I first read Earth Abides by George R. Stewart more than 30 years ago. It wasn’t newly published even then, but it was new to me.
Unlike many other books I have read and forgotten, Earth Abides has stayed in my mind. I have returned to it again and again. I can recall it with remarkable clarity especially considering the hundreds of books I read every year, probably thousands since I first encountered Earth Abides.
Earth Abides is considered by many writers and readers of science fiction as a “foundation book” and is often cited as “the original disaster” story. A foundation book it is, but “original disaster story” entirely misses the point.
Earth Abides isn’t a disaster story, original or otherwise. It is a book of rebuilding, renewal and hope. The event that initiates the story is a disaster, a plague accidentally released from a laboratory that runs amok and kills off most of Earth’s human population. Some small percentage of earth’s population is naturally immune to the bug (as is true for all plagues) plus anyone who survived a rattlesnake bite has immunity.
The plague is the back story. The front story and theme of Earth Abides is the ways that humankind copes with the tragedy as scattered remnants of people gradually find each other. Individuals find others to form groups. Through marriage and the pressures of survival, groups become tribes. Most ailments of the old earth were eliminated by the plague. The vanished ailments are physical — the new generations are wonderfully healthy — and sociological. Archaic religious and social structures are shed by survivors who don’t remember what purpose they served or have any interest in preserving them. The new world has no room for bigotry, hatred or mental disease. It’s a small world, a new world with much to do. The strong and useful will survive, but the unfit cannot be allowed to reproduce. The world is too small to support those who cannot contribute.
Thus new civilizations thrive and increase. Ultimately, they repopulate the earth. The reborn world contains bits and pieces of what went before, but is redesigned in a new and presumably healthier way. The world is free of race hatred and religious prejudice, as well as most diseases.
The book was re-released in a 60th anniversary edition a few years ago, including an audio version with an introduction by Connie Willis.
Cover of the 1949 Random House hardcover edition of Earth Abides. Cover illustration by H. Lawrence Hoffman. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I have owned dozens of copies of this book. I usually keep an extra copy to give it to people who haven’t read it.
The complaint that the book is a bit preachy is fair enough, but so are many science fiction and fantasy books, including everything Robert Heinlein wrote and everything written by Anne Rice. Anne Rice is so preachy that some of her books are the straight stuff: no plot, no story, just preaching. George R. Stewart had, in my opinion, better points to make and gets a free preaching pass from me. Most writers, especially in science fiction, have points to make and it won’t kill anyone to ponder them.
It’s also important to remember that the book was published in another time and place. Many things that are largely accepted without a second thought today were revolutionary 64 years ago. In some parts of the world and in this country too, they are still revolutionary. We have moved on … to a point.
When the book was first published interracial relationships and rejection of formal religion were not accepted or tolerated most places. Attitudes have changed though there’s still more than enough racism, religious fanaticism and hatred to go around.
I’ve seen criticisms pointing out how out of date the book’s technology is. It wouldn’t matter if the technology of the world gone missing had been spot on accurate. Gone is gone.
Regardless of how advanced it used to be, whatever it was became insupportable on a depopulated earth. You can’t drive cars without gasoline and you can’t keep the pumps working without electricity. You can’t use telephones or computers when there’s no service. Satellites would circle the earth, but their signals would be received by no living person, so how would it matter? No batteries and no power, and it’s all over when the power is gone. As the book makes clear, the amount of time before the automated system stop functioning when there’s no one to take care of them is a few years — maybe — for even the most basic infrastructure.
After that, the world goes back to a pre-technological world, though not a pre-industrial one. Industry existed before electricity. There has always been wind, water and sun. And books remain, knowledge exists waiting to be re-deployed. Earth abides.
