Judith Warner over at the NY Times Opinionator blog is musing today about a section of the embattled health care reform bill that has the National Organization of Woman all atwitter: a so-called Bo-Tax.

This proposal would levy a 5 percent tax on cosmetic surgery procedures, which, at last count, are still sought by women more than men. NOW’s argument is ridiculous, IMHO, and completely against what feminism once stood for. (Remember, girls? We didn’t want to be judged by the size of our bras but the size of our brains? Ah, those were the days.) Then again, feminism has morphed in the past decades, so much so that young college women now translate it to mean they should sleep around with as many young men as possible to prove they’re as good as men. We have a sleaze-factor in the women’s movement that should make true feminists cringe, but instead, you have the movement’s leaders focusing on access to abortion and now, access to cosmetic surgery at the lowest possible price.

“Now they are going to put a tax on middle-aged women in a society that devalues them for being middle-aged?” NOW Prez Terry O’Neill whined to the Times a few days ago.

Please. Our society may devalue women (and men) as we age, but that doesn’t mean we should all flock to the surgeon to remake ourselves and not expect to pay for it. We’re not talking fixing cleft palates here or dental problems or any number of necessary procedures that can help people to live better lives. We’re talking feeding into an obsession with youth and vanity that should have been nipped in the bud a long time ago.

Fact #1, we’ve got an aging, burgeoning population. Fact #2, we have a limited amount of money. Fact #3, we’ve got lots of poor people who can’t afford basic health care. Fact #4, getting a breast lift or a face lift or a butt lift is less important than helping subsidize health care, like immunizations and antibiotics for people who can’t afford it.

I admit I’ve been terrified since being laid off that I won’t get hired once I finish my teacher prep program. In a glutted job market, employers have the pick of the crop. Maybe principals will prefer a 25 year old to a 50 year old. I’ve thought, “Good gravy, I’ll have to find the magic ‘look younger’ formula and find it fast.” There’s evidence that there is age-discrimination out there in the dog-eat-dog world of un- and under-employment and, when push comes to shove, would I be willing to pay $2,000 for a painful procedure if it made me look 10 years younger and thus, put me in the “employable” range during an interview? I hope I can get a job on my brains, not my face.

But maybe brains won’t be enough. Last year, a woman wrote an anonymous blog post about how she got Botox because she’d been passed over for a full-time professor job at a community college numerous times, even though she’d had years of experience as an adjunct with great references and reviews. After she got the Botox, she once again applied for a full-time job and … she landed it. Also of note in that blog – a statistic revealing that about 40 percent of all men over 50 have gotten Botox injections, so fearful are they of not getting jobs.

So, yeah, our society sucks in its view of the “older worker” (off to Walmart greeter land to you, we say!), and maybe we’ll have to play that game to get a job. But if we do, we should pay for it, even if it is taxed. Face it, it ain’t the poor women who can afford this, so a five percent levy isn’t as “discriminatory” as NOW is alleging. And the more important effort would be in raising the cache of all “older” workers instead of buying into the Demi Moore method of “remaking” our bodies as well as focusing on getting the most vulnerable among us the health care that is actually needed.

The New York Times has a really cool interactive graphic that allows visitors to plug in various metrics about themselves to see where they fit in the “how do people spend their time” spectrum. It isn’t current – the data is from 2008 – but it is still quite interesting and I’m thinking the percentages are probably close to the same, year to year. Note to all members of that special group known as “former journalists” – there’s a section for “unemployed.” Check it out here. But expect to lose a little time while you examine how you spend that precious commodity.

These past few days have been a reality check about life in unemployment and that reality has threatened to overturn what little progress I’ve made in increasing my happiness quotient.

But I’m pleased to report that, using some of the techniques in “The How of Happiness” and sticking with my happiness resolution/commandment to “look for the good” I’ve successfully fought off (most days) the negative feelings that push in on folks who are either depressed or unemployed or, most likely, depressed about being unemployed! I have slipped a little, but I haven’t fallen, proving, IMHO, that one can become happier with some effort. (As we from Texas say when someone has a revelation like this, “Well, spit in the fire and call the dogs!” I don’t know why we say it, and I’m not even sure what it means, but it makes you smile.)

Our dogs in front of the fireplace, which has not been spit in.

It all started when I looked at our checking account online and discovered that we had not one, but two, overdrafts. Potential happiness killer. Luckily, we have 1) overdraft protection and 2) a savings account with money in it to cover the overdrafts, a fact I keep reminding myself of in an attempt to remain calm in the face of panic. (Score one for practicing happiness.)

However, it was still a shock. The last time we had an overdraft was about 15 years ago.That’s because for the past 15 years we’ve had the semblance of two incomes. For two-thirds of that time the second income was from part-time freelance work, but it was steady and covered all the extras (vacations, fun stuff for the kids, Christmas gifts, occasional golf for my husband or manicures for me) while my husband’s income covered necessities such as keeping a roof over our head and getting a college fund started for the four kids and repairing our ancient van – over and over and over again.

But prior to the Tucson Citizen newspaper closure, we were spoiled rotten because for two years we lived in nothing short of income heaven. (Can you hear the angelic choirs?) Not only could we pay the bills, deal with our part of the college expenses, cover random medical expenses and car repairs, we were able to sock away a good chunk for emergencies. And, best of all, we could, for the first time in 27 years of marriage, go out to dinner if we didn’t feel like cooking or splurge on day-trips with one or more of our kids during their visits home. We didn’t have to worry about spending because we had money coming in every week, not just every other week with my husband’s salary. This was steady money. Good money. Extra money. (more…)