My healthcare reform moment

May 2008- My daughter and I pulled up to the skating rink for a Friday afternoon skating fundraiser for her magnet school. For a 7-year- old girl, an afterschool skate party with her female classmates is the ultimate social event. And I am the chaperone, the designated parent for birthday parties and school functions.
The parking lot was almost full. Other parents have arrived ahead of us. We walked through the door and I was about to grab my wallet to pay to get inside, when I noticed the sign.
“If you do not have health insurance we recommend that you not skate. We are not responsible for injuries incurred on the skate rink.”
We had been to this skating rink for parties before. The sign was faded and old, but somehow I had never noticed it. Why should I? In 20 years of employment since I graduated from college, I always had health insurance. Until then.
As I reread the sign, the presidential campaign debate about portability, universal healthcare, single payer system and health care reform immediately became very real. It took two decades, but my ox had finally been gored.
Then the two of us had one of those unforgettable moments between a father and a daughter, man and child. That afternoon it seemed that for a second our roles were reversed. For a second I felt ashamed, powerless to provide for my daughter. I felt like one of those people who I used to look down on. But my shame was soon replaced by an infusion of pride. Instead of throwing the expected tantrum, instead of breaking down in tears over her disappointment, my daughter offered me an olive branch as sturdy as a life raft.
“It’s okay dad,” she said. “It’s okay. I’m not upset.”
We turned around and walked out of the rink and drove home to do something far less physically risky – watch television.
I lost my health insurance the minute I was laid off from my newspaper job. The process was much more humane than many of the lay off horror stories I had heard. I got early notice enough to schedule dentist, doctor and optometrist visits.
The company cut its ties with me on the last day of work. With the paycheck went my health insurance. The HR department offered one option. I could buy COBRAA for me and my family, the letter said. Cost? $950 a month. I was astounded by the absurdity of it. Those who are employed fulltime and have good paying jobs get cheaper health insurance than the unemployed. How was I going to afford COBRAA on my $275 weekly unemployment check?
Unemployment and the lack of health insurance are partners in the sad marriage of our present economic maelstrom. The Kaiser Family Foundation predicts that if unemployment rate hits 10 percent this year, the roll of those with employer sponsored health insurance could fall by 13.5milion people. That could swell the ranks of those with SCHIP and Medicaid could grow by 5.4 million. That could mean another 5.8 million uninsured Americans. Just think that in 2007 when times were good relatively, there were 45 million Americans trying to figure out how to stay healthy without health insurance.
KFF analysts say that every one percentage increase in the unemployment rate represents to a 1.1 million increased in the ranks of the uninsured population and a one million increase in the SCHIP and Medicaid enrollment.
And having a job no longer guarantees you health insurance. Companies that offer health insurance are making employees pay more for less. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that many small businesses are cutting employee health insurance in order to avoid layoffs or just to stay in business. Talk about a blow to employee morale. The bad news seems endless.
But here is the good news.
The stunning numbers of those newly unemployed and uninsured add an unprecedented urgency to the current health care reform debate. For the first time in a long time, enough people are affected by an issue and a forced to pay attention by what happens in Washington.
So what do we do? Hopefully we are beyond another “Harry and Louise” moment. Scare tactics about socialized medicine won’t work this time. It’s one thing to be a conservative Republican denouncing government run healthcare when you have a job and your doctor’s visits are subsidized. That argument holds less currency after you have been sitting at home for a few months and you don't know whether that bump on your son’s arms is just a bruise or a fracture. How about a plan that taxes those who are insured against the day when they might lose their health insurance? We’ve figured out a way to provide income for the unemployed.
This country spends $2.5 trillion a year on health care. Half is from the government; the rest is private. We have the framework for the kind of health system that can meet the needs of an increasingly unhealthy populace. Our problem isn’t one of means; it’s a lack of will.
There are people all over this country who are getting paid to maintain the status quo. They reckon if they stall long enough, good times will return; they hope people like me will forget and move on to the next big distraction.
They’re wrong.
May 2009 On the Friday before Memorial Day, my daughter’s elementary school has another fundraiser at the same skating rink from a year earlier. She’s a second grader. Third grade and its freedom looms. Her girl friendships are as important as ever and so are the parties and out of school social events- like a fundraising party at the skating rink. She has $5; she’s willing to pay her own way. She remembers the disappointment of a year earlier. She jokes with her mom about it.
Now dad has a job; he has health insurance. At the scheduled time we arrived at the rink. I paid her way in; they stamped her arm and I walked in behind her. I didn’t see the sign that blocked my way a year earlier. To be honest, I didn’t look for it. Unfortunately, when I have health insurance, there are some signs I think I can afford to ignore. But that sign I won't soon forget.

