pack
so you take the thing on your back, installation clothes, smaller than 100
meters in whatever space this is really. you take it with you, carapace
cloth, it hides you, you move, you move it, it moves. you can move things
totally gainormous, no leverage involved, only the usual matrix transform-
ations or maybe perspective all mixed up with sins, cosines, tangents.
it's all appearance, this thing with its smoke and rafters, balsa struts
and paper kite folding, the greatest moving freely as the smallest. blown
air a transformation factored into object emission-spigot movement, it's
all functions, high-speed rendering gaming physics does. it's that. but it
give you freedom as well, set up, perform fast, don't even bother to take
down, just detach, move on before they catch you. audience applause is
what you live for, every show more spectacular than every other, there's
no repertoire, just these things that flood, flow about, all going back to
the dimly-lit (it was dimly-lit) room in the virtual environments labora-
tory, a few people shuffling about, wires everywhere, up and down them, in
and out of them. it comes down to files and interrupts, data and keystroke
and mouse, some site and sight involved.
http://www.alansondheim.org/pack.mp4
http://www.alansondheim.org/ pack pngs
dict pack {Pack and prime road} or {Pack and prime way}, a pack road or
packs or bales. {Pack needle}, a needle for sewing with pack thread. pack
animal. {Pack staff}, a staff for supporting a pack; a peddler's {Pack
train} (Mil.), a troop of pack animals. pr. & vb. n. {Packing}.] [Akin to
D. pakken, G. packen, Dan. pakke, Sw. packa, Icel. pakka. ] 1. To make a
pack of; to arrange closely and securely in a pack; hence, to place and
arrange compactly as in a pack; to press into close order or narrow
compass; as, to pack goods in a box; to pack fish. Strange materials
packed up with wonderful art. Of all my buried ancestors are packed. 2. To
fill in the manner of a pack, that is, compactly and crowd into; as, to
pack a trunk; the play, or the audience, packs the theater. 3. To shuffle,
sort and arrange (the cards) in a pack so as And mighty dukes pack cards
for half a crown. stack[3]; as, to pack a jury or a caucus. packed
assembly of Italian bishops. devised and packed by his enemies. 6. To
load with a pack; hence, to load; to encumber; as, to pack a horse. Our
thighs packed with wax, our mouths with honey. packing}; -- sometimes with
off; as, to pack a boy off to Till George be packed with post horse up to
heaven. 8. To transport in a pack, or in the manner of a pack (i. e.,
steam; as, to pack a joint; to pack the piston of a steam 1. To make up
packs, bales, or bundles; to stow articles to form a compact mass; as, the
goods pack conveniently; wet snow packs well. perch begin to pack. Poor
Stella must pack off to town You shall pack, to join in collusion. "Go
pack with him." {To send packing}, to drive away; to send off roughly or
in presently sent him packing." gang"; "a pack of thieves" [syn: {gang},
{ring}, {mob}] 7: a cream that cleanses and tones the skin [syn: {face
pack}] v 1: arrange in a container; "pack the books into the boxes" [ant:
{unpack}] 2: fill to capacity; "This singer always packs the concert
halls"; "They murder trial packed the court house" supporters so as to
influence the outcome; "pack a jury" an umbrella"; "I always carry money";
"She packs a gun 7: press tightly together or cram; "The crowd packed the
8: hike with a backpack; "Every summer they are backpacking in the
Rockies" [syn: {backpack}] 10: seal with packing; "pack the faucet" 11:
have the property of being packable or compactable or of odd-shaped items
do not pack well" [syn: {compact}] 12: load with a pack [syn: {load down}]
to absorb blood; "The nurse packed gauze in the wound"; "You had better
pack your swollen ankle with ice" backpack, bag, baggage, bale, band, bar,
barrel, barricade, basket, bestow, bevy, bibliofilm, bind, bind up,
bindle, bipack, inscribe, interline, invest, jack, jam, jam-pack, jar,
joker, overlade, overload, overstuff, overweight, pack away, pack in, pack
off, pack the deal, pack up, package, packet, pad, pair, trick, trip,
tripack, troop, trouble, troupe, trump, truss.
