I have a confession to make. For the past couple of years, I’ve been involved in a drug trade.

I trade insulin.

It all started in 2019. Well, I take that back. It all started in 1966, when I was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes (now referred to as Type 1 diabetes). I’ve been injecting insulin ever since. Early on, Flo, my mom, was my supplier. They knew us at the local Rexall drug store: I’d walk with her there every month, she’d plunk two dollar bills on the counter, and they’d hand her a vial of “regular” insulin along with two cents change. In my college years, the university health system supplied insulin free-of-charge. After graduation I narrowed my job search to employers who provided good health insurance. The cost of insulin rose slowly over the years, but with health insurance, I was only asked to pay $30 per vial.

Until that one day last year when now-retired Seeing Eye dog Whitney led me to our local Walgreens. Our mission? Replenish my dwindling supply of short-acting insulin (the kind you inject every time you have a meal or a snack). I’d ordered three vials. “Okay, that’ll be $939,” The pharmacist said as he slid them my way.

You can imagine my reaction. I had a credit card, but I knew not to use it. You can’t return prescriptions you’ve paid for. The pharmacist suggested I contact my insurance company when I get home. I did. “We can straighten that out for you,” the woman at the insurance company told me. “But it might take a couple weeks.”

A couple weeks? I only had enough to get me through the next three days!

So I called a friend who takes insulin. He had extra, met me in our neighborhood park, and handed me a bag to get me through. .

Things got worse in 2020. Not for me, but for other diabetics I know. One of them was a server at a local restaurant/bar we go to. The place had to cut back on staff due to COVID, he didn’t have health insurance, and I got word he was having a hard time affording his long-acting insulin. I had extra long-acting insulin at home. Pay it forward, right? After rubber-banding my extra vials together, I set up a meeting time and slipped the contraband to the young man in need.

A Side Effects Public Media story I heard on the radio last week explains the high cost of insulin like this:

Drug companies have largely thwarted creating generic versions of insulins — which could dramatically reduce the price — by renewing drug patents. Drug companies say this is needed to defray the cost of development, while critics say it’s designed to maintain high profit margins.

An interview the Side Effects reporters had with Travis Paulson, who has Type 1 diabetes, brought up something that hadn’t occurred to me before. Unable to find work with health insurance during the 2008 housing crisis, Paulson often rationed his insulin supply — a risky practice that can be fatal — to make ends meet. As finances dwindled, he started traveling 90 miles away from home to cross the border into Canada to buy insulin. “I found out that I could get insulin up there for about $25 a bottle,” he told the reporters. “The same insulin costs $350 to $400 a bottle here.”

But then COVID-19 hit. Canada closed its border with the U.S. It’s been nine months since Paulson has been able to cross into Canada to buy insulin. “So that was unsettling,” he told the reporters. “It not only cut me down on insulin, but it cut down on anybody I could assist with insulin, too.” You read that right. Travis Paulson has been involved in drug trafficking, too.

The Canada – U.S. border is still closed, but the Side Effects story reports Paulson recently found a pharmacy in Vancouver where he can place large orders for insulin to be shipped his way. “Otherwise, yeah, I’d be seriously hurting right now,” he said.

Three pharmaceutical companies supply the U.S. with insulin: Eli Lilly, Sanofi and Novo Nordisk. Each offers financial help with insulin costs, but you have to register individually with the companies to qualify. A 2019 Washington Post story quoted a spokesperson for the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America saying that “Too often, these negotiated discounts and rebates are not shared with patients, resulting in the sickest patients paying higher out-of-pocket costs to subsidize the healthy.” Isn’t this the opposite of how health insurance is supposed to work?

I can tell you firsthand that despite what the outgoing president said in a September 2020 presidential debate, whether you are insured or not, insulin is still more expensive than water. I’m holding out hope for 2021, though. Happy New Year!

This just in: the January 1, 2021 edition of the Chicago Tribune reports that a Illinois law took affect on New Year’s Day (January 1, 2021) making our state one of the first states to limit the out-of-pocket price of insulin. The Tribune reported that the cost will be limited to $100 for a 30-day supply. Still not cheaper than water, but getting closer.

It being the end of the year, I thought I might write one of those year-end recaps. But as I cataloged things, I thought, nah.

I’ll just say this: When I got sprung from the City COVID quarantine hotel last April, I had no idea that Beth and I would look back and say we got off easy.

But we did.

And we’re grateful. And we think about those who have not gotten off as easy. Y’all know who you are. We’re with you and always will be.

Then I thought, well, it wasn’t all bad. Surely there have been bright spots, yes?

Well, not so much. But in our personal lives, there has been some goodness.

This affordable housing development in Cambridge, Massachusetts, won best overall passive project in this year’s PHIUS Design Competition.

