… I do wish when the tell me how good I look after not seeing me for a long time that they just wouldn’t sound so shocked.
Beverly Masek does not represent Native women
Here’s what struck me the most about the front page of the paper last Wednesday. Above the fold was a story about a Bethel doctor, Jill Seaman, who earned a MacArthur fellowship genius award for her work in southern Sudan. She first went to Africa in 1984 to help out in famine starved Ethiopia and has been returning to Africa ever since to offer what medical care, solace, compassion and help she could to some of the most needy and wretched populations on earth.
Dr. Seaman never used being a woman as an excuse for doing anything less than heroic
Happy Anniversary to me….
Today marks the 37th year since I arrived in Alaska. It’s been one wild and wooly ride so far.
Those darn Stellar Jays
I was sitting in my chair last evening watching the news with my headset on to block out the noise my parrots make in the evening. Through the melodic sound of the newscasters’ voices, I kept hearing a rhythmic banging. I kept shaking my head thinking there was a problem with the headset. Then I started fiddling with the tuning button on the side of the earpiece thinking I was picking up some construction noise. When nothing stopped it, I took the headsets off and got up to see where the noise might be coming from if it wasn’t from
Nazis
Don’t you get the feeling that at some point the people of Germany are going to get a little tired of Americans who oppose any health care reform calling the other side Nazis? I mean, Nazis were like the evilest group in pretty much all of recorded history. And comparing some long winded politicians to them is just… well absurd and ludicrous come to mind. Isn’t it bad enough that the German people must bear the burden of having actually produced this vile regime? Do they now have to share it with American politicians? I mean, the only two people
Back in Barrow
Back from Barrow. Funeral is a sad reason to go there. But while there they landed four whales and I got to have unaliq and watch all that was going on as a snow squall blew and then disappeared almost as fast as the whales did under the skillful hands of the whalers. Made me realize how much I missed it.
The very best time of the year
I have lived through many autumns in the northeastern part of this country and they are beautiful. But autumn in Anchorage is amazing. Before the snow and after the bugs, with golden leaves shimmering in the breeze. It takes my breath away… and not just because the temp is below forty degrees.
Today
Today I give a eulogy for Deborah Lyn, one of the best people it has ever been my privilege to know. I will miss her.
Body count
Remember during the Vietnam war how we kept getting those body counts from the military after each battlle as though if we finally had a large enough count of dead bodies we could declare victory? Am I the only one getting the same feeling out of the numbers now being released by the government about how many Taliban we kill each day?
Don’t call it health care insurance… it’s not
America’s current health care system should really be called our sick care system because health is simply not its primary objective.
Preventive care, which would actually be caring for your health, is all too often not covered. For instance, the state of Alaska’s retiree health insurance plan will not pay for an annual breast exam if you no longer have a uterus. I have never quite understood the connection but the shortsighted nature of this policy is obvious to anyone who looks at the cost of caring for someone with advanced breast cancer as opposed to someone who catches it