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Sept. 14, 2006
A couple of days ago one of our members, Kathy Bakkenist, was making her tireless rounds on Capitol Hill for bipartisan bills entitled, “Consortium on the Impact of Technology and Aging Health Services.” The bills, S. 3739 and H.R. 5906, would establish a Congressionally-sanctioned, broad-based group of experts to tackle the barriers to bringing technology to aging services and to present solutions to those barriers.
During one meeting, a young staffer asked her, “Why should we care about this bill?” I don’t know about you, but that response made me mad. Either this staffer was arrogant or ignorant, I don’t know. His boss represents a district with a growing aging population and a number of AAHSA members in it. After some gentle explanation of how important this bill is to the Congressman’s older voters and some reminders about his boss’ previous support of AAHSA initiatives, the young staffer’s attitude mellowed.
But the question is important: why should we care about this?
Here’s why: we have the technology in this country to make my cell phone ringer sound like my dog’s bark but we don’t have technologies to help people stay in their own homes, improve their quality of life and save money on their health care. Technology can help us keep track of our kids through their cell phones, but we can’t produce an electronic medical record that helps Alzheimer’s patients navigate our convoluted health care system. To me, that borders on insanity.
Because of red tape, fear of lawsuits and lack of incentives, technologies that have transformed how people work in offices and stay connected with their families have not been translated to meet the needs of our fast-growing aging population.
Those of you who have seen our vision video, “Imagine – the Future of Aging” know that the technology-supported world in which Ernesto lives is absolutely captivating. He sets his terms, get the services he needs and uses technology to do what’s most important to him: being connected to family and friends.
CAST, your Center for Aging Services Technologies, has developed an advocacy agenda focused on making Ernesto’s vision a reality. These bills are the first step toward achieving this important goal. The consortium that will be created will bring the right people to the table to make sure we harness technology’s potential to transform the aging experience.
AAHSA is not in the technology business, we will not profit from these bills’ passage. We will, however, help to create a future of aging services with technology as an accelerator of major longstanding quality care, quality of life and cost issues. And that’s priceless.
We all need to care about this bill. It is urgent that you contact Congress today. Tell the young, perhaps naïve, staffers in your Congressman and Senators’ offices why they should care about this bill. We have a responsibility to make sure policy makers understand how technology can benefit everyone’s family. Our country is aging, our policy makers are aging and even that young Congressional staffer is aging. We can’t wait for Congress to come around to supporting the things we value. I’m mad about this and you should be too. We can’t afford not to care.
Larry
William L. Minnix, Jr., D.Min.
President and CEO
AAHSA
2519 Connecticut Ave NW
Washington DC 20008
Sept. 11, 2006
Today marks the fifth anniversary of September 11. It comes on the heels of the first anniversary of Katrina. We can never forget.
These events sober and scare us because they remind us of the forces in life over which we have no control. Genetic predispositions to disease, random events, comets striking the earth—even the inevitabilities of aging—all uncontrollable forces.
If we dwell on the uncontrollable, fear and anxiety can rule our lives. Many people suffer from two major side effects of the uncontrollable: regrets about the past and worries about the future.
How much of our life is spent on “only ifs…” or “what ifs…”
Years ago, I worked in a psychiatric hospital with a man so depressed about his life, he could only stand in the middle of the floor, unable to make a step forward or backward—frozen by the uncontrollable.
I remember an elderly couple at Wesley Woods whose relationship erupted into a major conflict in their 90’s over a regrettable marital infidelity while they were separated during World War II. Frozen in time by unchangeable history, their marriage was affected irreparably by something neither could erase.
In fact, the only time dimension we have any control over is Today, and the only person I have much control over is me. Me…Today…
Having kids teaches you painfully that control over other people is an illusion. A director of nursing asked me recently, “How can I make CNAs come to work on time?” I said, “You can’t, you’re asking the wrong question. The issue is how do I change my style and the work of my facility so that staff makes better choices about their work.”
Today, I can choose to believe the world is falling apart and I will be a victim in it. Or, I can reflect on the people of New York, Washington, D.C., and the Gulf Coast and admire their resilience in the face of the uncontrollable. One belief leads me to despair, the other to hope.
Today, I can complain about my job, my fate, my kid’s teacher my aches and pains. Or, I can be grateful I have a job (or look for a better one), or offer to help at my kid’s school or deal with my health more responsibly. One stance makes me a complainer who attracts friends who find company in other miserable people. The other leaves me happy, useful, feeling good about myself and attractive to others.
Today, I can continue to let others take advantage of me, even abuse me. Or, I can choose to cut poisonous people out of my life, get help, associate myself with friends, colleagues and family who affirm me—and I them. One set of relationships makes me weak, the other strong.
Today, I can envy others for what they have that I do not. I can get more credit cards to try to catch up to them so I look good in a new car I can’t afford and leave the debt for later. Or, I can live within my means, plan for the future and share some of what I have with others, however modest my circumstances. The first path is one of financial and psychological bondage, the other leads to peace of mind.
Today, we can complain about the government and the politicians we don’t like. We can contact the call-in shows, ranting and raving about officials and policies we don’t like. Or, we can register to vote, follow the candidates, write letters expressing our support or opposition to policies, show up at the polls and pray that our political leaders garner divine guidance in their duties. One path leads to cynicism, the other to responsible citizenship.
Today, I can live responsibly, in relative harmony with people and institutions important to me, find balance between my work and personal life and have faith that I am in a country and among people who are able to rebound from circumstances over which I have no control. I can know that how I live Today prepares me for any tomorrow because I have survived tough circumstance of my past.
The Old Testament says that it “rains on the just and the unjust,” which tells us the uncontrollable is a condition of life. But the New Testament says “do not worry about your life, what you will eat and drink; or what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes… therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself…”
Today, is really all that we have…yet it is everything. It is full of people we love and opportunities we must seize.
Let these sobering anniversaries remind us—to be thankful we have Today. And let us pray for those who struggle everyday from the uncontrollable so they may find peace.
Larry
William L. Minnix, Jr., D.Min.
President and CEO
AAHSA
2519 Connecticut Ave NW
Washington DC 20008