Jobless

 The news arrived in a timely and technologically appropriate fashion. It came via a text message: “It’s official. I am jobless.”

She was 30-something, a veteran of the financial services. Wall Street had transferred her from New York to Tampa, North to South, and it has been downhill ever since.

She arrived at work one Monday morning. Come into the boss’office, we need to talk, she was told.

The job she’d thought she would  have until in the end of April  had left town  two months early, outsourced to India - Mumbai or New Delhi, to her what’s the difference.

 Pack your things and leave, she was told.

Thankfully, she didn’t go empty handed: six months salary; two months health benefits. She’s lucky I told her. Some men and women with families and mortgages and children in college are being let go with a month’s pay.

I gave her the "obstacles and opportunities" speech. She  can finally go out and get the job she always wanted. She’ll finally get that teaching certificate. She ‘ll perhaps try to be a social worker. The Department Children and Families needs employees who care about hurting adults and children.

A year ago I heard the same speech as I was preparing to leave the St. Petersburg Times. I didn’t always  believe it intellectually, but in my heart it made me feel better repeating the words: something good will come out this.  Every door that closes means a door is opening. Obstacles birth opportunities.

Those words don’t ever salve the hurt and calm the panic of being fired, but they’re true. And every day someone else needs to hear them - someone like the veteran reporter for a major newspaper chain who started his day interviewing folks at a recycling center. When he walked into the office, someone told him the boss wanted to see him in his office. He walked in to learn he was being let go that day.

“What about the story I’m working on,” he asked.

Forget the story, the editor told him.

Here’s more. I reconnected with an old friend from college this week. He has been freelancing as a photographer since January when he was laid off from a position he held for 18 years. Another former colleague, who had long fled newspapers for the saner pastures of public relations, finally returned my phone call after a month. She had been laid off since February. Her nonprofit employer closed offices and cut staff. They blamed the economic downtown and the sharp drop in charitable donations.

Sounds depressing? I know it is. But this cycle of trouble demands the best ideas, the best innovation, the best originality from all over us. This is a reminder that we can never get too comfortable. That master’s degree? Now looks like a great time to go back to school. That old hobby that has been catching dust in the garage? Time to dust it off.  Those kids stories that you always wanted to write?  Procrastination time is over.

Can’t seem to develop the motivation to get started and get off the couch?

Lace up those sneakers and take an early morning walk; better yet, go jogging. You won't come back emptyheaded.  

I want to hear some of those ideas you came up with while you were out breaking a sweat. Those endorphins have me feeling optimistic for you already. 

The UWI Open Campus Montserrat recently announced winners of the 2009 Creative Writing Competition. Entries were read  by six  judges some local and some international .My short fiction, dead, which was written almost a decade ago when I lived in the Carolinas, won the short story prize. I guess it's time for me to dust off all those other short stories languishing in digital purgatory. 

 Here are the list of winners: 

Poetry

Ease de Pressure by Laura Taylor

Stage 2 Denial by Jamaal Jeffers

View Through Beaded Curtains by Shirley Spycalla

 

Honourable Mention

      Etude by Jamaal Jeffers

            The Last Farewell by Shirley Spycalla

 

Short Stories 

Dead by Andrew Skerritt

He Would Remember Forever by Gordon Buffonge

We Will Not Go Quietly by Laura Taylor 

Honourable Mention

      One Year in Hell by Laura Taylor

      Nubian Journeys: As a Woman by Celia Marshall

The Open Campus will  organise a prize-giving ceremony which will also include the reading and signing of recently published work.   The Alliouagana Festival of the Word, a Literary Festival for Montserrat, will be held Nov. 13 to 15, 2009.  

Excerpt from Dead, a prizewinning  short story by Andrew  J. Skerritt 

The conductor announces each stop. In silence, I scrutinize my fellow passengers aboard the northbound No. Five subway train in Brooklyn heading for Manhattan. I search in vain for a familiar face. I look through a one-way glass. I see them. They cannot see me. I am the dead among the living. Together we ride in quiet isolation. A crowded New York City subway car is the loneliest place on earth.

