Author: Becky Sarwate

Newt Gingrinch Gains a Little of My Respect…Before Promptly Losing It (May 18, 2011)

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I have taken a detour the last couple months from my regular obsession with the political arena to talk all things divorce and cancer. But as I am enjoying a relative “good” period, filled with some degree of life satisfaction and emotional equilibrium, I am inspired to join the endless sport of Capitol Hill navel gazing once again.

I am a huge fan of NBC’s Meet the Press, the Sunday morning political chat stalwart now hosted by David Gregory. While Gregory with his whiny, waffley interview style is no match for the “just the facts” tenacity of the otherwise cherubic Tim Russert (may he rest in peace), MTP is a habit I just can’t break. In years past, I would enjoy the show while indulging in the traditional Sunday hangover remedy of carbs and Gatorade, but now I am in my 30s and am usually well rested and alert. There are things to like about aging.

Anyway, this past weekend I queued up my Tivo to watch the show commercial-free and nearly deleted it altogether when I saw that the featured guest was former Speaker of the House, and current Republican Presidential candidate, Newt Gingrinch. I will NEVER forgive Newtie for the 90s – from the ridiculous government shutdown of 1995, to his laughably hypocritical pursuit of President Bill Clinton on the “family values” front. This from a man on his third marriage, the second which began under the auspicious influences of infidelity.

For a number of years, Newtie sort of fell off the political radar, only emerging as the occasional commentator on really important issues like President Obama’s African, colonial worldview (I was under the impression that Hawaii ceased to be a colony in the late 1950s). Rhetorically, he was swatted away like the pop cultural gnat he became (though he prefers the term “gadfly,” thank you very much).

But Newt got my attention on Sunday’s Meet the Press when he addressed rising GOP star Paul Ryan’s irresponsible, top two percent-friendly budget proposal. Specifically commenting on the plan’s goal of dismantling Medicare as we know it, converting it to a voucher program, his Newtness said: “I don’t think right-wing social engineering is any more desirable than left-wing social engineering.”

Well ok! Newt never stood a chance of getting my vote, but such refreshing honesty, such lack of pandering! Maybe we have a new Maverick on the right.

But of course my praise and excitement was premature. Once the Tea Party establishment (who seem to accrue power in inverse proportion to their distance from the mainstream) got wind of Newtie’s comments, Gingrich began backpedaling faster than a honey badger.

Paul Ryan had this to say to Reuters: “I think he now understands the magnitude of his comments — how wrong they were. And I think he’s going to have more to say about that. And he’s working on that. He basically called and apologized. And I accepted his apology.” Newt – you just got served by a man with a freakishly big head.

Last time I checked, Ryan is a lowly House member from the minorityparty, but we currently live in an upside down political universe, where less is apparently more. As the brilliant Paul Krugman put it: “Normally, a party controlling neither the White House nor the Senate would acknowledge that it isn’t in a position to impose its agenda on the nation. But the modern G.O.P. doesn’t believe in following normal rules.”

And an article in the “Caucus” section of today’s New York Times asks, “Can Newt Gingrich Control Newt Gingrich?”

I may be wholly biased and partisan but I happen to believe that running afoul of an increasingly wingnut right establishment, which has essentially declared war on the middle class, is the FIRST positive thing Newt has done in awhile. Alas, no more. He has been cowed and has summarily returned to placating the ultra-conservative. I would have hoped he’d take a lesson from 2008 also-ran John McCain (another formerly bold player who relinquished any and all respect I ever held for him). Winning over your party’s base almost necessarily means alienating the mainstream in this century. In short, the already debatably electable Gingrich just become untouchable.

America’s Health Care System is Still Broken (May 12, 2011)

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Right about now, you may be saying to yourself, “Thanks, Captain Obvious! And this just in, water is wet!” But this week, the truth of my post title hit way too close to home.

As many of you know, I am going through a rather acrimonious split from my husband of three and a half years, Eddie. As part of the rules of separation, I will be losing my current health insurance, which I was able to take advantage of through my husband’s employer. Prior to moving into a studio apartment last month, I made the rounds: gynecologist, dentist, etc. Smoke ’em if you got ’em and all that. I had my IUD removed at the former appointment, not really the funnest 10 minutes I have ever spent, but I wasn’t expecting any other developments.