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---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 9 Apr 2009 20:42:41 -0400
From: moderator@PORTSIDE.ORG
To: PORTSIDE@LISTS.PORTSIDE.ORG
Subject: A System From Hell
A System From Hell
By Kate Michelman
This article appeared in the April 27, 2009 edition of The Nation.
April 8, 2009
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090427/michelman
My husband had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in
2002, a year after our daughter was paralyzed in a horse-
riding accident. His balance had deteriorated until he fell
two or three times at home last summer. In the face of his
diminishing physical condition, a single fall could result in
disastrous injury. We scheduled an appointment with his
neurologist in Washington.
We pulled up to the main entrance of the hospital after the
two-hour drive from our home near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
My husband opened his door, grabbed the roof of the car and
began to pull himself out as I walked around to help him. I
was too late. In an instant--time slowed enough for me to see
the danger but raced ahead too fast for me to reach him--he
lost his grip and fell to the concrete, shattering his hip,
breaking his femur and causing internal bleeding that kept
him in the hospital for months.
My husband is a retired college professor, and what the
teaching profession lacks in salary it often makes up for
with generous benefits. His health insurance would cover most
of the emergency costs related to the fall--the surgeries,
the hospitalization, the drugs. But in the astronomical sums
the cost of medical care often entails, "most" is not a
reassuring word. Months later, as his discharge from the
hospital drew near, I sat in my living room looking at the
bills piling up on the table. The co-pays, uncovered care and
other costs had already reached $8,000, and we had virtually
nothing left.
Seven years of caring for my husband and our daughter, who
had no insurance at the time of her accident, had all but
exhausted our savings. As my husband's condition
deteriorated, I was caught in a trap. We needed my income,
but the kind of political consulting work that was my forte
was incompatible with the demands of caring for him. It was
simply not possible for me to be available for him 24/7 and
simultaneously to work overtime, traveling for days or weeks
on the campaign trail, to bring in the income that would keep
us afloat.
The fraying financial thread by which we were already hanging
was now certain to snap. When I heard the awful sound of my
husband's body hitting the concrete outside the hospital, I
knew the modicum of independence to which he had clung for so
long was gone. He was discharged into an assisted-living
facility, where most of the cost was excluded from both his
private long-term-care insurance and Medicare. At $9,000 a
month, the bills accumulated quickly.
Recently, we decided to bring him home, although the doctors
would have preferred that he stay at a facility with full-
time supervision. But this was a mathematical decision, not a
medical one: we do not have the money it costs to keep him
there. I had already stopped working, to care for him; our
savings are nearly depleted; and his pension is not nearly
large enough to pay the bills.
Today he needs nearly round-the-clock professional help at
home--less than the cost of the assisted-living facility but
still far more than we have. I have spent recent weeks
looking for a job that can add at least enough to my
husband's pension and our Social Security benefits to cover
the cost of his care. It is a dilemma familiar to so many
women--finding work that can pay for care but also leave time
for providing it.
The time is drawing near when, job or no job, the expenses
will simply be more than we have. I am coming full circle,
back to where so many women's lives begin and end--and where
my career as an activist began: jobless, unsure how to pay
the next month's bills, caring for a family that depends on
me for survival--and utterly and deeply determined that
something about our country must fundamentally change.
That was in 1969. My first husband had abruptly left my three
young girls and me, stranding us without financial support.
Our family was in crisis, and when I found out a few weeks
later that I was pregnant too, I knew it was impossible to
give a new baby--whose father had already deserted it--what
it deserved while also giving my daughters what they needed.
So in 1969 I made the difficult decision to have an abortion.
Because state law radically restricted access to the
procedure, that decision had humiliating consequences. I was
forced to obtain permission both from the man who had
abandoned my daughters and me and from an all-male hospital
review board. The board's interrogation in a hospital
conference room covered subjects like whether I was capable
of dressing my children in the mornings and whether I had
been satisfying my husband sexually.
That experience sparked a lifetime of activism that
eventually took me to the front ranks of the prochoice
movement, where I forged deep and lasting friendships with
some of the most powerful political figures of the past
thirty years.
