Don't Get Me Started: December 4, 2017

A few years back, my trophy wife fell and broke her ankle in three places. I used the “Fireman’s Carry” I learned in the Navy and got her into the car. At the emergency room, we were lucky. They got her in quickly and efficiently (Springhill Baptist in North Little Rock, AR ☼☼☼☼☼).

It was Friday. Turned out the Doc on duty was the surgeon who operated on such breaks. He operated on Saturday. I took her home on Sunday. Within a week I was pushing her through Lowe’s parking lot in her wheelchair going “Whee whee whee!”

Until she made me stop, but that’s another story.

We’ve had to go back to that emergency room a couple of more times: once with a kidney stone (me) and once with acute dehydration and pneumonia (mother-in-law).

It’s gotten more crowded each time. Last time, I’ll swear I sat beside a teenager and 12 of her close relatives. From all appearances, she was there for a pregnancy test, or something very close to it. (When she came back from consultation, they all wanted to know if it was a boy or girl). Also saw someone we knew who, from all accounts, has the distinction of never having held a job in his adult life. He was with his latest girlfriend and their baby, I think his fifth. No. Not African-American—white and ultra-conservative. You ought to hear hear him rant about that "n****r" president."

Here’s my big fear for the future. The current plan for the ruling party, apparently, is for the emergency rooms across the country to provide care for those who don’t see the need for health insurance. I guess we’ll pay our share of the cost. We don’t like to watch suffering.

But … and here is the real rub. It’s going to be a helluva wait if you happen to need emergency care.

Oh, and I recently saw a particularly hateful and venomous essay by former football coach Lou Holtz. Yeah, he’s the one who left Arkansas because they wouldn’t let him use his position as football coach at U of A to advertise air conditioners. Anyway, he claims our country is divided into doers and takers. Made me think, yeah, there’s some truth to that. I thought of America’s “Sweetheart City,” Savanah, Georgia and how the “doers” who built those fancy homes were, upon completion, never allowed within them again except, perhaps, to serve the “takers.”

Now there’s the current ex-coach. He was supposed to “do,” but he didn’t. So, he’s “taking” somewhere near $12 Million to go and “not do” somewhere else.

I think I read in the Book of Ludicrous that oversimplification is as great a sin as worshiping riches.