Wednesday, July 16, 2014

In the Mail...

....came the Costco Magazine, featuring an illustrated article on myofascial release strategies, including the deep tissue work which has been so helpful in my recovery.  As we age we tend to dessicate, inside and out.  As our fascia dry out, they become adhesive, clinging to the tissues around them.  Separating them from others and themselves is something we should all be thinking about, because we are never too young to take prophylactic measures. 

I took that information with me to meditation several weeks ago.  I sat on the floor, legs extended, arms by my ankles as I leaned up and over my fourth and third quadrants (lower abs to pelvic floor), sinking into the pose, just as Costco advised.  After 15 minutes of clearing my mind and not judging the thoughts which entered and left, my forehead was closer to my kneecaps than it ever had been before.  My fingers were well beyond my heels, and my spine had no knots or kinks. 

It took me a while to regain an erect spine, and even longer to stand up and rejoin the group on my chair.  But it felt great to be so much taller..... a sentence which started out to read It was great to feel so much taller but which is truer as first presented.
*****
...came a letter from Robert S Mueller, III.  He apologized for taking so long to respond to my letter as he retired from the FBI.  He sent his thoughts to my family and said a thing or two about "the circumstances of that tragedy" and I smiled.

It's not often that remembering January 8, 2011 makes me smile, but thoughts of former Director Mueller always do.  He was a kind and gentle presence in a sharp and painful process,  He knew all of our names and our stories and he held my hand ... not shaking it, but holding it, as he apologized for the fact that this had happened on his watch. 

There was not a doubt in anyone's mind that he truly cared.  How often do you get to say that?  Can you see why thinking about him makes me smile?

And then, of course, there was the stationary itself.  A half sheet embossed with his name alone in a serif font, in big and small capital letters, in black at the top of the short end.  The watermark is straight down the center of the almost-but-not-quite-too-thick paper.  It made my smile even wider.
*****
....came a thank you note from a good friend.  She lives here in town.  We email and text and phone all the time.  Yet, she took the time to use a pink, deckle edged, folded over note card (yes, I do love stationary) upon which she penned words of gratitude and friendship.

Some old habits, ingrained since childhood, die hard.  This is one I am glad is showing staying power.
*****
.... came an AARP card.  Actually, it was two cards, one for me and one for my spouse.  My spouse has been ignoring these requests for two years longer than I have been, following his lead since the gesture matched my own desires. 

But this week he looked at the shiny red surfaces of the plastic rectangles and thought aloud that, maybe, we should sign up.  He said they were the only people who advertise anything about Medicare Supplemental insurance plans. 

I bit my tongue.  Medicare is his issue first and I am leaving it in his court.  I don't understand it and I don't want to undertake the investigation.  Therefore, I didn't mention the stack of ads accumulating in his Medicare file folder.  He'll get to it when he gets to it.

Meanwhile, I am frowning over joining an old people's club.

7 comments:

  1. Unfortunately, this comes to us all. From what I have read on the NYT, the drug formulary is the most tricky thing to navigate. One must ensure that not only are your drugs covered, but that they are covered at the dosages you use. My spousal unit got there before me, but it really did take two of us to made the spreadsheets, listen to the coverage details and detect when the nice man on the phone wasn't being truthful. Good luck, may the force be with you.

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    1. Iknew if I typed about this my readers would chime in. SPREADSHEETS!?!?!?
      Oh, dear....
      a/b

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  2. Be aware that the insurance company touted by AARP is owned by them.

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    1. I've never trusted AARP...... thanks for this detail!
      a/b

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    2. i never knew who AARP pushed but we went with United which had been the provider before for the corporate policy we had had. So far so good but every November a person can rethink the choice. That was the way it was with the corporate insurance also; so despite complaints ACA is limiting us, it's just pushing more into what corporate people experienced all along with their insurance choices.

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  3. Back when I tried to understand Medicare for the first time, it made me wonder how anybody without much education could do it. it was confusing and frustrating. We went into AARP about that time as the corporate policy we'd had became prohibitively expensive. We wanted an Advantage plan, which we then bought, liking AARP or not. The insurance is a fair price and so far it's been good coverage. It was a continuation of what we had during all our HMO years when the corporation was where we got coverage. It helps that we have been with the same clinic that we joined when we moved here in 1977 and it's been an HMO all that time, which can take some getting used to but for us it was what we'd had in Portland too.

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    1. I grew up with an HMO, and never understood why people didn't like them... we saw every specialist we needed and it cost nothing extra. I was a child, so I was unaware of scheduling and other annoyances my mother encountered, if there were any.

      The larger point, understanding it without training and education, will be the underpinnings of the series I write when he starts to gather his own facts. No matter how much I protest, I know I'll be a part of the decision. Like you, I'm prepared to put my personal feelings aside and choose based on price and coverage...... it's not Hobby Lobby, after all.
      a/b
      a/b

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