The world ends, the world begins. Earth Abides. Ish and Emma are the “mother” and “father” of the new tribe. Ish, in Hebrew, means “man” and “Eema” means “mother” which I am sure is not coincidental. It’s a wonderful story that suggests the human race has the capacity to not only survive, but reinvent civilization and make a better world. If you haven’t read this book, read it. It’s available in print and on Audible with a fine narrator. I cannot recommend it too highly. Earth Abides is timeless. As is the Earth itself. I discovered today there is an entire site dedicated to George R. Stewart –The EARTH ABIDES Project . The site contains pictures and other memorabilia. Definitely check it out!
After I was told I had cancer in not one, but both breasts — they were having a two-for-one special at the Dana-Farber — I had them removed and replaced by silicon Hollywood quality implants. I stopped short of adding the fake nipples. Previous surgeries had left me with no naval, so now lacking both naval and nipples, I think maybe I’m an alien walking the earth.
I have a tee-shirt that says “Yes, they are FAKE. My real ones tried to kill me.” It makes people laugh. It’s the high point of my cancer experience.
Unfortunately, cancer tends to enter your life and like a guest that long over-stays his or her welcome, you just can’t get rid of it. After I gave up my Medigap policy and signed on with Fallon Senior Medicare Advantage plan, it took me five months to get an appointment with an oncologist. It began last November and isn’t over yet.
To get started on the wrong foot, the customer service person who signed me up in the beginning gave me incorrect information, having assured me Dana-Farber in Milford was covered by Fallon. This turned out to be untrue and left me without an oncologist. I was annoyed, but they said I could see my Dana-Farber oncologist once more and I figured I’d get a referral from him.
My oncologist didn’t know anyone at UMass in Worcester which is Fallon’s only cancer care facility in Worcester County. I remained calm. I’m past surgery and chemo, in the maintenance phase of care, the part where they do their best to ignore you. Failing that, they do the least they can. Unless you obviously grow a new cancer in a location they can see and feel, they tell you you’re fine. Not to worry. Smile. It’s just cancer.
At Dana-Farber, I had been going for quarterly check-ups, feeling for lumps, taking blood, checking for weird symptoms that could indicate something growing somewhere it shouldn’t. Annually they run a scan to take a look around the property, aka my body. I’d had to go to war for the scan. Their plan was to do nothing at all unless I had symptoms. Does death count? I felt their plan was insufficient while they felt running a scan was a frivolous waste of taxpayer’s money. My life didn’t come into the equation.
My former oncologist couldn’t help me find a new doctor. He suggested I call the HMO and ask them to refer me to a medical oncologist with a speciality in breast cancer. I knew my PCP wouldn’t be able to refer me because she had already said so. She had suggested I get the referral from my oncologist. Full circle.
I called Fallon Senior Heath Plan.
The customer service rep sounded about 12-years-old, but knew even less than her years suggested. She didn’t understand the concept of different kinds of oncologists. After explaining for perhaps the dozenth time, I began to sink into the slough of despond. It was like talking to a smiling plastic doll who will recite one of 3 pre-recorded phrases. Pull the string, get an answer.
I got transferred to a supervisor and retold the story. She said she would “research the problem” and get back to me. Research the problem? Sounded like a kiss-off to me.
I called my doctor’s office, explained I hadn’t been able to get a referral from my oncologist or from Fallon where they kept saying my family doctor should send me to the right doctor even though I told them Dr. S. didn’t know the doctors in oncology at UMass, Worcester.
HELP, I said. Please!
I did my little song and dance, explaining I needed a Medical Oncologist with a specialty in Breast Cancer. Since breast cancer is frightfully common, it shouldn’t be that hard to find someone.
A few hours later, my doctor’s office called back, gave me a name, an appointment, a phone number. The appointment was for a few days hence, also my birthday. I didn’t want an oncology appointment on my birthday. Nor did I need an appointment immediately. I had just had my annual scan. So I called the doctor’s number to change the appointment to something more sensible.
I got transferred, transferred, and wound up talking to Lisa, the administrator for the Breast Care department. The doctor with whom I’d was booked is a surgeon and they need my medical records before they can continue. The records are all over the Commonwealth, scattered between 4 hospitals.