I am learning as I grow older that life has a funny way of really piling it on. Because anyone who has been through it knows that getting a divorce affects everything you say, think, do and feel – for a much longer period than you may wish. It permeates every nook and cranny of your selfhood, throwing the formerly stable and assured into tremendous upheaval, and rendering the impossible suddenly all too real. As you go about daily life, the experience is disorienting, the sensation that the world should stop for just a moment and acknowledge that it has run you over. But maddeningly, it doesn’t and you learn to cope with a new reality that you never imagined.

And just when you think it can’t get any worse, it does. Remember that visit to the gynecologist I mentioned? About a week after the “routine” pap smear that was part of the exam, I received the dreaded call: my doctor (not a nurse or a junior physician) explained to me in a very calm and soothing voice that I needed to have a biopsy (also known as a colposcopy when we’re talking about the cervix) as soon as possible.

This I did on Tuesday morning, and for other women out there who have endured a colpo, you will join me in declaring it a humiliating and uncomfortable procedure in every sense. I went in hoping for the best but fearing the worst and it seems that in this case, my fatalistic outlook served me well. Because when the doctor informed me that I appeared to have Stage 2 cervical cancer (final results will be in next week, but she felt confident enough to put a surgery on the books immediately), I took it fairly well.

The prognosis is very good. I learned this week that the traditional five stages of cancer (0-4) have a number of subclassifications. I am “lucky” enough to be classified under Stage 2A, which means that the surgery, scheduled for Tuesday, June 7, ought to be enough to eliminate the disease in my body once and for all.

While I am experiencing an epic case of conflicting emotions over the tumult of 2011 thus far: alternating between the joy of finally securing gainful employment as a professional writer, only to find myself suddenly alone, and now, ill, – that is not the drive behind writing this post. In fact my intent was never to address my battle with cancer publicly at all. In the first place, I have only begun to process my feelings, and in the second, it just seemed way too personal for now (yes, even I have my limits). However yesterday I realized that there is a cause to champion through my experience that is much bigger than a little laser surgery.

My employer is set to offer health insurance for the first time. When I learned this, I was overjoyed. How fortunate was I, just as I was about to lose coverage through my spouse? However, as I entered the small office where my boss had setup the insurance rep for the day, it dawned on me that telling the man I was in active treatment for the “Big C” could create some complications.

As soon as I informed the nice gentleman about my June 7 procedure, he pleasantly pulled a business card from his wallet, wished me well and told me to call him in 2014. That is the year when the part of Obamacare that forbids insurance carriers from rejecting “clients” (because we’re certainly not fucking patients anymore), on the basis of pre-existing conditions takes effect. Until that time, I was politely told there was nothing that could be done for me, and it was further suggested that I ask my spouse very sweetly to stay legally married for as long as possible.

The agent shared with me that the only health insurance provider that will even take a look at cancer “victims” (his word, not mine) is Aetna, and then only if you’ve been in remission for five years. Well I haven’t been in remission for five minutes.

I am 32 years old, and except for a spot of cancer, am in otherwise excellent health. I am afflicted with a temporary condition which, with a little luck and medical expertise, I will be free from after June 7. But for the next 3-5 years, I have the choice of no health coverage at all, or depending on the humanity and kindness of someone who no longer wants to be part of my life. It is a lot to ask of Eddie. It is a lot to ask of my personal pride. And it is way too much to ask of human decency. I feel like I am being punished – for what exactly, I don’t know, but the sense of shame remains.

The ironic part is that I feel physically fine. I can work, write, exercise and take full advantage of what the world has to offer. Yet I am shut out from the ability to inoculate myself against the expense of unplanned accident or illness for half a decade. I can speak out about this travesty, and more than that, I must. Because what about those far sicker than me, with far less support, who suffer in unnamed silence?

I appreciate what President Obama has done to begin to correct our backward, inefficient and illogical health care delivery system, but it’s still not enough. Not by a long shot.

 

Men Under 40: J’accuse! (May 8, 2011)

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While talking with my good friend who works in the fitness industry this week (a male, it must be noted), we found ourselves concluding that in the everlasting Battle of the Sexes, the female quotient of Generation X and ensuing batches of young people, appears to be winning – and winning handily.

