I know it's been kind of a long time since I blogged....but the comments on Haiku (and previous essays) continue to be so good, I've not wanted to interfere. Thanks to everybody who wrote Haiku...loved 'em. And thanks, most especially, to the Social Work Fairy who wrote to Governor Ritter!!
Since I'm no longer at the madhouse itself, my focus has been on the larger community - where persons with mental health disabilities live after escaping the tender ministrations there.
As I've said, the experience of being allowed to act in my job has been a relief from the forced idiocy that was the requirement of my labors at the madhouse.
Yet, all is not paradise.
I find it is not possible to "act" enough to hold back the tide of need.
The situation at Walter Reed (with which you are all familiar, no doubt) kind of sums it up, I think....and the continuing situation in New Orleans....and the recent example of FEMA's failure to recover its efficacy (as demonstrated by those new, empty trailers sitting 160 miles from those made homeless in Arkansas by the tornadoes)...and Owens giving Hammons that fat bonus as she fled the scene of disaster...
It's a bad picture, bloggers. The fact is that ALL of our big, social services systems are unraveled. None of them is working properly; all of them are in some state of dysfunction. How could it be otherwise when we are spending THIS on the war. Where the heck is all that money coming from? I'm here to tell you that a lot of it is coming from various social services....readers had better pray that they and their loved ones will never need any help of any kind from the society...it's effectively not there now.
This society's resources are going elsewhere.
Like the bees. Did you hear about the bees? Apparently they've become unable to find their way home .... they fly out in the morning to gather pollen.....and are never heard from again.
Our tax dollars are like that.
It's a problem.
A reader in Florida sent me a great article about the mental health system....I'm going to try to figure out how to link it to the blog in case anyone over there wants to read it. It's called "Organizational Stress as a Barrier to Trauma-Sensitive Change and System Transformation." by Sandra Bloom, M.D. in Philadelphia. It's all about us.
What I'm trying to say here...in this rather disjointed way...is that our social fabric is in trouble and its time for us to do something about it....something more than complain to and about one another. We must transform ourselves and our society right now if its to be the sort of place we want to live in. Getting Governor Ritter on board is certainly an important and valuable piece...we can all write a letter like the one the Social Work Fairly wrote...we can all contact our representatives.
Here! Write a quick letter now!!
Governor Ritter
Senator Allard
Senator Salazar
Colorado legislators
The issue is, as I see it, "What sort of community do YOU want to live in?" Is it OK with you to live in a society that spends THIS on a war but can't take care of the wounded the war has made? Or its disabled? or its poor? or its disaster victims? Aren't you tired of knowing that although we spend more (much more) per capita on health care, we have lower life expectancy and higher infant mortality rates than any industrialized nation?
And being tired of it, what are we going to do about it?
Let's talk about solutions...let's read about them, let's think about them...Let us come up with something that would work!!! and then let's make it happen....this is Amerika, damn it! consumerville ...I want to live in America - of the people, by the people, for the people. WE are the people, are we not? Come on, people! There's got to be a better way.
Since I'm no longer at the madhouse itself, my focus has been on the larger community - where persons with mental health disabilities live after escaping the tender ministrations there.
As I've said, the experience of being allowed to act in my job has been a relief from the forced idiocy that was the requirement of my labors at the madhouse.
Yet, all is not paradise.
I find it is not possible to "act" enough to hold back the tide of need.
The situation at Walter Reed (with which you are all familiar, no doubt) kind of sums it up, I think....and the continuing situation in New Orleans....and the recent example of FEMA's failure to recover its efficacy (as demonstrated by those new, empty trailers sitting 160 miles from those made homeless in Arkansas by the tornadoes)...and Owens giving Hammons that fat bonus as she fled the scene of disaster...
It's a bad picture, bloggers. The fact is that ALL of our big, social services systems are unraveled. None of them is working properly; all of them are in some state of dysfunction. How could it be otherwise when we are spending THIS on the war. Where the heck is all that money coming from? I'm here to tell you that a lot of it is coming from various social services....readers had better pray that they and their loved ones will never need any help of any kind from the society...it's effectively not there now.
This society's resources are going elsewhere.
Like the bees. Did you hear about the bees? Apparently they've become unable to find their way home .... they fly out in the morning to gather pollen.....and are never heard from again.
Our tax dollars are like that.
It's a problem.