Lisa said not to worry, she would take care of it. She did. She changed the appointment, booked me with an appropriate doctor, called the various offices and ordered my records. Said if I had any kind of problem, give her a call and she’d fix it because women with cancer shouldn’t have additional problems because they already had quite enough. My feeling precisely!
Shortly thereafter, my doctor’s assistant called asking why I’d cancelled the appointment she had made for me. She was furious. After all the effort she’d made making that phone call on my behalf, I’d had the gall to CANCEL the appointment. I explained she’d booked me with a surgeon — pointless since I’ve already been thoroughly surged. I needed a different doctor.
She was pissed because it hadn’t been easy to get that wrong appointment and seemed unable to grasp the difference between a medical oncologist and a surgeon. I explained — again — that a surgeon would not be able to help me because I don’t need breast surgery. I have no breasts. But I do need my medical records sent to UMass. She said Lisa from UMass had called about it but she wasn’t sure where to send them.
“Did Lisa tell you where to send them?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said.
“Then … why don’t you send them there?” Duh.
“But you cancelled the appointment I made!” she whined, still pissed off.
“I changed the appointment. To be accurate, Lisa changed it because the doctor to which you were sending me was the wrong doctor. NOW I have an appointment with the right doctor.” We went back and forth for a while until she grudgingly accepted my apology for not needing a breast surgeon. I assured her that I truly appreciated her futile efforts.
“I’m so sorry to upset you,” I repeated.
Yesterday I got a note in the mail (not email, the regular mail) from UMass cancelling my appointment with the oncologist and suggesting I call to make a new one.
Maybe I don’t really need an oncologist. Dying is easy; comedy is hard.
A friend asked me why I do this, why I blog. So I asked her why she plays golf.
We do what we do because we love it, need to do it, or both. Writing is like breathing. If I don’t write, I suffocate. My friend needs to compete, to be active. To play golf or she will suffocate.
I can’t begin to count the number of people who have told me they want to be writers, but don’t know how to start. They want me to tell them how. Because they asked the question, I’m reasonably sure they will never be writers. If you are a writer, you write. No one has to tell you how or when. You will write and you will keep writing because it is not what you do, it is what you are. It is as much a part of you as your nose or stomach.
I started writing as soon as I learned to read, which was about 45 minutes after someone handed me a book. It was as if a switch had been thrown in some circuit in my brain. Words felt right. Putting words on paper was exactly the same as speaking, but took longer. I didn’t mind the extra time because I could go back and fix written words. Being able to change my words and keep changing them until they said exactly what I wanted them to say was the grail.
I was awkward socially and my verbal skills were not well suited to my age and stage in life. I was not good at sports and no one wanted me on her team. In retrospect, I can understand why. But when I was a kid, it hurt. Games and other social activities let you become popular, make friends, and do those other things that matter to youngsters. I couldn’t do the regular stuff … but I could write and I could read and that gave me wings. I might be a klutz, but words let me build my own worlds.
I was consuming adult literature when I was so little that my mother had to run block with the librarian to make sure I was allowed to read whatever I wanted. I had to be told to stop reading so I would eat, sleep, or go outside. If I was writing, nothing could stop me. Some things never change.
If you are going to be a writer, you know it. Practice will make you a better writer, can help you understand how to build a plot and produce books that publishers will buy, but writing itself is a gift. If you have it, you know it.
Writers have words waiting to be written, lining up for the opportunity to get put on paper or into the computer. It may take quite a while for you to find what your special area will be, fact or fiction. However it sorts out, you will write, professionally or as a private passion.
There are many gifts. Talent comes in an endless number of flavors. If you have the soul of a musician, you’ll find a way to make music. The same with painting, photography, drawing, running, hitting a baseball or throwing one so that it just skims that outer corner of the plate at 96 miles per hour. Mathematics, engineering, architecture … creativity and talent are as varied as the people who use it.
Gifts are given to us. It’s up to us to use our gifts as best we can. Not everyone is gifted, Plenty of people would give anything for gifts that you may take for granted. What is easy for you may be impossible for most people.
