Paralyzed with Fear...

It all started with a commercial....

I saw a commercial to apply to be on the commission to redistrict California. It seemed simple enough! I voted for the redistricting to happen, and now they were opening the process and the decision to anyone who qualified. It seemed like an incredibly interesting and fulfilling thing to do.

So I applied. It turns out that the initial form you fill out is a PRELIMINARY application just to make sure you have no strong ties to either political party. That wasn't a problem. I don't know any politicians, nor have I ever contributed large sums of money to anyone's campaign. Super.

I'm an hispanic woman, which already makes me more diversified than the bulk of the applicants, and they claim to want diversity. Cool.

I "passed" their preliminary requirements and received an e-mail saying I can now complete step two of the application process. I must now write four (4!!) 500-word essays describing my qualifications in specific areas and the experience that I have to back up that assertion. In addition to this, I need three separate letters of recommendation collaborating on those assertions. OMG!

This is where my stomach dropped. I read the job description, and although it was incredibly long and complex that only served to make me want it more. The qualifications that they are looking for fit me to a "T", but I don't think I have any specific job experience that ever actually used any of these skills.

They want someone analytical, good with maps, can assign tasks to a staff, can read through a tremendous amount of legal jargon and technical data and make sense of it, can sort through statistics and make sense of them, can listen to arguments on fact and decide which would better suit the needs of California, and can appreciate the diversity that is California. I think I'm all of those things, but how do I prove that??

Hence the fear. Partly the fear is because I would LOVE to do this, and therefore want it badly. The rest is just the idea of trying to sell myself and my qualifications in a series of essays when I have no actual data to pull from.

I've written a business plan, and a thesis.... 2,000 words shouldn't be that scary, should it?

Mulan & Cinderella

My son decided to watch Mulan this morning. It is one of my favorite Disney movies, and one I can watch over and over, so I sat with him while I ate breakfast this morning.

It struck me, as Mulan is preparing to meet the matchmaker in the movie, what a difference there is in this Chinese "cinderella story" and the European one.

I know, I know... before you jump on me for taking a Disney movie literally, that Disney's movies are LOOSELY based on the traditional stories. I get that.

But even loosely, it's interesting how this Chinese cinderella story is about a young woman that joins the military to fight in place of her father, and becomes famous for coming up with the strategy that ultimately saves China. Whereas, the European cinderella is a scullery maid who gets "discovered" by the prince, and is whisked off to live happily ever after as a princess.

Hmmm...

(Of course, the Disney version of Mulan gets the strong, beautiful man at the end, and therefore enjoys the best of both worlds.)

What strikes me the most about these stories is that China, who is notorious for devaluing women, and even the Disney movie points out that the only way for a woman to bring honor to China is to find a husband and make boy babies, produces this amazing story about a woman that proves her worth as a strong, thinking individual. Yet we, who go on and on about women's rights, and equal this and equal that, still want to believe that to be whisked away by a knight in shining armor, to be spoiled and loved, never to work again is our ultimate fairy tale.

I can understand why young girls might be confused. It seems that we profess one thing, but believe another.

Interesting Conversation

I had an interesting conversation with an Iraqi woman today. On the way to pick up a friend from her doctor's office (to give her a ride home), I passed a Muslim woman walking along one of the back streets of my town.

My hometown is in the foothills. Some of it is flat, but most of it is on an incline, with the highest part of it climbing a pretty steep hill. I was driving along one of the steepest streets when I saw the woman. In addition to being steep, the point where I passed her was a LONG way from anywhere. She was obviously walking from the residential area, but it was at least a half mile to the next largest street, and she was lugging a rolling suitcase and a rather large shoulder bag, dressed completely in the traditional Muslim robe/dress and head covering.

Usually I rationalize every possible reason for a person to be walking and where they might be heading until I'm way too far along to stop even if I did feel like it would be the right thing to do. This time, it took no time at all. A woman dressed like that, carrying that much baggage, had no business walking the distance she would be going just to get to the next store, assuming she was walking to Costco (which seemed highly unlikely).