Not many Republicans were among them. But there ought to have
been more--because in a distant era fast receding in time,
theirs was the party of moderation and individual rights, and
also because, ironically enough, I have led precisely the
life Republicans claim to value. I started as a single
welfare mother, then worked my way through college en route
to a successful career. My second husband and I have
sustained a traditional and loving marriage for thirty-five
years. He purchased quality health insurance, including long-
term-care insurance, so he would not be a financial burden to
others. He enjoyed a long and steady career at an institution
that would pay healthcare costs and a modest pension for
life. Between his salary and mine, we achieved a reasonable
degree of economic comfort--never wealthy but independent,
self-sufficient, responsible.
Then came our daughter's accident.
We got the call in 2001. She was pursuing her lifelong love
of horses as a trainer in upstate New York. One day in May
her horse got spooked, reared up and fell over backward on
top of her, crushing three of her vertebrae and paralyzing
her for life.
The weeks and months that followed included multiple
surgeries, a long hospitalization and extensive rehab. The
bills were exorbitant, to say nothing of the fact that our
daughter probably would never again be able to support
herself through full-time work.
When the bills came in, it never occurred to me that walking
away from them was an option. I cashed in the IRA on which we
were depending for retirement and paid them myself.
My husband's diagnosis followed just as our daughter was
beginning to stabilize. Eventually I had to leave work to
care for him, and our financial independence deteriorated on
a parallel track with his health. The story is familiar: the
medical crisis that becomes a financial one. Still, we were
able to hold things together, moving from one crisis to the
next but finding a way to get by.
That ended in October. We quickly learned that not even the
most frugal planning is enough to cope with surging
healthcare costs. The long-term-care insurance barely covers
a fraction of his long-term care. I will care for him at
home, but a time will come when even our home might be at
risk: if he needs nursing home care, Medicaid will pay for it
only after we have liquidated most of our assets.
Consequently, a blessing--my husband could live like this for
years to come--is also likely to bankrupt us.
I do not tell this story because it is unique. On the
contrary, the point is precisely that countless people across
the country are living it. And millions more are a crisis
away from joining them--one lost job, a diagnosis, an
accident. Most people do not have the luxury of being able to
call, as I do, on powerful friends for help. Not even these
friends, of course, can change the predicament my husband and
I face. Nor will the situation change for anyone until
political leaders get serious about comprehensive healthcare
reform.
By "comprehensive," I mean that piecemeal approaches will not
work--not economically, not morally. The healthcare crisis is
not a series of isolated problems. The problem is not just
the uninsured. It is not only the underinsured. It is not the
young or the old. My husband had excellent health coverage;
our daughter had none. He faces chronic illness in the
twilight of life; she suffered a terrible injury just as her
adult life was beginning. Between them, they span the
complete spectrum of healthcare economics in America, but
when crisis struck, they found themselves in the same place.
Our story also illustrates the unique challenges women face
in the healthcare system, as in the economy at large. Women
are paid less and given benefits less frequently--yet they
are the ones on whom the responsibility of caretaking
disproportionately falls. In addition, women
disproportionately, but hardly exclusively, understand the
perverse economic choices the healthcare system imposes. In
my case, I had to quit working to care for my husband, only
to arrive at a point at which he needs care I can afford only
if I can find a job. The bills, meanwhile, are often
inexplicable, sometimes contain mistakes and are always
impossible to resolve without encountering a thicket of red
tape.
Even on the other side of that thicket, the insurance
companies cannot answer the most vexing question my husband
and I--and so many others--ask: if "health insurance" does
not pay for healthcare when people need it, then what exactly
do those words mean? And all this says nothing about the fact
that my husband had the foresight to purchase long-term-care
coverage. The problem is that it nominally covers long-term
care but does not cover its actual cost.
I am often told there is a shocking quality to our story--it
prompts a realization that if this could happen to someone
like me, it could happen to anyone. But of course there is
little that ought to surprise us; political connections are
bound to be of little avail in the face of a problem politics
has refused to address.
If there is an upside to the country's healthcare crisis, it
is that the problem is hurtling toward a point at which it
absolutely cannot be ignored without immediate and disastrous
consequences. If there is an upside for me, it is this:
returning to those difficult days of poverty and fear in 1969
also means returning to a place where anger inspires
activism. I was a young woman then, of course, with a
lifetime of battles ahead. I am not so young now. But I have
enough years left to have one more fight in me.
Healthcare is it.
Copyright © 2008 The Nation
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