I saw Bob the Woodsman over the weekend. He is not doing well.

Bob is a logger and handyman who was going to fell trees on my land to sell as firewood. He never got around to it last year, and the idea has more or less faded amid all the excitement about the new well dug at the camp by Kevin the Well Digger.

Anyway, I saw Bob and in answer to my softball question - "How are you?" - he reported that he has a bad ticker. Irregular rhythm of the heart, which can be serious. The number of beats per minute drops so low that he almost falls asleep.

He does not have health insurance, and two days in the hospital for tests and treatment has cost about $10,000, he said.

"A self-employed working man can't afford $500 or $600 a month for insurance," he said. "But with the bills I just ran up, it will take me years to pay.

"The doctors don't know exactly what is wrong with me. But now they don't want to see me again, because I don't have insurance. I don't know what's going to happen."

Bob, about 50, has lived a "full" life. He was a real drinker until about a decade ago when he was finally able to quit, he said. He's always been a smoker.

In the last year, his wrists have been bound up as he fights carpal-tunnel syndome. That's probably why he didn't get going on my lumber project.

With a bad heart and hands that don't function very well, he's not doing much working at all.

Among other things, this is where the rubber meets the road in healthcare. We keep reading about uninsured Mainers, and here is one.

I don't know his finances, but it sounds like he could be facing a ruinous situation - getting behind on bills, unable to work and now facing a cardiac condition that could be made worse by stress.

Your Scribe is not an expert on state-supported health care, such as the Dirigo program. (I do know that a similar program failed miserably in Tennessee, and now Massachusetts is confronting unexpected complexity in putting its "mandatory" health insurance system into play).

Bob the Woodsman, a very hardworking and terrific guy, is up against the wall because the bills are mounting and his ability to work in the woods is diminishing. I hope he finds a solution to this potentially ruinous dilemma.

E-mail this entry to a friend