A reader in Florida sent me a great article about the mental health system....I'm going to try to figure out how to link it to the blog in case anyone over there wants to read it. It's called "Organizational Stress as a Barrier to Trauma-Sensitive Change and System Transformation." by Sandra Bloom, M.D. in Philadelphia. It's all about us.
What I'm trying to say here...in this rather disjointed way...is that our social fabric is in trouble and its time for us to do something about it....something more than complain to and about one another. We must transform ourselves and our society right now if its to be the sort of place we want to live in. Getting Governor Ritter on board is certainly an important and valuable piece...we can all write a letter like the one the Social Work Fairly wrote...we can all contact our representatives.
Here! Write a quick letter now!!
Governor Ritter
Senator Allard
Senator Salazar
Colorado legislators
The issue is, as I see it, "What sort of community do YOU want to live in?" Is it OK with you to live in a society that spends THIS on a war but can't take care of the wounded the war has made? Or its disabled? or its poor? or its disaster victims? Aren't you tired of knowing that although we spend more (much more) per capita on health care, we have lower life expectancy and higher infant mortality rates than any industrialized nation?
And being tired of it, what are we going to do about it?
Let's talk about solutions...let's read about them, let's think about them...Let us come up with something that would work!!! and then let's make it happen....this is Amerika, damn it! consumerville ...I want to live in America - of the people, by the people, for the people. WE are the people, are we not? Come on, people! There's got to be a better way.
Saturday, February 17, 2007
Haiku!!
The gentle reader who suggested Haiku has inspired me! I think everyone should try a Haiku!
There are rules, you know. The main one is 5-7-5. First line should have five syllables, second line should have 7 and the third should have 5. Here are some links to websites about Haiku, if you want to really study up.
Keiko Haiku Rules
How to Write a Haiku
Forms in English Haiku
These three sort of sum up my week:
see more from this artist
____
OK, you guys, Haiku me back!
There are rules, you know. The main one is 5-7-5. First line should have five syllables, second line should have 7 and the third should have 5. Here are some links to websites about Haiku, if you want to really study up.
Keiko Haiku Rules
How to Write a Haiku
Forms in English Haiku
Her client looks up
Alert, attending within
While she babbles on.
On hold, the phone sings.
Hungry children growl and stamp.
Social Security.
T'ai Chi in winter
Gaul, untrapped escapes away
Leaving space for joy
see more from this artist
OK, you guys, Haiku me back!
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Fun
Good Morning, fellow bloggers! I'm here with new determination to get writing! The snow is melting, the birds are chirping, ...now if the city can just find the manhole cover they lost while scraping the ice on my street, life will be just about back to normal!
The comments have been great...thanks especially to the Social Work Fairy for such a thoughtful, and insightful, essay...and I was struck - while re-reading this morning - by E2's comment about T3 - which seems to forecast the recent patient death there.
Out here, in the world of community mental health, things don't feel as desperately bleak and hostile as they seem to be there in the Enchanted Castle. Partly, no doubt, it's because we aren't locked in together...but there are other factors, too. Big on my list is that I'm allowed to actually do something to improve the lives on my caseload...I'm encouraged to act, instead of encouraged to shut up and check the little boxes. Ahhhh!! what a relief.
...a side note here - I suspect that being allowed to "act" at work, makes it less necessary to "act" by blogging....thus these long gaps in essay writing....
And that's why, Social Work Fairy, I think you underestimate the effect Administration and/or Leadership has on an institution....Leadership creates the atmosphere - the "attitude" - by valuing certain qualities in the workplace. It is certainly possible to create an atmosphere where action is valued, for example. If personal motivation, independent and creative thinking, effective interpersonal skills, etc. were cherished, reinforced, appreciated...you'd have an entirely different hospital there.
I think that's why Hickenlooper, bless his heart, is doing so well. He's got a similar, complex of factors - and regulations - True, he's not locked up with his co-workers, and that does count for something. But he's action oriented, creative, and honest...he doesn't have to do it all, he just has to let others do it...be able to make sound judgements about what helps and what hurts an effort....have some notion of what the "goal" is.
The other important difference between working in the Enchanted Castle and working in the community, is the "fun at work" factor. When I was there (at the Castle), I had the impression that "fun at work" meant "patient neglect" somehow. Some people seemed to be having fun only if they were ngelecting patients - and others seemed to be viewed as neglecting work if they were having fun with the patients.
Out here in the community, we have more fun - it isn't frowned upon as much...on Friday, for example, the center had its annual Christmas party. (Apparently, nobody had time at Christmas.) We went - on the light rail - to the Wynncoop Brewery (there's that Hickenlooper, again). We had lunch, played a little pool, saw an improv comedy show. Went home at 3.
