Keys

Now that I'm officially retired my insurance has changed.

I'm unhappy with it. I don't understand why I'm seeing so much mail telling me to pay for things when I have supplemental insurance. Why isn't the second one picking up where Medicare leaves off? Why are all the labs and specialists nickel and diming me to death? Why so much mail?

The bills are infuriating. Not that they're so expensive, rather, that there are so many of them. They're ridiculous.

A lady at one of the doctor's offices told me to contact another lady who specializes in this sort of thing. "Several other people spoke to her. She really is good at this. The other people told me she's great."

I want a third insurance that pays everything and makes it all go away.

The whole time I worked at the Fed they bragged about how their insurance policies were the best available. All those extra benefits were part of their pay package. They never stopped reminding us how important they are and how splendid. But now that I'm actually using them, my experience is pure crap.

Why is everyone vexing me so much? Why so many demands? I have to put up with this same enrollment shit every year. Why so unsteady?

Why does AARP assume they own me? Why send me a gigantic package when I turned fifty, then another gigantic elaborate and expensive package when I turned sixty-five? How presumptuous! How amazingly stalking. Why would I want anything to do with a group that has stalked me based on my age, merely a number to them, and didn't take the hint I gave them at age fifty to go f themselves?

Good and hard.

How rude!

They have no idea how offensive their marketing behavior is. Combined with their lobbying. I have no use for them.

Where they are getting their information is beyond me, but that information is available globally. I have people from foreign countries calling me to tell me they're from Social Security and they noticed illegal behavior on my account.

Social Security doesn't call anyone. They have no time for that. You report to them, not they report to you. And when you do report to them for anything you can expect an elaborate automatic menu-driven system that lists the entire legal history at each step. They do things by mail. By computer. They do not call you and tell you that they noticed activity on your account. They are impersonal as possible. And when they do speak personally they speak with American accent.

Not Mexican accent, not Indian accent, not British accent, not Timbuktu. Go f yourself, Fraudster.

Good and hard.

I need help. So I'm seeking it. I have a housekeeper but she is insufficiently thorough. So now I have two housekeepers.

I have good medical insurance. But it's not good enough. So I'm looking for a third medical insurance that duplicates what I had previously.

In my previous incarnation I reached the end of my line.

At that exact moment a man appeared at my door selling insurance.

Usually I had no time for that sort of thing, although I had nothing but time, and my time had run out. I invited him in. He was from Secure Horizons an insurance that picked up where everything else left off. It paid everything and did all the paperwork for the other two insurers. I would see nothing.

Perfect.

Plus it was free! Even more perfect. Unbelievable, actually. How do they expect to stay in business?

After a few years they could no longer continue without charging a fee. Fine.

After a few more years their fee increased. Fine.

After a few more years the FRB picked them up as part of their package. Fine!

After a few more years they were acquired by United Healthcare. Not fine.

Now I'm right back to where I was fifteen years ago.

The FRB still uses them but as United Healthcare, for their supplemental insurer for retirees.

So now I am visiting the lady who is excellent about figuring out the best kind of insurance. To pick up where United Healthcare leaves off.

Something so easy as that is presently the biggest hassle for me. I must get myself presentable. I must drive to another unknown place. I must be on time. I must not have a wreck. I must have fuel in the truck. I must drive between the lines. I must merge with traffic. All the simplest things are presently challenges.

I practiced in Google Earth. And things are matching up pretty well.

Right at the critical moment of locating the building behind a Disneyland of curving and splitting driveways, choosing which stoplight to turn at to get me back there, the phone rings in my backpack. Surely it's her confirming our appointment. But I cannot deal with a phone and driving at the same time. I have to stay focused on the challenge at hand; making my turn. And I am nearly there anyway.

I park the truck, pull the phone from the bag and return the call.

It was another of those g.d. m't'h'r f'k'n bogus foreign spam callers who pulled my number from someone else's @ss and stole someone else's number to make the call. By computer.