The non-profit I work for (PHIUS) has thrived—we’ve hired four people since the lockdown. For reference, that increased our headcount by nearly 50 percent. We promote design and construction that results in buildings that use 40-60 percent less energy and produce less carbon. And it’s very clear that gradually, we’ll reduce our carbon footprint.

I’ve talked to architects and builders who also have thrived—and a common problem is finding skilled labor. One of our constituents is on a personal crusade to bring back technical education to high schools. He thinks, and I agree, that we’ve placed too much emphasis on four-year degrees and not enough on trades and technical skills. Here’s hoping that the Green New Deal offers training—there is a need for skilled tradesman who understand high-performance building.

After initial skepticism, Beth has built up a portfolio of Zoom memoir classes. It’s not the same, it’s not a one for one substitute, but it works. Beth’s new dog, and my new favorite, Luna, has, against all odds, performed magnificently. Think about it: within two weeks of coming home with Beth, Beth broke her wrist, limiting how much work they could do together to acclimate. Then the lockdown. Luna hasn’t missed a beat. Thank you Seeing Eye!

I can say without question that this year’s hardships have deepened friendships, as well as the love we feel for friends and family.

Perhaps best of all, this news: Red wine and cheese help fight dementia. I’m not making this up.

Everything in moderation. Well, most of the time.

From a Science Daily summary of the research:

1. Cheese, by far, was shown to be the most protective food against age-related cognitive problems, even late into life;
2. The daily consumption of alcohol, particularly red wine, was related to improvements in cognitive function;
3. Weekly consumption of lamb, but not other red meats, was shown to improve long-term cognitive prowess; and
4. Excessive consumption of salt is bad, but only individuals already at risk for Alzheimer’s Disease may need to watch their intake to avoid cognitive problems over time.

So on January 20, there’ll be red wine, there’ll be cheese, and they’ll be lamb chops. Can’t come soon enough.

I am pleased to introduce Mel Washburn as our Saturdays with Seniors guest blogger today. Mel grew up in Kentucky in the 1950s and graduated from Wabash College in Crawfordsville, Indiana, where he met his wife Pam. He worked as a firefighter/paramedic in Wisconsin for ten years, taught English in various Midwestern colleges, graduated from law school, and then settled in Chicago.

My assignment asking writers to describe where they were fifty years ago prompted Mel to come up with this wonderful piece starring their bulldog Ambrose and their daughter Kristen.

Half a Century Ago

by Mel Washburn

Kristen the gingerbread eater.

In December 1970 Pam and I were living at the corner of 61st and Ingleside, which is one block south of the University of Chicago campus. Our apartment was a third-floor walkup in a decrepit old building. The windows were so loose that during the winter a border of ice collected inside on the windowsill. The washing machines in the basement were always coated with coal dust. Because we were south of the campus, cabs wouldn’t come to our address and the Hyde Park Co-op wouldn’t deliver food there.

Our car was a 1961 Chevy Bel Air that we’d bought third-hand from our friends, the Waggoners. During the two summers before we bought it, they had driven it to Mexico where John, an anthropologist, was doing field work in Yucatan.

Those trips had been rough on the car. It was scarred with bumps and dents and rust. And the clutch was very sensitive. If you didn’t feather it exactly right, it would stall on you.

One evening shortly after we moved into our apartment, Pam and I were sitting in our front room when we heard the whine and chug of a car starting up, then dying, starting up, then dying. I said to Pam, “Sounds like he has the same problem we have.” After half a beat, we both went to the window and looked down at the street.

Someone was trying to steal our car, but it died each time he tried to pull away from the curb.

At the time we owned a bulldog named Ambrose. I shouted out the window at the young man in our car and went running down the stairs. Pam was right behind me with Ambrose. As soon as we came out the front door, the young man jumped out of the car and ran away.

A few weeks later, we sent Ambrose to live with Pam’s sister in Indiana. City life simply did not suit him. Nevertheless, his aura continued to protect our home. For example, in the months after Ambrose’s departure, every apartment on our stairwell was burglarized — every apartment except ours.

Amidst these hazards, we were very happy. My schoolwork was going well. I’d been given a full scholarship and was teaching in the college as a “Danforth Tutor.” Pam worked part-time in the library at the medical school. Our daughter Kristen was healthy and happy, the joy of our lives. Pam and I took turns cooking dinner and doing the laundry. In the evenings we read The Complete Sherlock Holmes in six paperback volumes.

In December 1970, Kristen was a year and a half old. We put up a small Christmas tree. Pam baked gingerbread men and women, which we hung on the tree. Soon some of the gingerbread people were missing their feet. Then their legs. Then their hands. And arms. Some small person was snacking on them.

We never said a word to her about it. To this day, it’s our dearest Christmas memory.

Mel and his wife Pam now live in a 1920s high rise in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood. Kristen lives with her family in Berkeley, California.

Today’s guest blogger, Cynthia Jones.