Mandatory attendance. "Just Go!" was the Administrative message. "Have fun!"
And I agree with the SWF about the effect of the entire "social" attitude on the mentally ill - or other dependent members of society. I was complaining to an attorney, (my "consumer" was consulting her to make an appeal on denial of benefits) , that the Social Security office was difficult to communicate with. She said, "You know why that is, don't you?" "No, tell me" I rejoined. She said, "Since the start of the war, the Social Security office has been on a hiring freeze. As time goes by, there are fewer and fewer people to do more and more work. The money is going to the war. It'll only get worse."
Today in the paper, there was an article saying that the government intends to spend - is required to spend - $2.9 million dollars to implement regulations that will save $300,000 for Medicaid....and then there's the president's Medicaid/Medicare budget for this year.....
I saw something last week in the paper about how welfare roles had dropped by some good percentage or other, indicating that more people have gotten jobs to support themselves. Ha! nonsense...there's just that many more poor people out there with nuthin' - nuthin at all!
I just think that's not good for society...and I think Leadership has a lot to do with it.
The comments have been great...thanks especially to the Social Work Fairy for such a thoughtful, and insightful, essay...and I was struck - while re-reading this morning - by E2's comment about T3 - which seems to forecast the recent patient death there.
Out here, in the world of community mental health, things don't feel as desperately bleak and hostile as they seem to be there in the Enchanted Castle. Partly, no doubt, it's because we aren't locked in together...but there are other factors, too. Big on my list is that I'm allowed to actually do something to improve the lives on my caseload...I'm encouraged to act, instead of encouraged to shut up and check the little boxes. Ahhhh!! what a relief.
...a side note here - I suspect that being allowed to "act" at work, makes it less necessary to "act" by blogging....thus these long gaps in essay writing....
And that's why, Social Work Fairy, I think you underestimate the effect Administration and/or Leadership has on an institution....Leadership creates the atmosphere - the "attitude" - by valuing certain qualities in the workplace. It is certainly possible to create an atmosphere where action is valued, for example. If personal motivation, independent and creative thinking, effective interpersonal skills, etc. were cherished, reinforced, appreciated...you'd have an entirely different hospital there.
I think that's why Hickenlooper, bless his heart, is doing so well. He's got a similar, complex of factors - and regulations - True, he's not locked up with his co-workers, and that does count for something. But he's action oriented, creative, and honest...he doesn't have to do it all, he just has to let others do it...be able to make sound judgements about what helps and what hurts an effort....have some notion of what the "goal" is.
The other important difference between working in the Enchanted Castle and working in the community, is the "fun at work" factor. When I was there (at the Castle), I had the impression that "fun at work" meant "patient neglect" somehow. Some people seemed to be having fun only if they were ngelecting patients - and others seemed to be viewed as neglecting work if they were having fun with the patients.
Out here in the community, we have more fun - it isn't frowned upon as much...on Friday, for example, the center had its annual Christmas party. (Apparently, nobody had time at Christmas.) We went - on the light rail - to the Wynncoop Brewery (there's that Hickenlooper, again). We had lunch, played a little pool, saw an improv comedy show. Went home at 3.
Mandatory attendance. "Just Go!" was the Administrative message. "Have fun!"
And I agree with the SWF about the effect of the entire "social" attitude on the mentally ill - or other dependent members of society. I was complaining to an attorney, (my "consumer" was consulting her to make an appeal on denial of benefits) , that the Social Security office was difficult to communicate with. She said, "You know why that is, don't you?" "No, tell me" I rejoined. She said, "Since the start of the war, the Social Security office has been on a hiring freeze. As time goes by, there are fewer and fewer people to do more and more work. The money is going to the war. It'll only get worse."
Today in the paper, there was an article saying that the government intends to spend - is required to spend - $2.9 million dollars to implement regulations that will save $300,000 for Medicaid....and then there's the president's Medicaid/Medicare budget for this year.....
I saw something last week in the paper about how welfare roles had dropped by some good percentage or other, indicating that more people have gotten jobs to support themselves. Ha! nonsense...there's just that many more poor people out there with nuthin' - nuthin at all!
I just think that's not good for society...and I think Leadership has a lot to do with it.
Friday, January 19, 2007
Diary of a Snow Shoveler
My new supervisor has a mot he uses a lot: "I got nothin'", he'll say. Remarkable the number of different situations in which this is, as it turns out, the appropriate response.