So my advice to all hopeful writers is simple. Write.
Don’t talk about it. Do it. Write a lot, as often as you can, even if most of it is awful and you never show it to anyone. Sooner or later, you’ll find your way to where you should be. If you don’t write, it is your loss, but it may also be the world’s loss. You will never know how good you can be if you don’t try.
This blog is my way, in retirement, to find an outlet for the millions of words stuffed in my head, seething restlessly through my brain. Blogging is freedom in every sense. I have no deadlines to meet other than those I set myself. No editor is looking over my shoulder, I can write about anything and I have no word count to meet.
I hate golf. I can’t figure out why anyone would want to walk or ride around an enormous lawn hitting a little white ball. I can’t think of anything more boring … but I know a lot of golfers and they live for it. The rest of the week is just a pause between tee times.
So, if you don’t get why I write, that’s okay. You don’t have to get it. That I get it and can do it and other people actually read it … that’s enough for me. You do your thing, I’ll do mine. If I believe in anything, I believe with all my heart that we should all be what we were meant to be because that is the only route to any lasting happiness.
Not long ago, I was Superwoman. I knew because so many people said I was, so it had to be true, right? Then life fell apart. I started to miss those leaps over tall buildings. I barked my shins and fell on my head. Finally what was supposed to be a single bound turned into a crash and burn.
Thus I learned I couldn’t do it all and shouldn’t try. Superwoman wasn’t so super any more.
The thing about having a superwoman image is that it’s so flattering. It’s sweet having folks tell you how much they admire you. It’s great hearing them say they wish they had your courage. Even if you don’t quite believe it, it’s nice to hear, isn’t it? The words provide validation. You feel appreciated. Loved, even.
Unfortunately, flattery has strings. Having told you how great you are, your friends feel free to tap into all that strength they admire and they know, by some instinct, that you will help. It’s a reflex. You see a need, you try to fill it. You can’t say no to such a needy soul. If you think about it, you almost never say no to anyone. It’s remarkable how popular that makes you.
Since retiring my cape, I’ve learned a few things.
Strong people, especially women, attract needy people. It’s as if we have a “get your free help here” sign on our foreheads. Everyone can see it — except us.
It took me the better part of a lifetime to recognize and accept having physical and emotional limits and understand with my heart, not just my head that I don’t have endless reserves. If I fail to set priorities, when those closest to me need help, I have nothing to give. It turns out emotional energy is like a bank account. You can’t keep making withdrawals unless you also make deposits.
I can’t fight every battle or support every cause.
The first time I said no to someone who asked for help, I felt so guilty I thought I’d drown. All these years later, I don’t say no easily or lightly, but I say it. It turns out that the world goes on anyhow. God is God. I am not.
Superwomen are easy to manipulate. Guilt and our over-developed sense of responsibility makes us vulnerable to emotional blackmail. We wind up doing the hard things that others can and should do for themselves. It’s a trap no less for them than for us.
Most people are not too weak to do what they need to do. Strength is not DNA, it’s a choice. Most “weak” people are lazy, fearful and don’t want to make difficult choices. They don’t look for solutions. They look for help. Big difference.
Of course there are plenty of people with serious problems … no end of them. Me too. I’ve had so many problems I’ve often wondered if God had a grudge against me or if I had somewhere along the line pissed off a minor but extremely malign deity or maybe am working off some terrible Karmic debt. I’ve been so sick I was nearly dead and not just once. I had no health insurance or money, but I had to survive. I worked the phones, called my congressman. I wrote letters. I don’t really know how I got through, but here I am. It wasn’t valor; it was desperation.
When life began to settle down and I was no longer fighting for my life every day, I decided I would be there for the people in my world who matter. My real friends, my real family. The rest of the world would have to find other resources. I was no longer an option.
