Robert M. Hutchins, an educational philosopher, dean of Yale Law School, president and chancellor of the University of Chicago, once said, “Whenever I feel like exercise, I lie down until the feeling passes.” Many of us, including me, think like that and for years I managed to avoid exercise other than walking to and from my car every day. But at some stage common sense prevailed and I joined a gym. Now I use a treadmill 2 or 3 times a week. The gym is careful – they want to be sure that their users are healthy and that no collapses or other events will darken their springy floor mats. They insist that each client brings a doctor’s certificate every year stating that the client is able to exercise.

When I received this demand from the gym, I went to my doctor and asked for the certificate. I’m his patient, he knows me, right? Not so. He sent me to a sports center for a stress test. I made it through that and paid the fee, which raised my blood pressure, and took the results back to my doctor. This time I got lot’s of Hmms and Hah’s and an instruction to visit a cardiologist, no doubt to read the ECG which the doctor didn’t understand.

Today I visited the cardiologist. It was impressive. Another stress test, an “Echo” which turned out to be an ultra-sound of the heart administered by a gorgeous technician with blue eyes and soft sexy voice. She got my heart racing all right! I waited while the results went to the doctor for analysis and then I was called in again.

“There’s not much wrong with you,” he said. Did I detect a note of disappointment? “Your heart misses a beat from time to time. It’s called Arrhythmia – go back to the gym. About our account, do you have health insurance?” I shook my head. Now there was a note of disappointment all right – I could read it all over his face. “Your account is just over $2,000. How would you like to pay this?”

I’m paying off at $100 a month. It’s going to take 20 months and it’s going to hurt like all these “small” monthly payments that add up. I could have bought health insurance for this amount and had all this testing for free! All I actually wanted to do was to continue going to the gym! Don’t wait like me – buy health insurance today!