I keep trying to come up with an interesting topic for the Blog, and....yep, "I got nuthin."
I think its the weather...
And in support of that theory I offer the following which I got forwarded to me in my email. Don't know the author...it's been around for a while. My compliments to whoever wrote it.
Diary of a Snow Shoveler
December 8 - 6:00 PM.It started to snow. The first snow of the seasonand the wife and I took our cocktails and sat for hours by the windowwatching the huge soft flakes drift down from heaven.It looked like a Grandma Moses Print.So romantic we felt like newlyweds again.I love snow!
December 9 -We woke to a beautiful blanket of crystal white snow covering every inch of the landscape.What a fantastic sight!Can there be a more lovely place in the Whole World?Moving here was the best idea I've ever had.Shoveled for the first time in years and felt like a boy again.I did both our driveway and the sidewalks.This afternoon the snowplow came along and covered up the sidewalks and closed in the driveway, so I got to shovel again.What a perfect life.
December 12 -The sun has melted all our lovely snow. Such a disappointment.My neighbor tells me not to worry, we'll definitely have a white Christmas.No snow on Christmas would be awful!Bob says we'll have so much snow by the end of winter, that I'll never want to see snow again.l don't think that's possible.Bob is such a nice man, I'm glad he's our neighbor.
December 14 -Snow lovely snow! 8" last night.The temperature dropped to -20. The cold makes everything sparkle so.The wind took my breath away, but I warmed up by shoveling the driveway and sidewalks.This is the life!The snowplow came back this afternoon and buried everything again.I didn't realize I would have to do quite this much shoveling, but I'll certainly get back in shape this way.I wish l wouldn't huff and puff so.
December 15 -20 inches forecast.Sold my van and bought a 4x4 Blazer.Bought snow tires for the wife's car and 2 extra shovels.Stocked the freezer.The wife wants a wood stove in case the electricity goes out.I think that's silly.We aren't in Alaska, after all.
December 16 -Ice storm this morning.Fell on my ass on the ice in the driveway putting down salt.Hurt like hell.The wife laughed for an hour, which I think was very cruel.
December 17 -Still way below freezing. Roads are too icy to go anywhere.Electricity was off for 5 hours.I had to pile the blankets on to stay warm.Nothing to do but stare at the wife and try not to irritate her
Guess I should've bought a wood stove, but won't admit it to her.God I hate it when she's right.I can't believe I'm freezing to death in my own living room.
December 20 -Electricity's back on, but had another 14" of the damn stuff last night.More shoveling. Took all day.Goddamn snowplow came by twice.Tried to find a neighbor kid to shovel, but they said they're too busy playing hockey.I think they're lying.Called the only hardware store around to see about buying a snow blower and they're out.Might have another shipment in March.I think they're lying.Bob says I have to shovel or the city will have it done and bill me.I think he's lying.
December 22 -Bob was right about a white Christmas because 13 more inches of the white shit fell today, and it's so cold it probably won't melt till August.Took me 45 minutes to get all dressed up to go out to shovel and then I had to piss.By the time I got undressed, pissed and dressed again, I was too tired to shovel.Tried to hire Bob who has a plow on his truck for the rest of the winter; but he says he's too busy.I think the asshole is lying.
December 23 -Only 2" of snow today. And it warmed up to 0.The wife wanted me to decorate the front of the house this morning.What is she nuts!!! Why didn't she tell me to do that a month ago?She says she did but I think she's lying.
December 24 -6". Snow packed so hard by snowplow, l broke the shovel. Thought I was having a heart attack.If I ever catch the son of a bitch who drives that snow plow I'll drag him through the snow by his balls and beat him to death with my broken shovel.I know he hides around the corner and waits for me to finish shoveling and then he comes down the street at a 100 miles an hour and throws snow all over where I've just been! Tonight the wife wanted me to sing Chris tm as carols with her and open our presents, but I was toobusy watching for the goddamn snowplow.
December 25 -Merry fucking Christmas! 20 more inches of the god damn slop tonight.Snowed in. The idea of shoveling makes my blood boil. God I hate the snow!Then the snowplow driver came by asking for a donation and I hit him over the head with my shovel.The wife says I have a bad attitude.I think she's a fricking idiot. If I have to watch "It's A Wonderful Life" one more time, I'm going to stuff her into the microwave.
December 26 -Stills snowed in.Why the hell did I ever move here?It was all HER idea.She's really getting on my nerves.