So I slammed on my brakes, backed up as far as was safe along the curb, and offered the lady a ride. It turned out she was walking to the light rail station which was clear across town.

She was at least 60 years old. She'd been in this country for 10 years, still going through the process of getting her green card. Living with her unmarried daughter, as is culturally correct (from what I gathered), she would take this hike anytime she wanted to go into the nearest city, which is about 30 miles away.

We talked about Iraq, and her view on the war. She voiced frustration that our country leaders (not the people, she stressed) invaded her country and dismantled her country's military. Hussein was a dictator, of course, but the people under him were required to obey for fear of death. Even I had to obey, or I would be killed, she said.

Can you imagine living like that? But the interesting part of the conversation was that she believed that the dismantling of the sitting military is what opened the country up to civil war between the religious factions. I don't understand the ins and outs of the Sunni and Shiite (and I thought she mentioned one other) factions, but she referred to them as militias with no one left to control them.

We didn't have much time, there was a bit of a language barrier, and I'm sure there was much more that I don't remember, but it was interesting to hear her point of view.

One Day...

Rain, Rain, Go Away,

Come again another day.

Is it human nature to deal with discomfort by pushing it off to a later date?

We experience hurt and disappointment and we swallow it, shoving it down deep in the corners, to dust out some other day.

But what happens if the rain never comes? What happens if that "one day" never occurs?

Does our soul shrivel up and die like parched earth?

My Recent Experience with Healthcare

The week before Christmas I think I broke my big toe. I showed up for my Taekwondo class, and no one else did, so my instructor offered to give me private jujitsu lessons. Of course I accepted!

Jujitsu is cool! It's all about getting out of holds and throwing people down. Ok. I'm sure there's more to it than that, but that was what my lesson was about.

However, twice during the class my big toe caught on the mat and rolled under my foot. The second time it happened, I was in the process of throwing my instructor down, and I had lifted him onto my hip. So the combined weight of him and I was too much for my poor toe.

Later that night I felt it. It swelled a little, but really started to hurt. Being stubborn and proud, I didn't listen when my husband urged me to go to the doctor. It's a toe for goodness sakes!! What could they possibly do for me anyway...

I finally conceded and taped the toe flat and straight with a tongue depressor cut in half. I did that for a couple of weeks, but that was REALLY inconvenient! After about four weeks, I was beginning to feel like it had fully healed, and healed well. I went back to Taekwondo.

That was a mistake! I was doing very well, but halfway through the class I kicked the paddle my instructor was telling me to kick, and I felt my toe give. Instantly, I knew that I'd made a mistake!

I went back to limping and taking it easy. I didn't re-tape it, but I was definitely being careful.

A week later, and it's actually feeling worse than it did when I first damaged it. So today I swallowed my pride and went to the doctor. My doctor sent me off for x-rays.

I have health insurance. Thankfully. But I intentionally have a plan with a high deductible, which I pair with an HSA account that we contribute to for small expenses, like prescriptions and office visits. It makes me very conscientious of what we go to the doctor for, or the price we pay for prescriptions. So, knowing I'd be paying for it, I asked for the cost of the x-rays.

This is what she tells me: If I pay cash (had no insurance), the cost would be $170. Since I have insurance, and they have a contract with my insurance company, the cost is $213. I asked her if I could pay cash, and submit the paperwork to my insurance company myself. She said no, because that would be breaking the contract they had with my insurance company.

Seriously?

I know that billing the insurance company costs money. However, I offered to do the paperwork myself. $43. I now have to pay an extra $43 because of a contract between the imaging company and my insurance provider. Could this be why the costs of insurance premiums are so high? And getting higher. This was just a $200 x-ray. What if it had been a $5,000 procedure. Would they tack on an extra 25% to that too? That's $1,250.

Do you have any idea what it costs when you go to the doctor? Or get an x-ray? Or get blood drawn?

Perhaps, if we were more aware of what's going on behind the scenes, we'd be better able to fight for a healthcare plan that would benefit everyone.