People say that when things get tough, you discover who your friends are. From the dozens of people I helped over the years, to whom I offered a place to live when they were homeless, hours of listening when they needed a caring ear … and so much more … when life turned on me, fewer than a handful of those “friends” were available. All the rest were missing in action. That was when I put my cape in mothballs. Now I take care of close friends and family. And for the first time, I take care of myself.
Thirty-five years ago, my mother asked me an odd question. She asked: “If you were to list the people in your life that matter, who would be first, second, and third on the list?”
I listed my son, my husband and a close friend.
She said: “You’re wrong. The first name on that list has to be YOU, because if you don’t take care of yourself, no one will. You won’t be able to care for anyone else, either.”
I thought it a strange thing for her to say since her own life seemed to have consisted entirely of taking care of others. She was dying then. I suppose her world-view had changed.
But she was right. In the final analysis, we are responsible for ourselves. Only if and when we have made sure we have what we need can we take care of anyone or anything else.
God — or Superwoman — will have to take care of the rest.
Annabelle was a doll made by Madame Alexander. She was in production for one year only — 1952 — the year I turned five.
My mother loved dolls, but she had grown up poor. She had only had one doll in her entire life, a china-headed doll she got from her mother. That was a big deal in a large, poor family. There were 6 other brothers and sisters to keep fed, clothed and who also had birthdays. Mom loved her doll and when one day, the doll fell off her bed and broke her china head, my mother was inconsolable. She said she had cried for weeks and everyone was sympathetic, but she never got another doll.
Then there was me, her first daughter and the one who loved dolls as much as she had. My sister, who came afterwards, never cared for them as I did.
Annabelle – by Madame Alexander – 1952
Annabelle was the first of a line of expensive dolls with which I was gifted through my girlhood. Annabelle was followed by Toni,the big 24″ Toni with platinum hair and the whole set of curlers and “permanent wave” solution. After that, there was Betsy Wetsy, though my mother, in the midst of potty training my younger sister couldn’t imagine wanting a doll that wet herself. Many other dolls would follow. But Annabelle always had a special place in my heart. I talked to her, slept with her, dragged her around. I loved her through restringing, rewigging, repainting and redressing.
After all my other dolls had passed along into dolly heaven, I still had Annabelle. Right before I left for Israel, I gave her to my friend’s daughter … and Loren still has her to this day.
Annabelle Too
Some years back, I went hunting for Annabelle. I knew I couldn’t get my original girl back. She was Loren’s now. Even though Loren was grown with a son of her own, she was not parting with Annabelle. Most of Madame Alexander’s dolls had long production runs, but Annabelle was a one year only limited edition. But I found her, and she has rejoined my life. I even have her original box, traveling beauty supply kit and tag. She’s perfect and obviously had never been loved quite as voraciously as I love her predecessor.
I still do give her a furtive hug now and again. Sometimes, the best person in the world to talk to is a doll that will always smile and understand. That’s my Annabelle.
I have a tiny kitchen, but well-organized for its size. I have some good black iron pots and pans, sturdy bright dishes in the cupboard. A small ice box keeps a few things cool if the weather is sultry and I get at least some electricity, perhaps from a small generator. I can only bring five foods. Well, I’m going to hope that the drinks are separately counted so I can can put the coffee and tea on different list, along with the sports drinks I need to keep from dying of a serious electrolyte imbalance. Hard to do the island thing when you have very specific, rigid dietary requirements. Diabetes is not island friendly. So I’m just counting on drug deliveries along with food stuffs! I wouldn’t last long otherwise, though if I had enough books to read, I’d go out smiling.
Since this is not a desert island, if the soil is at all fertile, there may be many ways to supplement a limited diet and the sea contains much that is good to eat, including kelp and other seaweed. Maybe there will be some coconuts or mangos to be found. A little fruit would be awfully welcome! I’d better also have a goodly stock of vitamins and minerals too! Wouldn’t want to get scurvy or something.
First, protein. I love seafood, so if I have to pick just one, salmon it is, but if I can get seafood as a category … I’ll be happily stranded. Seafood has the highest amounts of all the good stuff to keep ones body and soul together.