December 27 -Temperature dropped to -30 and the pipes froze, plumber came after 14 hours of waiting for him, he only charged me $1,400 to replace all my pipes.
December 28 -Warmed up to above -20.Still snowed in.THE BITCH is driving me crazy!!!
December 29 -10 more inches. Bob says I have to shovel the roof or it could cave in.That's the silliest thing I ever heard. How dumb does he think I am?
December 30 -Roof caved in.I beat up the snow plow driver he is now suing me for a million dollars not only the beating I gave him but also for trying to shove the broken snow shovel up his ass.The wife went home to her mother.9" predicted.
December 31 -I set fire to what's left of the house.No more shoveling.
January 8 -Feel so good.I just love those little white pills they keep giving me.Why am I tied to the bed?
Comments since last post on Cherry Blossom Time
I keep trying to come up with an interesting topic for the Blog, and....yep, "I got nuthin."
I think its the weather...
And in support of that theory I offer the following which I got forwarded to me in my email. Don't know the author...it's been around for a while. My compliments to whoever wrote it.
Diary of a Snow Shoveler
December 8 - 6:00 PM.It started to snow. The first snow of the seasonand the wife and I took our cocktails and sat for hours by the windowwatching the huge soft flakes drift down from heaven.It looked like a Grandma Moses Print.So romantic we felt like newlyweds again.I love snow!
December 9 -We woke to a beautiful blanket of crystal white snow covering every inch of the landscape.What a fantastic sight!Can there be a more lovely place in the Whole World?Moving here was the best idea I've ever had.Shoveled for the first time in years and felt like a boy again.I did both our driveway and the sidewalks.This afternoon the snowplow came along and covered up the sidewalks and closed in the driveway, so I got to shovel again.What a perfect life.
December 12 -The sun has melted all our lovely snow. Such a disappointment.My neighbor tells me not to worry, we'll definitely have a white Christmas.No snow on Christmas would be awful!Bob says we'll have so much snow by the end of winter, that I'll never want to see snow again.l don't think that's possible.Bob is such a nice man, I'm glad he's our neighbor.
December 14 -Snow lovely snow! 8" last night.The temperature dropped to -20. The cold makes everything sparkle so.The wind took my breath away, but I warmed up by shoveling the driveway and sidewalks.This is the life!The snowplow came back this afternoon and buried everything again.I didn't realize I would have to do quite this much shoveling, but I'll certainly get back in shape this way.I wish l wouldn't huff and puff so.
December 15 -20 inches forecast.Sold my van and bought a 4x4 Blazer.Bought snow tires for the wife's car and 2 extra shovels.Stocked the freezer.The wife wants a wood stove in case the electricity goes out.I think that's silly.We aren't in Alaska, after all.
December 16 -Ice storm this morning.Fell on my ass on the ice in the driveway putting down salt.Hurt like hell.The wife laughed for an hour, which I think was very cruel.
December 17 -Still way below freezing. Roads are too icy to go anywhere.Electricity was off for 5 hours.I had to pile the blankets on to stay warm.Nothing to do but stare at the wife and try not to irritate her
Guess I should've bought a wood stove, but won't admit it to her.God I hate it when she's right.I can't believe I'm freezing to death in my own living room.
December 20 -Electricity's back on, but had another 14" of the damn stuff last night.More shoveling. Took all day.Goddamn snowplow came by twice.Tried to find a neighbor kid to shovel, but they said they're too busy playing hockey.I think they're lying.Called the only hardware store around to see about buying a snow blower and they're out.Might have another shipment in March.I think they're lying.Bob says I have to shovel or the city will have it done and bill me.I think he's lying.
December 22 -Bob was right about a white Christmas because 13 more inches of the white shit fell today, and it's so cold it probably won't melt till August.Took me 45 minutes to get all dressed up to go out to shovel and then I had to piss.By the time I got undressed, pissed and dressed again, I was too tired to shovel.Tried to hire Bob who has a plow on his truck for the rest of the winter; but he says he's too busy.I think the asshole is lying.
December 23 -Only 2" of snow today. And it warmed up to 0.The wife wanted me to decorate the front of the house this morning.What is she nuts!!! Why didn't she tell me to do that a month ago?She says she did but I think she's lying.
