As I grow older I have the time to notice things about which I once knew little. I was always up to my eyeballs in being busy with life. I’ve had jobs since I was fifteen years old in addition to going to school, earning degrees, managing a household, having children, doing all of the things that modern women do. I’d leave my home in the dark each morning and rarely go to bed before it was almost the next day. Whenever my mother became ill with her bipolar disorder my balancing act became even busier as I cared for her until she was well again. 

I knew about some of troubles that plague our American society through my interactions with the students whom I taught. For most of my years in the classroom I encountered a preponderance of young people eligible for free and reduced lunch. They lived in areas of town through which few middle or upper income people would want to even venture to drive. They were often lacking in books and things that many of us take for granted. They were more likely than not unaccustomed to the kind of preventive medical care that so many of us take for granted. Initially most of the schools where I worked had nurses who kept busy providing them with referrals to free clinics where they might receive the medical attention that they needed. Sadly, toward the last years when I was teaching more and more schools relied on traveling nurses who had little time do insure that every student was receiving regular medical care. Since retiring I have become more acutely aware of the strains on our medical system and the tremendous inequities in who is receiving attention from doctors.

My father-in-law has enjoyed a lifetime of exemplary medical care. Even as a child growing up in the great depression he did not experience the kind of want and desperation that most people of that era saw. As a young man without college he found work in a unionized company that provided him with free health insurance and a generous pension plan that sustains him with “Cadillac” style living into his ninety fifth year. He can afford a concierge physician who sees him every three months. He pays little or nothing to see the best heart specialists, opthamologists, dermatologists, and dentists in the city. At the age of ninety five his doctors keep him in tip top shape because his insurance will pay them without needing referrals. They will see him immediately if he feels even a twinge. 

My father-in-law has been blessed with good fortune that not many people in our country enjoy. We may have the best doctors anywhere but for far too many citizens seeing them is too costly and so they simply ignore symptoms until it is too late. Most Americans today have to pay exorbitant fees for health insurance and then face ridiculously high bills when they seek medical care. Younger workers today rarely earn the kind of pensions to protect them in old age that my father-in-law enjoys along with Social Security. Theirs is a quiet panic that is rarely discussed but needs to be addressed. Far too many people do not have the means to regularly visit doctors even as they continue to work hard and attempt to save for an uncertain future. Those who are poor have even drearier prospects. 

My mother, like me, worked from a very young age. She unexpectedly became a single parent at the age of thirty and enrolled in college to become a certified teacher. Hers was a balancing act that few would be able to handle, particularly given that when she was forty years old the first dramatic episode of her mental illness became apparent. She lost her position as a teacher and found herself hunting for work that would provide a reasonable healthcare benefit and flexibility in dealing with her illness. Luckily she became a member of a research team at the University of Texas Health Science Center. Her health insurance was free and she earned a pension with the Teachers Retirement System of Texas. More importantly her boss and coworkers were incredibly understanding of her bouts with mental illness. As a result she was always able to address her health issues with proper care even as things tended to get more and more difficult as she aged. 

The luxuries of free health insurance and generous pension plans are fewer than they once were. Even while my father-in-law was grandfathered into the incredible plans of the company where he worked until early retirement, those in my age group who worked along side him learned that such perks would be a thing of the past. He was the last of the people who would retire never having to pay into any of the plans. Today’s workers in the same company would not recognize the benefits that he earned simply for showing up to work. 

We have safety plans for Americans that are often inadequate. The poorest among us tend to wait until they are so sick that they verge on death. We comfort our feelings of guilt by making assumptions about them that are often far from the truth. Many times such people are actually working at many jobs, none of which provide them with viable benefits. They are not simply lazy or ignorant, but more often just victims of circumstances that have made their lives difficult. They have experienced a lifetime of drudgery and fear of becoming homeless and faceless in a world that does not always see them as people worthy of the same perks that some of us enjoy. 

My grandfather lived in a time before Social Security and Medicare. He was old when my grandmother became afflicted with cancer. Since Medicare was still a few years away Grandpa depleted the savings that he had stored away for his later years in order to provide her with the care she needed. When all of his money was gone the hospital sent my grandmother home to die. Grandpa became her nurse at the age of eighty nine. I was only fourteen years old and my mother was busy working so there was nobody to help him from day to day so he emptied my grandmother’s colostomy bag and dressed her wounds. When she died he moved into a rented room because his only source of funds was a very small Social Security check. Fortunately it was a win win situation for him and the young widow who used his payment to keep her home.

We think of ourselves as the greatest nation on earth and there is much to demonstrate that we have bragging rights. Nonetheless, it would be wrong to allow anyone in our country to flounder at any age in life without proper medical care or the ability to at least find a room with someone kind enough to share a home. With all our great wealth surely we should be willing to make certain that everyone has a minimal assurance of a roof overhead, food in a pantry and access to medicine when they need it. Making our country great has nothing to do with selecting one religion for all or flying flags. It is about making sure that all of our brothers and sisters have the care that they need.