For the past four mornings I’ve walked to the white line; a long overdue goal. Walking a mile a day is when I breathe the air that moves the birds, walk among other legged creatures like frogs and turtles, and share Mother Earth with my beloved plants and trees — pollen and all. With my heart pumping a new found pace, I’m in awe of the morning’s activities — including mne.

We’re fortunate to have such a long drive way that I can walk in peace and quiet and with security. Well, the peace is there but quiet isn’t because the birds, frogs, and crickets are continuously singing all sorts of songs and calling to one another; security isn’t certain because a skunk could appear at any moment and even though it’s been a while since a coyote has come this far out it is a possibility, not to mention the wild dog packs. But other than that, my walk is wonderful. Do I ponder on such things? No. My trusty walking stick is ever-present and is dual purpose. The driveway is rocky and uneven so having a walking stick is critical to not spraining an ankle, falling, or tripping on vines.

All these things aside, this is a time of reflection when thoughts flow freely from my heart to my head and all sorts of inner thoughts converse with one another. All I have to do is listen and pay attention.

Like yesterday, for instance, a solution to the American way of health insurance worked its way to my surface. For years I’ve said there should be a better way of insuring Americans. I say American because that’s who I am. While I’m NOT for socialized medicine, something needs to be done about the out of control upward spiral of expensive health care and the outrageous methods of insurance companies.

Thoughts of what I liked spurred more thoughts. I like the way Social Security follows you through your work history; from day one of your first job. I like the way you can change jobs from one place to another, from one career to the next and Social Security follows you. Why couldn’t health insurance operate the same way or at least be similar?

I’ve never liked that individual companies should be responsible for providing health insurance for its employees. Large companies could offer better packages than small companies because of the number of employees; but people have the same basic needs. What about the folks who prefer to be self-employed or are unemployed? Why should businesses who specialize in certain widgets be forced to offer a commodity they know nothing about? They should focus on their specialized widgets and turn insurance over to those gurus.

I’ve never liked the way that you pay and pay and pay for insurance but there’s no financial gain or interest earned for your invested dollar; and when you leave that employer, your insurance  investment stops without any returns. Yet the insurance companies used my money to invest in stocks and other money producing products — aside from offering insurance coverage.

You pay dearly for something you seldom see or use yet when you quit paying your coverage ends. There’s something wrong with this concept. That is, unless you’re on the receiving end of that coin. It’s like fire; itls alive only as long as you feed it. When you quit feeding it, it dies. At lease with fire there’s a residual; smoke or a cleared path or new growth will come from it. But not insurance. No pay no have.

I’ve never liked that insurance companies could dictate what they’ll pay for or not. Nor that they determine how much to pay, nor that they tell doctors how and when to use certain tests or not. Isn’t that practicing medicine without a medical degree?

Why do insurance companies police our doctors and pharmaceutical companies? Don’t get me wrong, someone should but why insurance companies?  Isn’t it to their best interest to force others to use services that cost them less money instead of providing the best care for the patient?

Why do we need health insurance?  Insurance is little more than a set of statistical models used to distribute costs from one incident to the next, spreading out the costs, so to speak. As a community, I have no problem with this concept. However, … . Here’s where my lack of knowledge about the insurance industry plays out so I’ll make up my own rules.

All monies should go into a clearing house of sorts but NOT government-owned. Certain illnesses could be inclusive based on statistical data (I’ll give statistics that, deep data does have its benefits.). We already know which physical conditions we’ll have based on our age from pregnancies to childhood diseases, and based on our fitness levels from obesity to hip replacements. This could be incentive to get into shape and lose weight, stop eating processed foods, and such. (Looks like process foods will be an upcoming discussion.) But let that be a choice that dictates which policies one can purchase. With that said catastrophic coverage should include everyone.

There, I’ve solved the problem for you, America. Now all you’ve got to do is wipe out corruption, political payoffs, greed, forgeries, laziness, redundancy, waste, and actuarial bull shit.