Hair of the dog
Friday, January 15th, was not a good day for me. For that matter, it probably wasn’t a very good day for anyone who has to live by their wits, meaning they work for themselves. The 15th of January simply means that it’s tax quarterly day. That last quarterly for 2009 was due. It always hurts but it was especially painful this time around. Not only did I have that chit to pay but I got the notice from my insurance carrier on the same day that my next quarterly payment on my catastrophic health care policy was due in another fifteen days. And I still owe the bank money. I’ve been going through twenty-nine years of this; I don’t know how much longer I really want to.
I do know one thing: in that long process, I have been voluntarily transferring what little wealth I accumulated to three entities: the government, the banks and insurance companies. I can’t keep going on like this. I’m sure my fellow solo practitioners feel the same and if not, then 1) you don’t give a damn about making the quarterly payments (can’t blame you) and 2) you either don’t bother with individual health coverage or lucky you, your spouse is a wage earner with group coverage.
Blackie Sherrod once said, “It’s not the income, it’s the outgo.” How true. What do I do in the face of yet another increase on my quarterly premium on the health coverage? Do I kick it up to a 10K deductible? Do I go even higher, essentially becoming self-insured? Yet one three or four-day stay in the hospital will break anyone. Seen the bills for short stays in the hospital lately? They are mind-boggling. We can’t keep going on like this. We really can’t. I don’t want to bludgeon readers with tired saws but this is not a situation where we have a date in the near future with a reckoning. It’s here, it’s now and people are going bust, simply because the take from this unholy troika is unbearable. It’s enough to turn one to a life of crime or at least, the black economy.
After all the checks were written, I took a deep breath and then, what . . .? Why not drop a dime on myself? Ever since Breeders Cup, I had taken to watching the races and not betting. Maybe it was time to crank it up and try my hand at Gulfstream Park. Saturday’s card was a treat with deep fields and several races on the turf. A quick trip to Albuquerque might be the cure for the blues, right? Well, the drive over is a nice diversion because I seem never to tire of the geography in our sister state and I like Albuquerque. I love to gamble on the nags but my return to the races only underscores the brutal truth - you want to succeed at this game, you have to work at it regularly. It’s like anything else; it takes practice, practice, practice, especially at Gulfstream. It was a frustrating day with the chalk dominating the races. There was just one play, just one that day, and I missed it even though it was right there for the taking. Quiet Harbor in the feature stakes race of the day. I had the filly at a play at anything over 12-1; she goes off at 18-1. And I didn’t have a penny on her for the win even though I had in everywhichaway in the exotics. She pays $39.40 for every two dollars bet. And I have a handful of mutuels for tax purposes. The problem with that is lack of income. There it is again - not the income, the outgo. And the crash has hit everything and everyone. My beloved Jockey Club at the N.M. State Fairgrounds is the latest victim. It had fallen on hard times since my last visit in November. Gone was the kitchen and its great buffet, the mutuel tellers, several big screen TVs. What was left was me, a few other old codgers hanging on, doling out their two-dollar bets and a single mutuel teller handling all the action on Saturday. It was pretty sad.
You ask me how I feel about all of this? Uncertain. Not depressed, not catastrophic, not bitter. Just uncertain, as uncertain about everything as I have ever felt about anything. I look to the future and all I think about is how to make things better for my daughter. She doesn’t deserve the way we’ve screwed up everything. All I know to do is get up tomorrow morning and keep at it. I don’t look for inspiration, just the will to keep going from day to day.
Now, aren’t you glad I cheered you up this morning?