Now I am know I am courting controversy with this post, and I can already read the outraged comments that I will receive, but let me make a couple points before you unleash the hounds:

  1. I am not a hard core feminist. I love men. The world needs them and for the most part, they are still the dominant producers of the world’s ideology and power structure. Whether I like that or not (usually not), I have to respect the facts.
  2. See Paragraph 1 – my indictment of the male character, in this case, is limited to men age 40 and under. I don’t pretend to understand the stolid, silent mien of my grandfather and his generation, or the blue collar gruffness of my uncles, but I’ll never accuse them of being sissies.

For the purposes of this essay, I am referencing with broad strokes (and there are of course many exceptions) the daily evidence I see of physical laziness, avoidance and lying as relationship strategies and a general inability to cope with discomfort of any kind. Don’t believe me? Here are some real world examples offered from my wanderings of the last couple of weeks:

  1. My friend in the fitness industry runs a regular Thursday night strength training class at a popular Chicago gym. On this particular evening, his pupils were all men under the age of 30. As he tried to put the group through its paces, he reported that it was the “saddest, whiniest spectacle of ‘can’t-do’” he had ever witnessed. When he repeated the same program with an all-female class at 6:30 the next morning, hardly the finest hour for most of us, each and every warrior lady made it to the end with no complaint.
  2. Any Amazing Race fans out there? If you want evidence of exactly the kind of shit I am talking about, watch this episode where “Goth” team Kent and Vyxsin continue a season’s worth of self-destruction, driven by Kent’s inability to comprehend that racing is a physical and emotional game requiring endurance and nerves of steel. After enduring his whiny, useless performance for eight weeks, I cannot help but hope that Vyxsin dumps his ass for a more robust Boy George wannabe (Boy George, who been through some adventures, would label Kent a “petulant cow”).
  3. Another man I know, age 37, is about to unleash a storybook marriage proposal on his girlfriend of two years. The moment will be fairytale in every way. The only problem is that the entire relationship is based on lies. The man is a closet smoker, drug user and womanizer, and though the couple cohabitates, he has managed to keep his true self under wraps for their entire courtship. As a woman just exiting her own committed relationship that was built on a foundation of quicksand, I see this bride-to-be’s future and it isn’t pretty.

Now of course women of my generation and beyond, myself included, are not perfect. We tend to suffer from the same type of extended adolescent wish fulfillment that appears to be the hallmark of those born after 1975. BUT (and it’s a big but) we have managed to cultivate a kind of independent cultural savviness that endows ample internal resources in the event that traditional marriage and motherhood elude. We have careers, knitting classes, bike races, girl’s night out, networking, you name it and some woman is doing it. We must deal with pain, of the internal and external variety as we endure men who don’t call, work environments where we continue to make 77 cents on the man’s dollar, and diseases that are specific to our gender (cervical, ovarian and breast cancer among others).

Meanwhile, nearly 50% of single men under 25 live rent-free and 5% percent of bachelors of all ages still call Mom to clean their house. What gives with the enfeebling of the male sex?

Thoughts? Angry missiles you want to throw at me? Let’s discuss.

 

Bicycle Bumper Cars Part II (May 5, 2011)

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Some of you who have been reading my posts for awhile may recall this one from last October, Bicycle Bumper Cars, which recounted the experience of being knocked off my bike by a heartless hit and run driver.

Since that time I have upgraded bicycles (see photo above) and to say that I am having a love affair with my 2011 Schwinn Madison is possibly the understatement of the year. My Facebook friends are absolutely weary of endless bragging about my mode of transit’s speed, attention grabbing proclivities and general adorableness. Tough for them. I won’t stop.

I used part of the cash settlement I received as an outcome of my separation from Eddie to invest in the cycle. I no longer have a car (one of many things I have had to relinquish post-marriage) and my bicycle is now my primary form of transportation. I needed something light (so I can carry it to my third floor walkup), fast and naturally, aesthetically pleasing. The Madison satisfies all of those requirements.

But apparently, it can’t do much to protect you from other people. Shame.

Yesterday after work, I took advantage of a rare sunny, and somewhat warm Chicago spring day to enjoy a leisurely ride around my neighborhood. I live on a side street in the Rogers Park community and the road is fairly narrow. At one point there was a large SUV that wished to pass me, so I scooted slightly to the right, nearish but not adjacent to a row of parked cars.

I was humming along, enjoying the feeling of warm rays on my face, eyes firmly engaged on the pavement ahead when it happened….

BOOM! Car door! Had I ridden by one second later, it would have missed me altogether. Had I arrived a second earlier, I would have swerved around the careless parkers. Just one of those perfect timing things.

