Dream Life

I had drinks with my friend Katie last night. Katie's leaving her job in a month, and is planning on taking some time to just do project work before settling into her next full-time gig. I think Katie works kind of like I do: makes work a part of her identity. I have a tendency to lay awake at night, worrying about work.

We were talking about what it is that I do all day, and how I like working from home and taking in chunks of money wherever I can, and I think I started to gush a little. There are definitely days in which I've watched too much TV and not gone on enough walks, and days when I don't get a lot of work done because it's hard to get into the mindset when you're not in an office, but after almost a YEAR of unsteady employment, I'm having a hard time wrapping my mind around the fact that I'll be back at a desk, full-time, soon.

(Bank of America has pretty much told me I have to be.)

I'm hoping that when that happens, I don't need to give up the projects I've come to enjoy. There's this sporadically-updated blog, there's my business idea, there's the idea that I can make dinner, there's the knowledge that people can get substantive work done in coffee shops.

My friend Curtis lives his work, and seldom in an office. He has his laptop with him at all times, and when he's on it you never know if he's creating the first non-sucking expense report or if he's reading his never-ending RSS feed. He kind of has the ideal situation: he ENJOYS working in the middle of the night, because work is satisfying to him. His work is also his hobby, and his interest.

I want that.

And then today I read something on Facebook that bothered me, and made me feel, a little bit, like that's out of reach for people like me. You know how today, everyone was posting those two sentences about healthcare? ("No one should die because they cannot afford healthcare; no one should go broke because they get sick.") A good friend of mine--someone who I consider myself to be very much like--changed her status to say that she wasn't sure we should be talking about serious things on Facebook, and that she misses when it was fun.

Fifteen comments ensued, of course, and most of them were a discussion about for what purposes people use Twitter versus Facebook. It was commonly acknowledged that people tweet about things that are serious or related to their job, and use Facebook for casual, funny conversation.

That's an acknowledgment that they're hiding part of who they are.

Maybe I'm just always repressed because I know my bosses and work friends are amongst my Facebook friends, but do they really think that when I leave work, I'm reading nothing but industry reports? And if something about my work is interesting, and I write about that, will my friends not think it's interesting, too?

I'm friends with a lot of ambitious people, and I understand being guarded when it comes to your professional life, but you kill a good work-life balance if you're constantly self-censoring out of fear that someone will think less of you for being multi-dimensional. And, frankly, no one wants to network with a hack.

Yep. My time at home has given me some perspective.

Going Viral...ha ha. Get it? VIRAL.

I haven't gone to any healthcare town halls. Because the last few places I've LIVED lived have been liberal enclaves (Cambridge, Berkeley, San Francisco), I have a tendency to ignore all the action alerts that pour into my inbox every day. I mean, I feel pretty confident that 1) Nancy Pelosi's mind is made up, and 2) She's voting my way.

My mom's going to a town hall tonight, though, and we had an e mail conversation the other day about what her sign should say. She was going to go with something like, "Lies are bad, dialogue is good." I don't think anyone would disagree with that, but I'm not sure that points to one side or the other. And the only thing I could think of as a better sign was: "My five-year-old was refused healthcare."

And it's totally ridiculous that Eden had to be denied before I could figure out something pithy to say about health care reform. I've always had relatively good care--or, at least, could afford my co-pay.

But last week's Newsweek, as usual, had some good talking points. Sharon Begley, who is perhaps the most readable science reporter on the planet, and to whom I'm constantly thinking of sending a fan letter, wrote an article called: "Attack! The truth about Obamacare." The article laid out the R's talking points versus the D's. The GOP has catchphrases like "death panels" and "standing between you and your doctor," whereas my team is working with "bending the cost curve" and "the status quo."

My girl Sharon, per usual, writes exactly what I wish I was thoughtful enough to say to naysayers: That the system is broken; that currently who stands between the decisions of you and your doctor is your insurance company; that people are prevented from leaving their jobs because the cost of carrying that insurance on their own is so expensive; that even in the last ten years, small businesses have dropped coverage by another 30%; that half of all personal bankruptcies are due to illness; that Medicare IS government-run healthcare; that the government is proposing that it pays for you to talk to your doctor about your end-of-life directive, not put you in front of a death panel; that the discussion of "cost effectiveness" is a mistranslation of the actual discussion of "medical effectiveness"--that maybe no one should pay for treatments that haven't been proven to work; that nothing in this bill mentions paying for sex-change operations; that abortion isn't covered in the bill, because the government has already banned using federal dollars for it; that people die every year because their insurance companies refuse to pay for treatment that might work--against doctors' wishes.

I think most of my Facebook friends are of a like mind, but I know there are at least a few who aren't. So from today until this debate is resolved, my status update is going to be a health care talking point. I only had one negative response to my status posting about Eden, and his comment was jumped on and he failed to respond to the challenge. Maybe if more of my "friends" were armed with talking points, they might get a little more fired up. Or at least know how to respond to crazy in-laws and the like.

Healthcare Reform

My brother applied for health insurance for his five-year-old through Kaiser, who was already covering Tim.

As a result, Kaiser re-evaluated Tim, and refused him coverage.
Reason:
Within the last 24 months, kidney stones
Illegal drug use within last 5 years
Tobacco use within last 2 years

Kaiser also refused Eden, my nephew, coverage.
Reason:
Within the last 12 months, visited a doctor for minor illness/injury

If a five-year-old can be refused for visiting the doctor once in the last year, I wonder if I can be refused for blogging about it?