               I sit in the double seat between the conductor's booth and the rear side door, squeezed between an off-duty transit cop and a Jamaican girl wearing braids. She told me who she was the second she asked the conductor for directions. Seated next to the officer in uniform, I imagine the curved butt of the officer's service revolver digging into my ribs, wrinkling my mauve, double-breasted suit. He kept folding his arms and fingering his piece while looking out of the side of his eyes at half a dozen Puerto Rican-looking youths standing near the door leading to the next compartment. Their boots seem more suited for rocks and boulders than concrete and asphalt. They laugh and jostle each other in a friendly warm up for Times Square. A woman transit cop enters our car and strides down the aisle, eyeing the pocket of Latin energy. The youths fall silent as if on cue.  Within minutes, the train slides further north. Home is lost in the darkness and the cold behind me. I live in a field of strangers. For twenty five years, I lived off Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn.

 On December fourth, I moved to Evergreen Estates, a ten-acre development resting beneath the sod alongside the Interboro Parkway. My place is twenty feet inside the wrought iron fence.  Low cut grass and freshly turned earth surround me. Patches of beige-brown clay suggest that new neighbors just moved in. Although I'm not used to the damp, frozen earth, this new place has a certain charm. Each dawn I revel in the mist as it drifts over the Chinese section. Huts and gongs stand gaunt. Like Manchurian sentries, they guard their dead in exile. To the left, in the Jewish section, crows play late afternoon games of tag.  Beyond the wrought iron fences and landscaped berm, Parkway traffic crawls east, where Brooklyn peters out and Queens, bushy and pretentious, emerges. To the west and south, yellow cabs honk their horns as they make their mad rush toward Pennsylvania Avenue. They mean no disrespect to us dearly departed residents of Evergreen Estates. A Brooklyn cab driver without a horn is like an undertaker without a hearse. 

Under the Evergreen Tree - Oral History Project

The need for this project was reinforced in December 2008  as I attended funeral services for Richard “Richie” Allen, a former newspaper and television journalist and ex-press secretary to several Virgin Island governors. Allen was also a native of Montserrat.

 I never met Richie Allen, although near the end of his life we lived a few miles apart in Tampa Bay, Florida. He was my wife’s relative and so we received the news of his death from a cousin in Connecticut who was flying to Florida for the funeral. That weekend I learned about Mr. Allen’s work as a journalist, his humble upbringing in Cudjoe Head, his involvement in the expatriate Montserrat community in St. Thomas, and his dedication to his family and his faith. During his lifetime, Allen met presidents and other dignitaries. He made a difference. It would have been wonderful to sit and talk with him about his life in Montserrat, what inspired him, his influences and record his life story for posterity . Unfortunately, I never had that opportunity. Standing at Mr. Allen’s gravesite in Tampa,  I was struck by the urgency to begin an oral history project for the Montserrat diaspora. Gathered for that solemn occasion were dozens of fellow Montserratians who had immigrated decades ago; some had never returned to home, but all cherished vivid memories of their childhood, adolescence and young adult hood on the island. Their memories are frozen in time. They deserve to be collected, shared and saved to inspire future generations.

Montserrat is a nation of immigrants. Many Montserratians grow up and aspire to leave the 39- square- mile British colony to seek their education and fortunes abroad – England, America, U.S Virgin Islands, Europe and Africa.

During the nineteen fifties and early sixties, Montserrat experienced significant waves of  immigration  to England  to fill the void in the labor force caused by the devastation of  World War II. Those immigrants, gone more than half  a century, are fast exiting the stage and their stories of struggle and perseverance are being lost to history. Now is the time to reach out and document their long overlooked personal narratives.

The eruption of Soufriere Volcano in 1995 and the violent deadly explosions two years later set off an unprecedented exodus. More than any time in the island’s history, Montserratians have been scattered around the world. Only a brave remnant soldier on. In time that remnant will be outnumbered by an influx of immigrants from other islands in the region. Already we see the Spanish influence of Dominicans immigrants who have relocated to the island. Indian dances at the Montserrat Christmas festival events portend the cultural shift. That influence is not always a negative one, but therein lurks the peril. Our open embrace of other cultures usually comes at the expense of our own. Our sense of identity as a people and as a culture is endangered.

