Institutions, or where's Jose'?

More than a century ago, the French social scientist Emil Durkheim viewed social institutions as inextricably linked and interdependent, like the organs of higher order living creatures.  It's obvious that we are now in at least the early stages of multiple organ failure.

Our institutions are failing us.

Among them are the family, education, religion, government and politics, economic institutions, health care systems, legal and judicial systems, media and communication, art and culture, activist private humanitarian and environmental organizations, financial institutions, social welfare systems, and public administration and bureaucracy.

As the poet Yeats wrote, "The center cannot hold."

We've just been through the dog days of summer. Clearing our heads is a seasonal luxury.

For most of us, the pace of life slowed down, as we hoped to recharge the batteries of our depleted psyches. 

The yawn of neurasthenia: a drab, romantic hangover.

This summer was a time to take stock as the burnt scent of Canadian wildfire ash alighted on our tongues. I sat in my garden directly below the branch of a tree just as a loose-stooled bird relieved itself.

This was not the year for cicadas. They're not due for another 14 years.  Their record of appearing on time puts that of the MTA to shame.

Reflecting on the failure of our social institutions is not a fit activity for the dog days of summer. It's never productive anyway, except for spawning pseudo-rebellions that fizzle out.

Our social institutions are corroded. Our faith in them has gangrene. But never mind. We still have Hellman's mayonnaise, Golden Blossom honey, Gulden's mustard and Heinz ketchup to define our brand as a civilization.

Our traditional American "institutions" have become little more than the intellectual property of "American exceptionalism" and a knockoff of its original designer specs.  What defines us now is how we treat each other in the ordinary encounters of everyday life, such as with neighbors, merchants and strangers in distress.

No matter the regime or what movements and trends appear to be sweeping the nation, the only reliable clues to the condition and prospects of our country are those revealed in compilations of evidence driven by our personal experiences. 

Here are a few picayune, yet momentous anecdotes this summer that were transitory yet in aggregate, left me with a bitter taste. "Bitter taste" has taken its place among the summary American "institutions."

The demise of equanimity has not been a "death by a thousand cuts," but chagrin by a thousand encounters. First, a little surprise from my car insurance company.

I got a letter stating that I must bear the (exorbitant) cost of insurance for a relative of mine, who their records indicated lived under my roof.  I explained that the person lives elsewhere but uses my address because of rampant mail theft in his nearby community.

Besides, that person is over 21 of sound mind, and responsible for his own debts and liabilities.

And that individual does not even have a driver's license, never had one, and is not in the process of applying for one. You'd think this would be sufficient to make the matter go away immediately.

Not so. 

My agent had to repeatedly contact the "underwriter," who refuses to interact directly with policyholders. After around a week, common sense and the law prevailed.

I'm a well-oiled squeaky wheel, but many folks don't have the time and patience to field these fastballs of bureaucratic incompetence that private industry and the government pitch at us in a game that never ends. It wears one down, like walking around a low-grade fever.

To his credit, my agent was sympathetic and efficient, but he had no choice but to cite and heed the corporate playbook.

When it rains, it pours. And this summer was a torrent of annoying reminders of how things have broken down.

For more than a decade, I've been a patient of a reputable medical provider.  Never got a bill.

When there was a disparity between the insurer's allowed charge and the provider's fee, it was sorted out between them. Occasionally I'd ask, just to make sure, and was told that all was in order and to relax. 

Then one sticky morning in late August, I airlifted a slug off my mailbox slot and removed a Manila envelope that was thicker than the Report On The Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election. It was dozens of pages with swarms of unverifiable or indecipherable data, all related to alleged services provided during 2021, and my implied responsibility for reconciling the demands of the greedy provider and the pig-headed insurer.

When I brought it to the attention of the provider, they basically told me to get lost.  Another "institution" down the sewer: even a pretense of dutifulness, fairness and empathy, especially in the corporatized practice of medicine.

Institutions are slow to evolve, but quick to succumb, even as they cling, sometimes pathetically, to shared national identity.  As for America, they would have us believe the sky is falling down as the people are rising up. 

But there's still Senator John Fetterman.

Our most cherished institutions are no longer those that grew out of the U.S. Constitution, but rather out of simple habits and consumptions of mundane Americans.

For generations, there was no more trusted institution among motorists than the American Automobile Association (AAA).  But for me, that hit the skids when, during the same week as the other dog-day fiascos, I called them for emergency road service after my car radiator ruptured.

Triple A's level of service has reached rock bottom, although they still proudly recommend themselves. When they vaunt their reliability, they taunt their customers who depend on it. 

This country is around 3.8 million square miles and includes some extreme habitats, from snows on mountain peaks to forbidding desert basins.

I figured my emergency call would be a pretty quick dispatch: the weather was perfect, the traffic was light, it was midday, and I was on the service road of an expressway in an outer borough. Although I was blocking two driveways and a fire hydrant, I figured the tow truck would be on the scene soon enough. 

It took 3 ½ hours.  I needed to call them around a dozen times to give them the same information and to receive the same false assurances.

Almost three hours after I was told my call would be "prioritized," I got a text message from "Jose" stating that he was at my vehicle.

He was not.

I phoned for the umpteenth time and was told that they had contacted Jose and been told that he had sent the text by mistake but would be there in 7 minutes. 

It's been several weeks, and he still hasn't shown up.

AAA would not take the rap for the ordeal they caused. There was silence on the phone. I assume they were shrugging their shoulders and giving me the finger.

Perhaps Jose was on the job, hooking up a UFO swallowed up in an extraterrestrial sinkhole.

Nearing 3 ½ hours after my initial call, an AAA tow operator phoned me wanting to know where I was. He had the wrong address, though I had provided it five times already. No exaggeration. 

Although by this time, my blood pressure was higher than the International Space Station, but AAA rejected my request for an apology or at least an explanation.

The only bright side of this year's "dog days of summer" was when an oral surgeon agreed to treat a virulent infection and perform an extraction, partially by a bartering arrangement in lieu of payment, on an uninsured friend of mine.

Such "random acts of kindness" might be an institution in heaven, but when I recounted it to a skeptical colleague, he said, maybe tongue-in-cheek, "He must be crazy. He should be institutionalized!"