I am proud to say that I am almost thirty-five years old and to this day I have yet to rack up a single cent of credit card debt. It’s easy when you don’t own a credit card. But that hasn’t stopped me from amassing a mighty and powerful barrage of hospital bills.
A dog bite, a seemingly fatal sinus ordeal, ultraviolence inflicted upon my person. A decent variety of alcohol related visits. The bills are neverending. I have yet to acknowledge a single one of ‘em with payment or a phone call or anything. And still they come. I don’t know what these people think they are going to acccomplish with persistence, but I applaud ‘em for it.
If I ever need to enlist the services of a collection agency, I got a full directory to choose from just looking at past notices. So that’s good.
What’s even better, I was sitting around the other day staring at an open drawer ‘cause I got sick of standing around staring at it. The drawer was full. Crammed full. Mostly bills that I don’t have the money to pay, and almost certainly wouldn’t pay even if I had the money, as the treatment was beneath lousy just about every time. I would pay my doctor, but I only owe him seventy-five bucks and he will get paid soon regardless. He has nothing to do with this drawer.
I’m not sure why I’ve kept every single bill and notice they’ve sent me over the last however many years. That drawer is not alone. There are many. Drawers, boxes, et cetera and so on. Maybe I kept them to salute their ongoing persistence. (One of the collection campaigns is somewhere in the neighborhood of seven years running.) I thought about scrapbooking, maybe. I’m not paying them, I might as well do something with them. I could build and paint a lifesize paper maiche Big Foot family and plant them in the forest to freak people out.
This is where I was at. When I struck gold. Tender, merciful gold.
Recycling. I admit, this is what it took to get me to recycle. I’ve been pretty decent about glass and plastic and aluminum in the past. Real good with copper. Just never recycled paper. Not so much as a bubble gum wrapper. I’m a horrible person. I have problems.
Nevertheless, I’m excited. I know it won’t look like much to the people that pick it up, but dangit, I tried. I gave what I had, ya know? And in this spirit, if you think about it, hospitals all over the country are sending out bills just like mine that people can’t afford to pay because Americans aren’t yet ready for Universal health care, evidently, but if all those bills just like mine that people can’t afford to pay were then recycled into something useful?!
We’re all saving the planet in our own way.
Just imagine the possibilities. We could build cathedrals. Fer real. Paper maiche cathedrals. Lifesize. Or just smash it all into paste that we use for the mortar in building a Legoland paradise. You couldn’t live there, you could only visit, and then you have to stand outside looking in. It would still serve a greater purpose than the ink and paper wasted in staggering, breathtaking excess letting people like me know that I owe them money.
One of these days we’ll evolve to quick video conferences, you and the bill collector, you’ll know better than to avoid his call, ‘cause all he does, he shrugs his shoulders, tells ya, “I know, man. What can I say? I’m just makin’ my daily visit. That’s all. How are the kids?”
And the trees will thank us.
Oh my Lord we are freakishly alike in this department! My van...er trash truck on wheels...is littered almost to our knees with notices for medical bills. They amass until entry into the vehicle becomes impossible then finally make their way to a trash bag and the fiery pit that is my burn barrel. :D However I am not contributing to the environment...I am adding to our polluted air with these useless envelopes that arrive faithfully every day. I am a horrible person, I should recycle! Good idea!
ReplyDeleteHaha :) I know a few of my bill collectors on a first name basis too... They just call every now and then to ask how I'm doing, we shoot the shit, tell a few jokes, and then hang up. Next week, happens all over again.
ReplyDeleteThe other day one of my bill collectors was taken off my case because she'd failed to collect on me for so long. It was a sad moment for both of us, I think. If there wasn't a phone between us, I think we would have embraced and left as friends. I'm gonna miss you, she said, before hanging up. I like to flatter myself by imagining tears forming in her eyes.
It is stupid.. Republicans are so mad about universal health care because they think its gonna raise their taxes when they're already paying their own health care. But most republicans have the wool pulled over their eyes in a lot of ways. Doctors charge an exhorbitant amount for services because half the people who visit them never pay. So they have to charge the other half twice as much.
If there were universal health care, doctors would slash their rates, and the cost of private health care would fall too, and even the republicans would save money.
In the meantime, entire forests would be saved with the reduction in paperwork.
The only reason they charge such rediculous bills is because they can sell them to collections departments for like 10 cents on the dollar. So they charge you $1000 for some simple procedure, knowing you're not gonna pay, then they sell that $1000 debt to a collections agency for $100. If the hospital charged you a reasonable $100 in the first place, they'd only get $10 out of it.
This is just one more example of the retarted things we end up doing because of our capitalistic system.
The worldwide economy has human beings running in circles wasting so much time with paperwork and other things that do not matter. I wonder why nobody notices it. And then I realize, Television.
You and Lizzie were the most interesting people I've met so far on my travels, the most intelligent, creative free thinkers. You know why? Its because you never watch television.. or at least I never saw you watch television.
So thanks for the enlightening breath of fresh air, of meeting some other people who aren't insane like most of the world is.