My oldest son feels he has to warn me against scammers and
seems to have an idea of me as one of those old folks who will wire their life
savings to a Nigerian prince. Patently ridiculous. Yet the other night, I was
drawn out to see a car for sale that turned out to be at an abandoned house out
in the boonies and the furtive guy selling it obviously had no plates or title
for it. As my son said, “Be thankful it was no worse than wasted time. He could
have pulled a gun on you.”
I wrote a poem about the massacre at Mother Emanuel in
Charleston and just titled it “Mother Emanuel A.M.E. Church, Charleston, South Carolina
6/17/15,” thinking any breathing, literate person in this country would know to
what I was referring. I read it a few nights ago at a public event and had
someone come up to me afterward, not sure what that poem was about and what that
title meant.
I keep thinking the ultra-conservative political clowns have
gone so far off the track that they surely can’t go any further. Then, one says
the first act he’ll take as president is to declare war on Iran, a second wants
to fire the Supreme Court, others make it legal to fire unmarried women for
getting pregnant, and another claims that ancient Native American cave drawings
thousands of years old aren’t antiquities but “just bullshit,” and shouldn’t be
protected.
I thought when my entire city voted for and paid taxes for
years to replace our damaged, antique storm sewer system that the system was
being replaced instead of what actually has happened—the wealthy sections of
town getting new storm sewers while the poorer parts, which paid the same
taxes, have their storm sewers “refurbished.”
I thought, after I called a medical biller and pointed out
that my insurance had already paid all that was due by contract and for them to
bill both Medicare (when I don’t have that coverage) and me for the amount my
insurance company wouldn’t pay is illegal and they said it was just a clerical
error, that would be the end of that. Instead, they’ve re-billed this
fraudulent amount to both Medicare and me once again.
I don’t think I’m naïve, but sometimes I have to wonder
about that.