Man, oh man. My culture gives some other cultures computers and phones and the low-lifes use them to extort me.

I pack the phone back up and enter the building for our meeting.

The directory is electric and it is turned off.

I'm recalling what I read in her email. Suite 400.

I'm guessing. I go to the 4th floor. It should be the first door. They are not marked.

Locked.

But the door opens and there she is! She was right there waiting.

The place looks like a modern museum.

We walk together way to the back.

W-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-y to the back.

Like a mile.

To a tiny intimate office.

I brought everything with me. I dump it all on her desk. She sorts through and lifts out one single booklet. She reaches behind her desk and produces another booklet. She says:

"This is the next best thing to what you have. It has a maximum co-pay of $4,000. Your policy has a maximum co-pay of $1,000. Your policy is better than the next best thing. There is insurance that does what you want. But those premiums are more than your maximum co-pay. You really do have the best policy that is available."

     "What?"

"You already have the best policy that is available.'

     "So let me get this straight. You're telling me I should be happy with what I already have."

"Yes."

Major attitude adjustment occurs instantaneously. Suddenly hundreds of piddling envelopes doesn't sound all that bad. I can deal with those.

     "Thank you. You just now changed my whole attitude. I can live with this nickel and diming me to death, given what you explained to me. I just now experienced a major attitude adjustment. Did you notice it?"

"Not until you told me. No."

We chatted the rest of the time. I enjoyed her and she enjoyed speaking with me. I told her dreadful stories and she loved them.

I went downstairs to my truck, reached into my pocket for my keys but my pocket was empty.

My keys were hanging in the ignition.

The bogus phone call at the critical moment of finding the building, and my wanting to tell the woman I'd be right up, and all the extra things I must account for, my laptop, phone, papers, glasses, sun glasses, two canes, anticipating my meeting, my planning what comes after the meeting, the whole doing things well out of my comfort zone caused me to leave my keys in the truck and lock it.

AAA took over an hour. And that's very unusual for them. But there I am way out there waiting. Once they arrive they break into my truck within thirty seconds it's all over and I'm back in business.


But my energy is used up. I must sleep.

I'm right next door to a Whole Foods and I'm out of the things that I like. I could just drop in and pick up the things that I know that I'll use fairly quickly. Good fish, good cheese, and a few other things.

That place was happening.

People buzzing around like they're on fire. The place is packed. P-A-K-T, packed. And buzzing.

Yet there are three open spots for handicapped parking right there smack in the front.

That means everyone who goes to Whole Foods is healthy. Except me.

:-(

Inside people are tearing around all over the place. Racing like racing-ants. With carts.

This is a very unusual Whole Foods. It's larger than most.

Surprisingly, people inside are still very talkative. You have only to say something, anything, to get a friendly response.

The fish guy was a tall stylish black dude eager to engage conversationally.

The meat guy was a regular white dude, also eager to engage conversationally.

The cheese guy was another regular young white dude super eager to engage conversationally and at extreme length.

The checkout girl was tall, thin, young and gorgeous and incredibly friendly and eager to engage conversationally.

I talked my ass off in there with gorgeous young people eager to speak and to listen. Where they find all these people or how they train them is amazing.

I could feel my body break down. Sharp pain in my ankles, dull pain in my shoulders, my neck was having difficulty holding my head up. My gait was unsteady. I kept calculating the shortest distance between things. I had to get out of there fast.

Outside. "I can take that back for you."

Another customer whose vehicle is facing mine is loading a 5-gallon container of water. He offered to return my cart for me. I thought he was an employee at first.

He came here for water.

Water!

Oh. The storm. Everything changes tomorrow. We'll go from beautiful summer-like weather to winter just like that in a snap. That's why Whole Foods was humming. That's why everyone is so cheerful. They are preparing for a storm while enjoying incredible weather. They are of two minds. Everyone is. That is what is what is so unusual about them today.