Next, a calcium source. Cheese it will be! Pass the Jarlsberg please! If I can get cheese as a category, just bring them on, love them all, but if it has to be just one, I’ll go with a full flavor Jarlsberg.
Need veggies!! Okay, perhaps I’m cheating a wee bit. All veggies are a single food for my purposes: tomatoes, onions, peppers, mushrooms, spinach, collards … the things that turn just food into meals.
For the high carbohydrate choice: Potatoes. You can bake them, boil them, mash them. Serve them fried, grated and made into a loaf. Serve them with fried onions and make them into pancakes. My ancestors more or less lived on potatoes, so I gotta have item.
Bread. There’s a reason “breaking bread” is synonymous with eating a meal with others. Bread goes with everything — cheese, gravy, tomatoes and lettuce. Bread is there with all the meals. Dry it out for crumbs and if I have some spare, maybe I can lure some egg-laying birds to my little camp.
No sweets, no junk food. But I can live on these foods and remain healthy.
I’m assuming that condiments and spices come “free.” Sugar, salt (especially salt!), garlic, basil, cumin, ginger, peppermint. I shall have an herb garden. No one said I can’t grow a few things, right?
I wonder what I’ll do for cooking oil? Any coconuts on the island?
Every bit of space not otherwise occupied with a bed, a few comfy chairs, a table and a fireplace will have to be filled with books … although if I have access to the internet and can bring a Kindle, I will be in Heaven. I do hope the water is warm enough for swimming and the soil rich enough for growing. I might really like that island. Guest room anyone?
It took me five months to get a new oncologist from Fallon, the HMO that runs my Medicare Advantage plan. It began last November when, in a necessary cost-cutting move, I gave up my Medigap policy and signed on with Fallon Senior Medicare Advantage plan.
To get started on the wrong foot, the customer service person who signed me up gave me incorrect information. She had assured me Dana-Farber in Milford was covered by Fallon. This turned out to be untrue and left me without an oncologist. I was annoyed, but not wildly upset. They said I could see my Dana-Farber oncologist once more and I figured I’d get a referral from him.
That turned out to be overly optimistic. My oncologist didn’t know anyone at UMass in Worcester — Fallon’s only cancer care facility in Worcester County. Like many satellite facilities for larger institutions, it’s hard for them to keep ambitious young doctors on staff. They stay a while, then move to better paying jobs at bigger more, prestigious hospitals. A few doctors stay, usually those who live locally, but most move on. It’s a bit of a revolving door, personnel-wise, though it really isn’t their fault.
Even this didn’t faze me. I’m past surgery and chemo. I’m in the maintenance phase. I go for checkups and blood tests. Once a year they scan me to make sure nothing is growing someplace it shouldn’t. Nonetheless, I’m only 2 years from the initial discovery of two separate tumors and there have been a lot of cancer deaths in my family. Mother. Brother. Both maternal grandparents and I’ve had cancer twice, so there’s no reason to assume I’ll ever be entirely safe. I’m not acting crazy because I feel it’s a bit soon to stop monitoring me.
My doctor assured me that the facility is good, but he couldn’t help me find a new doctor. He suggested I call the HMO and ask them who do they have in medical oncology with a speciality in breast cancer. I already knew my PCP couldn’t give me a referral because she said so. She had suggested I get the referral from my oncologist. Back to square one.
I called Fallon.
She said — this is a quote: “We do not list our doctors by specialty.”
“What,” I asked, “Do you list them by? Alphabetically?”
I mean, seriously, if you don’t list doctors by specialty, how in the world can anyone get an appropriate referral? This is supposed to be senior health care organization. It’s not as if cancer is a rare event. There’s a lot of it going around. I patiently — really patiently — explained I needed a medical oncologist specializing in breast cancer. That yes indeed, cancer doctors are highly specialized and it really did make a difference and no, there’s no such thing as “just an oncologist.” If ignorance was bliss, this was one deliriously happy young woman.