The impact sent me flying over my handlebars. My front right thigh bears a blackened imprint that bears a perfect resemblance to the bar. I landed on the backs of my hands and slightly to the left of my keister, so there are swollen bruises in both of those general areas. But seriously, apparent bad bike karma aside, I must have a guradian angel watching over me. It could and should have been much worse.

My assailants clearly knew they were guilty of attention deficit, because you never saw men so solicitous for my well-being. The real tragedy only became apparent after I stood up and realized that I had not broken any limbs. My beautiful, beautiful bike suffered some scratches, a loosened handlebar grip and – horrors! – a realigned front end. The men held the bike in place and readjusted the forefront of the cycle to a point where I could adequately finish my ride. However I will have to stop at a Schwinn shop for a full workup. Yes, I helicopter parent my bike. What of it?

The gentlemen did have the integrity to ask if I wanted to call the police, but given that I was alive, if shaken, and my baby (Lil’ Red) was operational, I thought it best to put the incident behind me.

I think this narrative provides an accessible metaphor for my life at the moment – a journey into the unknown equally fraught with danger, excitement, and the occasional fall. The bruises adorning my body reflect interior contusions that I often struggle to articulate. I can achieve moments of assured self-confidence yet turn into an insecure sobbing mess just as quickly. There are many things that are exhausting and painful in a divorce, but the sudden removal of a stable identity is among the worst. It presents a tabula rasa on the one hand, yet a sense of failure and isolation on the other.

I mean who are we really as individuals, independent of others? Is such a question even answerable? I am slowly becoming aware, through ample self-reflection and quality therapy, that so much of the construction of “I” is based upon relationships: personal, professional and otherwise. Is there a consistent “Becky” that I could identify, had I been a feral child raised alone in the wilderness, a woman who never met parents, sister, husband or colleagues? Would she have any traits that I would recognize, that would remain after 32 years of being smacked by the car doors of culture and society?

I admit that I am a little more fearful and cautious in my heretofore bat-out-of-hell riding style after yesterday’s dethronement, so perhaps that answers my question.

 

In Memory of Jesika (April 25, 2011)

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Jesika Stairs

Two years ago today, I lost my partner in crime, Jesika Brooke Thompson, to an almost ludricrously brief battle with ovarian cancer, the “silent killer” of too many amazing women. Her 17-day struggle with the disease, and the effort to accept life without her, has been a huge factor in my personal transformation since April 25, 2009.

I am reprinting the eulogy I read at Jesika’s memorial service, as a small way of spreading the word about this fantastic friend, wonderful daughter, partner and professional.

In less than two weeks, I will be walking with Team June/Jesika as part of the Chicago Chapter of the National Ovarian Cancer Coalition (NOCC). If you would like to make a donation to this important cause (and any amount is appreciated), click here to be taken to my personal page. 

 

I first met Jesika Brooke Thompson in September of 1992 when we were both freshman at Lincoln Park High School on the North Side of Chicago. Jesika had come over to Lincoln Park with a crew of her fellow graduates from Hawthorne Elementary school, some of whom are with us today. As for me, I was the lonely, 100 pound, 5′ 4′ refugee of a tiny place called Pilgrim Lutheran Grade School. My graduating class had 12 students, so I was both overwhelmed and excited to start my new life as the member of a freshman class of nearly 1,000.

Luckily enough, I knew a few people from a summer school program I had participated in only a few months before. Some of the students I met were from Hawthorne, so when the inaugural at Lincoln Park rolled around, I stuck close to them. That first day of classes, a bunch of the Hawthorne crowd, including Jesika, decided to grab lunch at Robinson’s Ribs across the street from campus. As I walked across the quad to meet my pals, I got a look at Jesika, and, more importantly, she had a chance to size me up. I will never forget her first words to me: “What is that thing on your head?”

Yes, I, the skinny 14 year-old white fish swimming for the first time in a huge, multi-cultural pond, had dared to wear a bandanna to class. I had some misguided notion that it made me look tough or cool. Of course Jesika called me right out, not for the last time in what would turn into a beautiful 16-year friendship. You see that was Jesika’s way. The more she loved you, the more she enjoyed poking you in the ribs, reminding you never to take yourself too seriously, or get too big for your britches.

