By Teri Ong The Democrats in Congress and in the White House have promised us that we will have some sort of nationalized health care plan before the next congressional recess. I hope they have over-estimated their ability to pull off such a feat because it will mean nothing but trouble down the line if they get their way. How can there not be trouble? The demand for care is only limited by the number of people on our soil, but the supply is greatly limited by the number of caregivers available, and severely limited by the amount of money […]

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Introduction Those of you who are reading this (and who undoubtedly are few in number), I admire you for your patience, perseverance, and love. Without those qualities, it is unlikely you would have stuck with me through three extensive periods of time in one single year in which my blog has been “down” for weeks at a time. My site has been hacked and ruined three times, but we have now moved to a new provider who has assured us that security for my site will be much improved. Time will tell. Nonetheless– I thank you for your readership and […]

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by Teri Ong A poignant movie scene that never fails to choke me up to some extent is the scene in Chariots of Fire where the head master of a college in Cambridge is welcoming new students. He references a memorial on the wall behind him listing the names of all of the students from that college who were lost in World War I. He says it represents the “loss of a generation.” I think it affects me more than it might some others because I, too, am a teacher who has now seen numerous classes come and go. I […]

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by Teri Ong Physiologists tell us that the sense of smell is more acute and memory of particular scents more long lasting than other sensory input in humans. In a metaphoric sense, we ascribe a “scent” to aspects of our life. When things are good we may say that things are “rosy” or “sweet”. If someone comes out of a difficult circumstance in a positive way, we say they “came out smelling like a rose.” But when things are not good we are likely to say, “That stinks!” There are a lot of things in life that are necessary, but […]

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