Before my junior year in high school, I returned from a Boy Scout canoeing trip to discover my sister had been killed in a car crash. I will never forget the sadness of the moment when I walked into the house that was filled with what seemed like half the caring and wonderful town of DeSmet to find my mom and dad there grieving. It was near the end of that summer, but the beginning of a long period of mourning for my family and me.

Four years ago this month, our home of Nebraska experienced a uniquely challenging natural disaster. A severe winter storm, a bomb cyclone, caused historic levels of flooding from Nebraska rivers, resulting in the tragic loss of life as well as destruction to homes, businesses, infrastructure, and farmland.

2/24/23-7:40 a.m. Oxford, NE: Deputies are investigating a report of abuse of a vulnerable adult in Oxford.

My colleagues and I on the Senate Agriculture Committee have already begun working on the 2023 Farm Bill, a package of critical agriculture legislation passed only once every five years. Those of us on the Agriculture Committee often agree on many aspects of the Farm Bill, and one of the most popular solutions we hope to implement this year is an increase in the accessibility of precision agriculture technologies.

They say curiosity killed the cat, but for me, I’m not so sure. With family in southeast Nebraska, boards that I serve on and activities that I cover almost constantly in Lincoln in Omaha, I spend a lot of time driving down I80 between York and Lincoln as well as Highway 81 from York down to Bruning. For all those trips - I’ve probably driven on these roads no less than 20 times in the past year - it’s unfashionable how often I witness a truly strange sight.

After 40 years as a doctor interacting with patients, in the last two and a half years the tables turned, and I’ve become the patient. Although most are good, I’ve found some doctors are detached, some are too quick, some would rather be somewhere else, some are even angry; but, when a physician who cares walks into the room, and I’m not exaggerating, the day becomes better, the pain becomes less, and hope fills my heart. Scientific knowledge is important, but the ability to convey honest concern, human thoughtfulness and compassion is equal in importance in this healing profession. So, how do we select premed students for that, or teach compassion in medical school?

When in life does one come to confront the tough truth that each of us will eventually die? In my years as an internist caring for young and old alike, some people understand this early, and some people never get it. In denying death, we intensify our fear of it. Usually, however, it is sometime during their 50s that people first look into the eyes of death. Put it off as we may, the hard certainty is that we are all aging and one day an end will come. Shakespeare described advanced age in his play As You Like It, Act II, Scene VII (All the world’s a stage):

This weekend, I had the opportunity to visit our southern border and see firsthand the chaos occurring there. Our trip to the Rio Grande Valley reaffi rmed that what is going on at our border is nothing short of a national security crisis. The Biden administration’s reckless disregard for border security has turned every state — including Nebraska — into a border state.

This week the Supreme Court heard arguments on Biden v. Nebraska and U.S. Department of Education v. Brown, two challenges to the Biden administration’s student debt cancellation proposal. The administration’s debt cancellation scam is just one example of a pattern of irresponsible economic policies that have resulted in ongoing inflation, exacerbated workforce woes, and increased financial hardship hitting American households. In our Commitment to America agenda, House Republicans made a promise to deliver a government that is accountable to taxpayers. To do this, we must conduct stringent oversight, stop reckless policymaking, and move forward proposals that will get our country back on track.

Southwest Nebraska Public Health Department (SWNPHD) will be offering Vaccines for Children at public clinics in March. Anyone two months of age and older are invited to get their vaccinations.