Why Celebrate Beethoven by Becoming a "Point of Light"?

Beethoven's Birthday today!

Even if you don't love his music, it is undeniable that the man gave the world a great gift - soaring music in so many different genres, that influenced every generation that came after him.

OK, so the man was a genius.

But we all have gifts. ALL of us. And they need to be savored and relished for our own enjoyment - painting, coloring, writing, building dog houses.

And we need to keep reminding ourselves that some of these gifts need to be shared. The yarn group I started at my local Unitarian church has produced warm shawls and lap robes for Meals on Wheels and the local Senior Center. I have a bag, a la Santa, of 40 hats, gloves, scarves, etc. to share with the Emergency Food Bank. If you are food-insecure, you don't have $ for warmth. And if you can lower in the inner temp because you have sweaters, you can save some more $ to apply to food.

And I offer free classes every term at my local senior college. I do free health talks at the Food Co-Op. I do free work in reiki and other healing work as a percentage of my total work time.

In my parents generation - and among working class and Southerners today, especially - community work was an integral part of life. Everyone, of every income level except the dirt-poor, knew that they had a responsibility [that means, not optional] to give back out of whatever abundance they had - money, time, prayer, or all three.

The shredding of our social safety net - and Republicans going after "benefits" that we working people of America paid for, over a 47 year work life, like Medicare and Social Security - means that we have to band together as never before.

As a Hindu scripture reminds us, "Do not berate or think badly of the poor, because many poor were once prosperous - and you may someday lose your prosperity as well." In other words, we are all in this together.

So inventory what you are good at. Can you cook? (free cooking classes) Can you crochet? (sit over here by me) Can you build things? (Habitat). You get the picture.

Beethoven was a genius, and you and I are not going to have the earth-shattering impact that he had. But consider these words from Middlemarch: : "The growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs."

Every year when I pay my property taxes, I feel like the hero that I am. I am taking care of my community, without fuss or complaint. There are so many unhistoric acts of making our worlds a better place we can take.

Honor the man immortalized into the depths of space..... make your mark on your small corner of the world.

https://www.amazon.com/Red-State-Blue-Heart-Victoria/dp/1974032272/

Do You Want the FDA and Medicare to Save You From Isolation and Dementia?

A select committee of the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine has identified a BIG problem for Americans as we age: hearing aids are not a covered medical expense in Medicare, and Congress has a history of resisting changing that.  Costs average at least $5000/pair and research indicates that at least half of us who need this help try to do without, with results that vary from uncomfortable to disastrous.  Sociologists, social workers and medical researchers have long linked hearing loss to increasing social isolation in elders.  If you can’t hear, you can’t keep your social networks strong, which in its turn is closely linked to poorer physical and mental health.  Now Alzheimer’s researchers, including Dr. Frank Lin at Johns Hopkins, part of the committee, say that an aging brain that is over-tasked with trying to discern language from faint, muffled sounds is a brain that is deprived of the power to maintain cognitive tasks.  In other words, if you need a hearing aid and don’t get it, you are making cognitive decline inevitable.  

The obvious answer, for those who can’t afford a $5000 set themselves, nor the Medicare Gap policies that can cover them, is to do without.  As the Boomer generation continues to swell the elder ranks, this is becoming a public health problem.  In addition to the purely humanitarian aspect, adding to the ranks of dementia is not in the best interests of the nation.  Some members of the committee want the FDA to make hearing aids an over-the-counter purchase to help drive down the cost, while other members caution that hearing aids require careful tuning so the comparison with OTC reading glasses doesn’t really fit.  The committee also asked for more consumer information, including forcing vendors to tell buyers if the product can only be tuned by a particular provider (locking you in if you don’t like the service) and forcing vendors to unbundle the product and services, so that people can determine how much fitting and tuning they want (or really “can afford”.)

The committee also had specific suggestions for helping an elder who needs hearing assistance and can’t afford a hearing aid: speak more slowly and distinctly, not more loudly; face the listener; reduce background distraction noises, so meeting in a library is better than a crowded coffee shop; turn off the radio and TV; rephrase, rather than repeating yourself.  The latter is particularly important.  If the person can’t hear certain sounds well, using different words will be more likely to lead to comprehension.  And do your best to get Congress to change its mind…. Which will undoubtedly require a new Congress, one focused on improving the lives of ordinary Americans.   No elder should be forced to slide deeper and deeper into an isolating silence because they lack the financial resource to both hear and eat. 

Don't Stay Stuck!  Blast through the barriers that are preventing you from living the life you want!  You CAN do it!  www.soaringdragon.biz