;)
I had been a bit worried about how we would get Margie out the door, down the two steps and then up into the Escape, which sits pretty high off the ground and is averaging 23.1 miles to the gallon, but the process went fairly easy. She pretty much did it all herself.
Then we took off for Anchorage. As I drove, I noticed a young man pass by on the left. He looked at us and then started laughing. I figure this was because Margie was in the back seat and me in the front. The young man probably thought that he understood the situation - that my wife was mad at me, and refused to sit in the front seat with me, or perhaps he thought that I had picked up a hitchhiker and had made her sit in the back seat.
Or maybe he thought that my name was James, that I was the hired driver and that it was mighty strange for a chauffer to wear a t-shirt and drive a red Ford Escape.
;)
We pulled off the freeway in Eagle River to get something to eat. We went through the Taco Bell drive-through and then parked next to a police car. It is the first one that I have seen with this picture of Anchorage stenciled into the word, "Police."
;)
Yesterday, Margie got a call from someone at ANMC who asked her to come half-an-hour before her appointment so that she could get new x-rays shot first. So we did, and then we waited an hour before the x-rays were shot.
"It's so good to finally be out of the house," Margie said.
;)
Margie getting her x-rays shot. I had to stand in this room for my own protection.
;)
Margie's knee. The Physicians Assistant, a camera shy woman, who would attend to her would tell us that her bone structure is not good; she has osteoporosis, which means she can more easily fracture her bones.
When she was a child, Margie's family was poor and there were many times when they had little more than flour from which to make tortillas and tennis racket bread (cooked over an open fire on a homemade grilling device that looks like a tennis racket - very tasty). She seldom had milk or other dairy products, although her grandfather had a wagon and a donkey and on occasion would take her up the hill to the trading post and buy her an ice cream cone.
She greatly enjoyed that, but it just wasn't enough calcium for a growing girl.
Her bones have been a bit weak ever since. One time, right after we were married, we were playing in a park when I wrapped my arms around her and twirled her in a circle. We were both laughing, but then a rib cracked. She suffered pain for weeks.
That was when we first found out what the childhood lack of milk had done to her. We haven't thought about that for awhile. Now we have to think about it, because she's getting older and its getting worse, so we must do what we can to arrest it.
Damnit! This should not have happened to my Margie! She should be able to hike through the mountains with me, and run down the downhills, but she can't.
;)
As we wait for the PA, I examine a fake knee. We didn't learn much, because, despite all her improvement, Margie was still too sore and tender and could not bend her knee far enough for the PA to make a good exam. The PA scheduled her for an MRI Friday, so that they can take a good look at her ligaments.
If this had happened to me, and I needed an MRI, notwithstanding the $100 thousand plus dollars that I have spent on my insurance, I can tell you from experience that the insurance company would find the way to get out of paying most, perhaps all of the cost, and I would be set back several thousand dollars more.
This fear of further financial setback is keeping me from going to the doctor for things I ought to go to the doctor for, from taking medications that I am supposed to be taking, and from getting checkups that I am supposed to be getting.
American Indians and Alaska Natives paid a terrible price for the health care that the government is now obligated to give them, but the good thing is, unlike my private insurer, her federal insurer will make good on all expenses involved. Furthermore, if something is bothering her, she need not fear what a trip to the doctor will do to us financially, the way I, who have paid a modest fortune for my health insurance, must.
You see, Sarah Palin, screamers, et al, these panels that you try to whip up so much fear about are already active and are denying many Americans the care they need right now, even as they drive them into a financial pit - but they don't work for Obama or the federal government. They work for the insurance companies.
And so do you.
Can you feel my rage?