After I explained for the dozenth time it would not be okay to send me to “just any” oncologist, that I wanted someone who knew about my kind of cancer and moreover, I want a doctor who has been out of medical school for at least 5 years. I’m not ready to put my life in the hands of a baby doctor. My life, my choice.
I spent over an hour trying to make some progress, being repeatedly told I needed to go to my primary care doctor and get a referral from her. Despite my explaining she had already told me she didn’t know the doctors at UMass Oncology, it was like talking to a doll who only has three or four recorded phrases. By now, my good nature was gone and my fangs were showing.
It took another 45 minutes and further reiterations of the same information to get transferred to a supervisor. I told the story again. Finally, she said she would “research the problem” and get back to me.
I called my doctor’s office, explained that I hadn’t been able to get a referral from the oncologist at the Dana-Farber, nor could I get a referral from Fallon and they seemed to be of the opinion my family doctor should send me to the right doctor even though I had told them that Dr. S. didn’t know the doctors in Oncology at UMass in Worcester. I needed someone to step up to the plate and help me.
A few hours later, my doctor’s office called back and gave me a name, an appointment, and a phone number. The appointment was for just a few days hence, also my birthday. I didn’t want an oncology appointment on my birthday. Nor did I need an appointment immediately. I had just had my big annual scan and wouldn’t need to be seen again for six months, so I called the doctor’s number to change the appointment to something sensible.
I got transferred then transferred again and wound up talking to Lisa, the administrator for the Breast Cancer Care department. It turned out that the doctor with whom I’d been booked was a surgeon, not a medical oncologist and that in any case, they couldn’t do anything without my medical records which were scattered through three hospitals and a doctor’s office — each located in a different town.
Lisa said not to worry, she would take care of it. Remarkably she did. She changed the appointment and booked me with a doctor who specialized in my type of cancer, called all the various offices and ordered my medical records send to UMass. Said if I had any kind of problem, give her a call and she’d fix it because women with cancer shouldn’t have additional problems because they already had quite enough. My opinion precisely. But wow. What a difference a woman with intelligence and a willingness to actually provide customer service can make!
Shortly thereafter, my doctor’s assistant called asking why I’d cancelled the appointment she had made for me. I explained that she had booked me with a surgeon. I’d already been surged so I needed a different kind of doctor. She was pissed off because it hadn’t been easy to get that appointment and seemed impervious to the difference between a medical oncologist and a breast cancer surgeon. I explained — again — that a surgeon would not be able to help me because I don’t need a surgeon. I have no breasts, but I really do need my medical records … and she said yes, Lisa from UMass had called about that but she wasn’t sure where to send them.
“Didn’t Lisa tell you where to send them?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said.
“Then … why don’t you send them where she told you to send them? What am I missing?”
“But you cancelled the appointment I made!” she said, still angry.
“I changed the appointment. Really Lisa changed it because the doctor to which you were sending me was the wrong doctor. Now I have an appointment with the right kind of doctor. I’m not blaming you, so why are you mad at me?”
And so we went back and forth for a while until she finally accepted she had booked the wrong doctor, but I assured her that I truly appreciated her efforts. Since this is my life, getting the right doctor was my goal regardless. Sorry to upset you.
“Oh,” she said. Not a “sorry” in the batch.
“Right,” I said.
I’ve gotten a lot of calls from Fallon since then, all of them wanting me to explain again why I wasn’t happy with their customer service. I said a patient should be able to call and get names of appropriate doctors and at least some basic information about the doctor, like how long he/she has been in practice, their specialty, from what medical school he or she graduated and on which boards he or she is certified. And this information is fundamental to medical care and I am entitled to this information and they are obligated to provide it. Nor, I pointed out, is this such a difficult thing to accomplish. I could produce an appropriate data base in a couple of days using the internet and making a few phone calls. The problem could be solved with a memo sent to all customer service personnel in an email. Lives could be saved and it wasn’t an insurmountable problem. It just needed someone to recognize they had to do something and just do it. Although everyone agreed with me, I had the definite impression that no one would do anything about it. Inertia always seems to win over doing the right thing.