The last time I saw and spoke to Jesika in person was April 10th of this year. It’s so hard to believe that was just six weeks ago. Though we had grown and changed so much in the last decade and a half, Jesika’s final words to me were as memorable as the first. By the this time, Jesika was aware that she was ill and carted around an oxygen tank and mask to help her breathe better. One would have thought this challenge might subdue her sarcastic side. Not so.

For a few years now, and much to the embarrassment of my husband Eddie, I have been illogically attached to this puffy, long black winter jacket I bought at H&M. The thing may be ugly as sin, but it’s warm and that’s all that matters to me when it’s 30 degrees below outside. Am I right? Jesika had taken a few swipes at this coat over time, but I forgot all about this as I spent time with her at the apartment she shared with her partner, Kevin Smith. It wasn’t until I put my jacket on to go home that I was reminded I ought to have had the presence of mind to wear something else. Because out came Jesika’s quiet and serious voice with an important question: “Becky, why do you always have to wear that? When you gonna buy a new coat?”

I told this story of our first meeting, and shared this piece of the final conversation I had with Jesika, because they are two beautiful and funny bookends to a friendship that spanned half my life. I couldn’t do anything remotely foolish or uppity if I wanted to escape Jesika’s notice. She kept me, and so many of us nodding our heads right now, honest. I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I loved her for it.

Now that doesn’t mean that Jesika lived to giggle at the ones she loved, even if it sometimes felt that way. Jesika also had a way of letting you know when she believed in you, that she was 100% behind you, your biggest fan.

I had so many stupid ideas when I was a teenager: trying out for the high school dance team for instance, when I don’t have a lick of rhythm. Going to the homecoming party freshman year, though I was warned by someone we all know well that it would be “ghetto and stupid.” But you know what? I followed through with those plans, and guess who stood right by me as I made a fool of myself? Of course Jesika. She might tell me once I would be sorry if I made up my mind to do something I’d later regret, but that never, ever stopped her from supporting me. She was even willing to endure the same embarrassments if it meant I didn’t have to stand alone. What an amazing gift.

Recently, and in a sorry economic state such as the one we’re facing right now, I made the decision to leave the stable comfort of my 9-5 job and strike out as a freelance writer. I had 6 years of undergrad and grad school to prepare me for this moment, in addition to the simmering will of a dreamer. But I feared what others might say. Did I have enough talent? Was I crazy to give up my solid income at the age of 30 for such a potentially risky endeavor? Would I live to regret taking a chance, and have to endure the ego check of crawling back to the corporate world? For as many doubts as I had in myself, Jesika made it clear that she didn’t have any. She was a registered follower of the blog I manage with my sister. Her only teasing complaint when I published my first piece in StreetWise newspaper last month, was that she’d have to hit the street to get what she called “her daily Becky fix.” Again for a moment, I have to stop and marvel that conversation took place only a month and a half ago. But that was the Jesika way: tickle you with one hand and hug you with the other. For everytime she kidded me for leaving my Facebook profile picture up too long, she would end her message by throwing in a reminder of how proud of me she was.

Maybe the reason I find it so hard to believe she’s gone, even a month later, is because I still feel Jesika behind me in so much that I do. When I walk through the mall and see a kiosk selling the latest model of pink Blackberries, Jesika is there. A week ago, as Kevin and I stumbled around the Lemont cemetery in the pouring rain, looking for Jesika’s burial plot as my worthless high heels sank in the mud, I could almost hear the heckle of Jesika’s generous laugh.

It doesn’t seem real, right or fair that a person so young, intelligent and hilarious be taken from us in such a sudden and terrible way. Sometimes I still have to sit quietly and repeat the words, “Jesika is gone.” Otherwise, I might let myself believe she is just out of town, catching a Janet Jackson concert with one of her many friends scattered across the nation. At a number of points in the last month, as I spoke to Kevin, or my husband, about my great friend Jesika Thompson, I felt as if I were choking on my own selfish desire to bring her back. I was Jesika’s side kick, not the other way around, and I wondered how I could keep moving forward without her love and support.

But that’s just it. I don’t have to. Jesika is right behind me, as she always has been. She will always be young, fresh and healthy. I don’t remember an old or sick version of my friend, just the bright light that she was. If there is any comfort to be found in the gaping wounds of her loss, perhaps that indelible image of Jesika’s teasing laugh, her unyielding support, is what will get me, and maybe some of you, through this difficult time.