It’s that time of year when the air feels crisp, when holiday lights adorn homes, and when presents are exchanged between family and friends. And that can only mean one thing: It’s time to shop for a 2026 health insurance plan whose monthly premiums won’t bankrupt me. Since I’m not quite old enough for Medicare coverage, health insurance falls to me to sort out. Luckily, I have a smart, well-informed insurance broker, who, for the past three years, has expertly guided me through the labyrinthine, Kafkaesque world of insurance plans, premiums, deductibles, and copays.

With my current insurance premiums threatening to triple—perhaps quadruple—in price, I needed to find a less expensive option for the new year. What my broker and I eventually settled on was a plan that won’t offer much in terms of preventative care, but will grudgingly step in to cover treatment if I’m mauled by a turtle or accidentally inhale an earring. Stuff happens. With my new plan’s high deductible and many caveats, I’m investing in a bubble wrap wardrobe and rerouting my local driving from highways to low-speed backroads. I guess it’s a sign of my advancing age, but the themes of my nightmares have shifted from ghosts and ghouls to the horror of being rendered unconscious in an accident and waking up in an out-of-network hospital. I do have a small surgery coming up in January, which, alas, is after the new health insurance kicks in. Can’t wait to see that bill. I had cataract surgery a few years ago, and now my left eye has developed a cloudy covering that makes it seem as though I’m looking through a heavy veil. It’s annoying and makes night driving a real adventure.

And it’s irritating that the very expensive artificial lens I had implanted two years ago apparently didn’t come with a warranty. So, my crummy insurance and I are on the hook for the cost to get ole leftie fixed.

The holidays went fairly smoothly this year—maybe because I got my holiday shopping and cards done so early. Since Mom and Dad don’t drive, my holiday gift buying includes purchasing everything I’m giving to family members as well as purchasing everything my parents plan to give. Hubby is kind of clueless about gift buying, so if gifts are going to magically appear under the tree, it’s on me. Hubby will, thankfully, chauffeur me to and from stores, which means I don’t have to drive with my dodgy left eye. So, he’s doing his part to keep me and the world safer.

Just after Thanksgiving, I asked all our nieces and nephews to share their holiday wish lists. The results were a fascinating microcosm of birth order psychology. That’s the theory that a child’s position in the family influences their personality, with firstborns being considered more responsible, middle children deemed attention seekers, and youngest children thought of as charmingly social and thriving on humor.

Whilst the legitimacy of this theory has been debated for years, my nieces and nephews seemed to be playing their birth-order roles expertly. All of the firstborn “kids” (the eldest is nearly 30) provided detailed lists with links to the things they wanted. One niece used an online wish-list guide, so that we could buy items through her list, which would then automatically mark the gift as “purchased.” She also included such helpful info as preferred sizes and colors, making it all super easy. The more laidback younger-borns weren’t quite as detailed. After I made several pleas for gift ideas, one sent a text with the following words: “Camo sweats, sweatshirts and eyelashes.” And that was as much as we were going to get—no sizes, no colors, no helpful links. I’m sure she and her thumbs were exhausted after sending that text and needed a lie-down.

Another niece just kept saying, “I don’t know; I just buy whatever I need when I need it.” Even my pitiful begging for the tiniest crumb of an idea wouldn’t budge her. Okay, sweetie, coal it is.

I am looking forward to a fairly quiet post-holiday January. And then I just gotta make it to the end of the year without any major injuries or illnesses. Fingers crossed.