The day was only half over and I was not done with medical misinformation.
When I finally finished the marathon calls to Fallon, I got a call from Humana Insurance to remind me I hadn’t made a payment this month.
I hadn’t made the payment because I cancelled the insurance when I switched to a Medicare Advantage (HMO) program. I didn’t want to switch but I couldn’t keep paying the almost $200 a month for my Humana policy. When, at the end of November, I signed up with Fallon, I called Humana and explained I was changing to an advantage plan and needed to cancel my Humana policy as of the first of the year. I was told that as soon as my new program kicked in, the policy would automatically be cancelled and there was nothing more I needed to do.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“Absolutely,” I was assured.
So, there it was, the middle of March and Humana is harassing me for money I don’t owe. When they called again, I finally got a person on the phone and pointed out I had called and cancelled at the end of November 2012.
The representative said that he could see in his records I’d called to cancel, but I’d been given incorrect information. I was required to send them a letter; I could not cancel by phone or on-line. I pointed out that I signed up on-line and on the phone, so why did I have to write a letter to cancel? “Those are the rules,” he said.
“I want to speak to your manager,” I said. He explained that the manager would tell me the same thing. I pointed out that I didn’t care, I wanted to talk to a manager, and I don’t owe them any money. He said I’d have to file a dispute to not pay them because although it was their fault and they have it in their own records that I called in advance to cancel the policy, it didn’t matter. I was going to have to fix the problem, even though they were the ones who had caused it.
I thought my head was going to explode.
The manager reiterated that indeed they had given me incorrect information, but now it is my problem. Tough luck lady.
I hung up before I said something really rude. I believe there was steam coming out of my ears.
I took a slow, deep, cleansing breath, then called the other customer service department, the one whose number is printed on back of the membership card.
The lady I spoke to looked it up, agreed they had given me erroneous information, contacted the cancellation department and assured me it was fixed. I have a name and a number in case it isn’t. I pointed out that until this snafu, I’d had positive feelings about Humana and would have recommended them.
They had handled my claims promptly without haggling, but they had burned a whole year of good will in about an hour. I pointed out that I was not going to pay them any money because I didn’t owe them any money and they know it. I wasn’t going to send any letters or dispute any charges. They could put it all where the sun doesn’t shine. And thanks for everything. Have a good day.
The Humana Building
It had grown dark while all this was going on and as the day had gone from morning to evening, my hard drive had been doing a full system back up. It was, I was glad to see, nearly complete.
As I hung up the phone, panting with exertion though I hadn’t gotten up from the office chair, the backup announced itself finished. I registered the hardware, did whatever I thought I was supposed to do. Garry got back from the grocery store and I put the stuff away. The dogs started howling for dinner. Life closed around me. The dog’s dinner was half an hour late and they were telling us they were so hungry they were going to fall over from weakness, poor darlings. They lie like dogs. Of course, they are dogs, which accounts for it.
So passed my day. Now, it’s eight in the evening. Either everything is fixed or it’s not, but I’m done. Totally and completely out of gas, I am ready for some mindless entertainment. Please, do not give me anything to think about for at least 24 hours.
How come so many blatantly incompetent people have jobs? Why are they working when so many others are unemployed?
Something is terribly wrong. I just don’t have enough strength to figure out what it is, much less fix it.
The benches in front invite you to sit and look beyond the waterfall, down past the bend into the river beyond. So many hours have been spent sitting on these benches doing just that … looking beyond and beyond.
With camera in hand, exploring European lands, cultures, food, and drink...mostly with a plan, but sometimes enjoying the adventure of just getting lost.
The representative said that he could see in his records I’d called to cancel, but I’d been given incorrect information. I was required to send them a letter; I could not cancel by phone or on-line. I pointed out that I signed up on-line and on the phone, so why did I have to write a letter to cancel? “Those are the rules,” he said.
