Part two:
My favorite Suzi Quattro song
comes from her first era, during that time she was latched on to the British
Glam movement while floundering in obscurity here in the states.
She recorded some good tracks
during her go in Great Britian, and one of my favorites is “48 Crash,” a
charming ode from a young Suzi poking fun at the middle age men who are
reaching the end of their sexual virility.
According to Suzi’s source, a man’s
sex drive begins to take a nose dive, to the point where they become
increasingly disinterested in sex, as apposed to the female gender which tend
to have the exact opposite.
Miss Quattro, who endured a lot of
advanced by creepy old guys, used the song to call out such behavior. I use the
song in another manner, A reminder to the fact that I’m now a few years away from the age Suzi declares when I should be sexually dying.
I wasn’t worried about my sex
drive, thank you very much, but starting around my 40th birthday, I
began to notice various changes within my body, specifically the way I felt in
general. With children and office work, my world became very sedentary. I was
no longer active-gone were the 10 mile daily bike rides and eating healthy.
Everything became whatever was quickest to get to the next day.
In this change, I completely
stopped caring about going to the doctor. My wife was aware that early on in
our relationship, I was regularly taking high blood pressure medication and
something for cholesterol too. With two kids behind us, she noticed that I was
no longer taking those medications. She also noticed that I never bothered to
obtain a physician when we moved here, and that it was years since I’d even
entered a doctor’s office.
Finally, I agreed for our fifth
anniversary that I would visit a doctor and begin a new relationship with the
medical community. I would get the once-over, obtain the necessary
prescriptions, and continue on like nothing every happened between the seven
years or so since my last visit to a physician.
Within minutes of this initial
consultation, I was being urged to go to the hospital emergency room. By the
time another test was complete, the doctor was asking me to contact my wife to
have her take me to the emergency room immediately. “And this is how is ends”
is what I kept thinking, reaffirming a previous premonition where everything
moves along swimmingly until the moment I seek health care only to be declared
after entering the sterile medical facility.
After EKG’s, echocardiograms, MRI’s
and a litany of prescription medicines, I am still alive with the incredible
weight of middle age sitting on my shoulders. I was reminded of something that
my grandmother told me a few years before she died, “This getting’ old stuff is
for the birds!” and now completely understand her confounding dialogue.
It is for the birds, the 40’s suck
ass, but I’m told under good advice from my mother that it kicks ass again when
you turn 50. Speaking of, old mom now views my wife as a saint for getting me
to the doctor to begin with.
The irony is that the results of
my poor lifestyle has made me a dependant of the pharmaceutical industry. And
all of the nonsense and expense of just getting to a point of treatment has
made me realize that anyone who isn’t behind some kind of health care
reform-including the minor shuffling that the SCOTUS will be dismantling here
in a few days-is completely retarded.
Who are these opponents? What kind
of fantasy world do they live in that some kind of reform is in order, and to
rely on the free market to simply adjust themselves after years of enjoying a
gangbang of profits and unchallenged regulation.
And this is coming from someone
with insurance. As fortunate as this is, my company is dropping our traditional
insurance programs for some low cost health savings plans that help eliminate
my company’s costs while driving up mine. There is no chance that my
compensation will increase to adjust for these additional costs and there’s not
a lot of confidence that these newly acquired ailments will not be treated as
some kind of preexisting condition with another provider.
Humble Pie was right.
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