December 24 -6". Snow packed so hard by snowplow, l broke the shovel. Thought I was having a heart attack.If I ever catch the son of a bitch who drives that snow plow I'll drag him through the snow by his balls and beat him to death with my broken shovel.I know he hides around the corner and waits for me to finish shoveling and then he comes down the street at a 100 miles an hour and throws snow all over where I've just been! Tonight the wife wanted me to sing Chris tm as carols with her and open our presents, but I was toobusy watching for the goddamn snowplow.
December 25 -Merry fucking Christmas! 20 more inches of the god damn slop tonight.Snowed in. The idea of shoveling makes my blood boil. God I hate the snow!Then the snowplow driver came by asking for a donation and I hit him over the head with my shovel.The wife says I have a bad attitude.I think she's a fricking idiot. If I have to watch "It's A Wonderful Life" one more time, I'm going to stuff her into the microwave.
December 26 -Stills snowed in.Why the hell did I ever move here?It was all HER idea.She's really getting on my nerves.
December 27 -Temperature dropped to -30 and the pipes froze, plumber came after 14 hours of waiting for him, he only charged me $1,400 to replace all my pipes.
December 28 -Warmed up to above -20.Still snowed in.THE BITCH is driving me crazy!!!
December 29 -10 more inches. Bob says I have to shovel the roof or it could cave in.That's the silliest thing I ever heard. How dumb does he think I am?
December 30 -Roof caved in.I beat up the snow plow driver he is now suing me for a million dollars not only the beating I gave him but also for trying to shove the broken snow shovel up his ass.The wife went home to her mother.9" predicted.
December 31 -I set fire to what's left of the house.No more shoveling.
January 8 -Feel so good.I just love those little white pills they keep giving me.Why am I tied to the bed?
Comments since last post on Cherry Blossom Time
Sunday, January 07, 2007
Cherry Blossom Time!
"The warmer it is, the more snow the atmosphere can hold". That's what the guy on NPR said this morning. The cherry blossoms are blooming in New York...."At the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, it hardly seems like the dead of winter. Most cherry blossoms don't bloom until the beginning of spring when the winter chill finally begins to warm up. But there hasn't been a winter chill for most of the season, and for that reason, a cherry blossom tree was in practically full bloom on this the second day of January." (according to wcbstv.com)
NPR also says it's going to discuss "The Politics of Mental Health Care" tomorrow morning (That'd be Monday, January 8th). I'd like to hear that...might get me refocused.
But I'm struck by how the weather can take over experience. When I posted the last "blog", it was just after the first storm. Then there was the second storm...then the third.... On the news last night, the weatherman warned about the possibility of another "big" storm next weekend. Work is providing an unprecedented number of "snow days". I bless them for it. I thank my lucky stars I'm not "essential personnel" any more.
How extrodiarily difficult it must be for those who are having to go to work, or leave it, at midnight...or who are kept in cold hotel rooms on their off time, so they'll be available tomorrow. One weekend is one thing. Two, three...maybe four...maybe more....is another.
I hope you're all finding ways to take care of yourselves. Even though I'm now non-essential, I took up T'ai Chi...figured it couldn't hurt. Even for the non-essential, the snow adds a layer of challenge and uncertainty to ordinary activities. Deciding to go grocery shopping becomes measuring your willingness to launch the car into the uncertain reception of the street you live on, bump your way around and through remarkable snowy caverns, find a parking slot in the piles of snow in the parking lot, then shove your cart fully laden back to the car through inches of slush. All of which requires movement with strength and balance...thus, T'ai Chi!
The instructor was late the first morning...came in through the snowy steets, stamping and swearing..."Hey! I thought this T'ai Chi stuff was meant to increase serentity!" I said. He mumbled and grumbled off to the changing room.
He felt better after class. At least that's what he said.
I left class wondering why I can't automatically know my right from my left. I think I'll put a big X on my right hand before class next week.
Nevertheless, the T'ai Chi class brought to mind the hexagram of "Return" in the I Ching..the one that says,
Merchants and strangers did not go about,
And the ruler
Did not travel through the provinces."
The gist of it is that in the dead of winter, as the earth changes from days getting shorter, to days getting longer, everything should rest. All this snow seems to underline that advice. Everything tends to slow you down. The non-essentials are abandoned. The essentials turn out to be eat and stay warm. So simple. So restful. Unless you're an "essential personnel", of course. Then you're toast.
Humor, surely, is the only helpful response to our snowbound predicament.
....I'm trying to think of a joke....
Well. That's all I can muster this week. Hope somebody out there wants to post an interesting comment or two!! Everybody could use "em!
Good Comments since last post on the most recent three essays.
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