I am pleased to introduce Cynthia Jones as our Saturdays with Seniors guest blogger today. After a long career in nursing and social work, Cynthia officially retired in 2013 and, until this past March, had been working part-time at City of Chicago senior centers and a residential facility for people with chronic mental illness. With so many Americans wondering how on earth they’ll celebrate the holidays without big gatherings this year, it was refreshing to hear from a caregiver who never liked big family parties in the first place – here’s Cynthia’s 2020 holiday essay:

by Cynthia Jones

I’ve never liked Thanksgiving. Actually, I’m not a big fan of holidays. As a kid, Thanksgiving meant having to dress up in “church” clothes and sit at dinner and be seen and not heard with a bunch of adults who ignored me after a few inane comments about how big I was getting.

They talked of weird things like who died or had surgery, the high cost of everything, the evils of Russia and communism and reminisced about the glory days of WWI and II.

As I got older, younger cousins joined the family. I was expected to sit at the “kids table” with them, cut up their food, clean up anything spilled, and entertain them so they wouldn’t interrupt the fascinating conversation the adults were having.

As a teen and young adult, I longed to spend the holiday with my friends, but they, too, were condemned to spend the day with older and younger relatives who we felt superior to. As a single young adult, I was tasked with driving three elderly grandparents to the dinner. This wouldn’t have been such an aggravation if they hadn’t started asking when I would be taking them home a half hour after we had arrived.

After I started working as a nurse, I discovered an awesome fringe benefit of the job: someone had to work on Thanksgiving!! I was always the first to volunteer. I felt so righteous telling my mom or grandmother, whoever was hosting dinner, how sorry I was to miss the family celebration. “Oh, you know,” I’d say with a sigh. “The patients in the ER need me.” How could they argue with that?

After I had a family of my own, I continued to work on Thanksgiving. That way I could be off on Christmas. It felt deliciously irreverent to order pizza or binge on White Castle sliders with my husband and children after working my Thanksgiving shift.

As years went by, I moved from working in hospitals to social service agencies and often had the day off. By this time my mother was widowed and said she could no longer entertain a large group.

So I became the reluctant Thanksgiving hostess for the extended family. I found I actually enjoyed the cooking — it kept me from having to participate in the same recurring conversation about the evils of communism and glory of World Wars.

As my kids became teens and young adults, I vowed not to make them hate Thanksgiving as I had. I encouraged them to invite friends for dinner, or leave to be with friends right after the meal. Having a different group each year was so enjoyable that I started inviting random friends myself.

With my children married now, sharing the holiday in recent years with in-laws has been fun…and interesting. This year, with COVID-19 rampant and dire warnings about holiday gatherings being super spreader events, my daughter and I cooked a big dinner together with the help of my three-year-old granddaughter. The only other guest? My son in law. It was an amazing day.

In the midst of despair and divisiveness, there’s one thing we can agree on: the COVID vaccines represent a remarkable accomplishment. Like every medical/technical achievement, the vaccines were enabled by earlier breakthroughs. Moderna’s, for example, relied on a new messenger RNA technique. Expect advances to keep coming. For example, using CRISPR technology, a COVID test that uses a cell phone camera to detect COVID and produce a result with 30 minutes.

As remarkably fast as it’s all coming, it all can’t come fast enough. Meantime, I’m hearing and reading one thing again and again from the health experts I’ve come to trust: As tempting as it is, we better not let our guard down. (Any more than we unfortunately have already.)

Let’s be safe nerds.

It’s going to be dicey as more and more of us start thinking about venturing out and into indoor spaces. I don’t know that there’s going to be a “coast clear” announcement that we can trust.

As part of my work at PHIUS (Passive House Institute US), I did come across some information that may help people decide whether a space they’re in is safe.  Buildings that meet our performance standard employ constant, low level ventilation. Equal amounts of air exit and enter at the same rate, constantly. There is no kicking on and off. Ingeniously, the exhaust air and intake air pass by a heat exchanger without mixing, allowing the outdoor air to scavenge heat energy from the exhaust air.

That ventilation is a good way to prevent COVID loads amassing to dangerous levels. During a recent webinar for our constituents, a manufacturer rep from a ventilation equipment company showed a way, if and when the time comes when people must or want to be indoors at establishments, to determine if the space is safe.

You need a carbon dioxide meter (not a carbon monoxide detector). It works like this: CO2 is a kind of proxy for COVID build up. The greater the CO2 level in a room, the worse the ventilation. That CO2 is the product of people breathing, and so, if there are lots of CO2 particles in a space, then there are lots of other particles that are products of breathing.  I’ve done some research and the following guidelines seem very solid.

• Outdoor air has 400 ppm (parts per millions) CO2 levels
• A well-ventilated room will have 800 ppm or less.
• Anything more than 800? Run away.

I think well-ventilated businesses should install these things so people can assure themselves (or not) that it’s safe.

I’m hoping I find one under the tree this year, but I think I’ll be gifting it to myself.