Currently a number of projects are undertaken to preserve our national identity for future generations. I propose Under the Evergreen Tree, as an addition to those efforts.

Under  the Evergreen Tree will be patterned on the Story Corps,(www.storycorps.net) listening  project, which allows ordinary Americans to visit audio booths and record their  families’ history romances, struggles and triumphs of everyday life. Like Story Corps, Under the Evergreen Tree is predicated on the unshakeable premise that stories matter. This is an audacious attempt to honor that belief and gather our history before it’s too late.

Just imagine, there already is a generation of Montserratians who are too young to remember what it was like to live in Plymouth before the volcano erupted; they have not experienced a Christian crusade or a political rally at the War Memorial, a walk down Parliament Street at 4 p.m. on Friday afternoons,  the majesty of the Evergreen tree at the round about, the magic of Boxing Day at Sturge Park. If we don’t collect these stories now, all future generations will have only pictures. Under the Evergreen Tree is an attempt to provide the stories and the historical context.

          This is an opportunity to gather family and personal histories of all Montserratians wherever they may live. The stories will dwell on various themes - family, natural disasters such as hurricane Hugo, the 1974 earthquakes, immigration, family, love, the volcano eruption, the 1960s Plymouth fire, education, religion, recreation, culture, calypso, sports and village life, the Lasso man episode of the early seventies.

Under the Evergreen Tree includes five major components:

 

1. Collection: The first step is to invite Montserratians from the four corners of the globe to sit down and digitally record their stories - sons can interview fathers, daughters their mothers, grandfathers and grandsons, uncles and nephews. I and other professionally trained individuals will visit cities with large Montserrat communities and conduct interviews. I also plan to travel to major cultural events where Montserratians are gathered, such as the Caribbean carnival weekend in Atlanta on Memorial Day weekend, Labor day in Brooklyn and Columbus Day weekend in Miami/Fort Lauderdale, to personally collect  stories for the archives. The St. Patrick's Day events are a perfect venue to begin collecting those stories.

Each interview will be recorded on CD and sent either by mail or in electronic form over the internet to designated collection points to be processed, catalogued and archived.

2. Archiving:. Oral histories on CDs will stored at the at the Montserrat National Trust or other designated  Montserrat location. The archived material will form part of a permanent multi-media exhibit that can be hosted at the Cultural Center. One can even envision that in the future, this initiative could be part of a stand alone multimedia, interactive Montserrat historical and cultural center to showcase all aspects of  what makes the Emerald Isle special.  I also plan to approach Florida A&M University and Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn, N.Y., to serve as U.S depositories of the stories so that scholars in future generations will have access to Montserrat history.  Similar partnerships are being sought in England.

3. Sharing: The aim is to share stories with family members and the wider community. We will provide each interviewees with a copy of their CD, keep a copy at the archive and, with the family’s permission, air segments weekly on Radio Montserrat and other outlets. Podcasts and YouTube versions will also be created.

4. Marketing. A major part of this project would be the outreach to the Montserratian communities scattered throughout the world. This initiative will require tremendous legwork. I plan to travel to New York, London, Boston, Birmingham, Atlanta, Washington D.C, St. Thomas and other places with significant Montserrat communities to visit churches, homes, businesses and community groups to spread the word. Traditional media outlets that serve ethnic communities will also be targeted to get out the message to this unique audience.

Under the Evergreen Tree will be heavily promoted on social networking sites such as Facebook, MySpace and Hi-5. Presently there are dozens of online Montserrat related communities forged by a common love and longing for a prosperous Montserrat.

 I also plan to create a web site where visitors can click and hear podcasts of the stories, and upload their own stories and pictures.

5. Organization and Operation: As part of the process, interviews can be catalogued and archived at the Montserrat National Trust or the Montserrat Cultural Center. Each week Radio ZJB will air one segment, one family’s story. Businesses will be encouraged to sponsor the broadcasts. The goal is to establish permanent booths and liaisons in each city. These individuals will coordinate the interviews, process the CDs and ensure they get posted to the web,  sent to the National Trust, aired on radio, and given to each family. 

This project will  be accompanied by an aggressive promotion campaign world wide, using free media interviews over Caribbean radio programs, internet email list etc. to get Montserratians to sign on to this project. I plan to tap into the vast network of Montserrat associations abroad. With the easy availability of technology, however, many individuals and families will be encouraged to conduct the interviews in their own homes and email the audio or upload directly to the web site for editing and listening.

Interviews will be catalogued and cross indexed in various ways. By geography for example, , former residents of  St. Patrick’s could be grouped together. The interviewers will try to get interviewees to talk about significant family and national happenings, wedding, births, hurricanes, epidemics, the earthquakes of the 1970s, and life during World War II. The volcano experience will have a separate category.

 As envisioned, a permanent booth will be set up at the National Trust or  the Cultural Centre and or studio space provided a ZJB radio to allow Montserrat residents and Montserratians visiting from abroad to come sit and record their stories. To enhance the visuals of this project we will be encourage people to submit copies of  family photographs, obituaries and death notices of Montserratians, career announcement notices etc. Funeral announcements on Radio Montserrat will be added to the  Under the Evergreen Tree archives.

 As part of this project, Under the Evergreen Tree’s web site will display old family photos, pictures of Montserrat etc. The site will allow people to listen to the interviews and upload their audio files of interviews to be edited. There will be detailed instructions to show people how to submit their stories.

This initiative will be conducted under the auspices of a  soon to be created nonprofit entity, with an active board of directors. The not for profit corporation will work in partnership with the Government of Montserrat and civic groups who support the goal of gathering and safekeeping Montserrat history. Success and longevity will require financial, logistical and moral support from a variety of government, philanthropic and individual donors.

If you're interested email me at drewskerritt@gmail.com. 

Some voices, mine included, just demand to be heard.

 In May 2008, shortly before the tsunami of newspaper layoffs, I left the St. Petersburg Times, where I had been a columnist and editor for five years. 

 One of the hardest things about leaving the newsroom is thinking of yourself as anything but a journalist. After 20 years of seeing the world through the lens of who, what, where, when, why and how, how do you  stop asking questions, being inquisitive? 

             Here's the good news. It has not been easy, but it has been educational. 

I soon learned that when you discard your "journalist" name tag and press pass, folks tell you things they'd never say to any working journalist and invite you to meetings where you hear information that would make a great scoop for the next day's front page. In other words, you get to see how things really work. However, that insider's view is very seductive. After all those years of being on the outside, you get to come inside and sit at the table. But the insider’s view is only a small part of the picture; it’s mostly about self interest, not the public interest.

Old habits die hard. Certain instincts can't be buried simply because you're no longer on the media's payroll. So I'm still asking why, how and when. 

After I left the newsroom I worried that I'd find a job that would stifle my ability to write and say what was on my mind. Thankfully, I've hit the intellectual jackpot, sort of.  I teach journalism at Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, Fla., where they expect me to teach and write. Publish or perish is actually part of the job  description.  Also, as adviser to the Famuan student newspaper, I can try to influence the next generation of journalists as they hone their craft. And that's only half of my story.

 Being in academia has opened a window for me to pursue the kind of writing that I put on hold when I walked into the newsroom two decades  ago. I became a journalist because I believed that toiling as a newspaper reporter would provide the training and discipline I needed to tell the stories of my people - people of color, Caribbean immigrants, people from Montserrat - the Emerald Isle of the Caribbean. I believed and still do that too many stories would otherwise go untold if scribes like me didn't tell them. So now, more than ever,  I have the passion to write those stories about the peanut vendor who sat on the side of the road under the grafted mango tree, the old woman who supported herself by selling sugared donuts and ice cream at the park during cricket matches, the boy who cried at night because he was afraid of the dark, the girl whose lifeless body was found under the sandbox tree.

             TropicZone will tell the story of the Caribbean diaspora - our loves, our losses, our triumphs, our failures. It will be a forum to examine and highlight the best we have to offer. As someone who grew up on Montserrat, one of the smallest and least known islands, I will also dwell on the people of Montserrat who have been scattered to the four corners of the earth since the explosion of the volcano in 1995. This blog will serve as a bulletin board for progress on my oral history project, Under the Evergreen Tree (see upcoming posts).

 But this blog won’t be all serious stuff. I promise to have fun. Expect to see stories about sports - especially cricket and soccer; music, literature, politics, even religion, all told in text, audio and pictures. I will use this location to update readers on my journalistic, literary and cultural projects. Of course, in order for this to work, there must be a dialogue - you'll hear from me; I’d love to hear from you.