Federal Disability Retirement: The Silence of Cemeteries

Whatever your theological foundations, the cemetery is a reminder that we return to the earth from which we came.  And the visitors to that place called “a cemetery” — the evocation of memories, of lives once shared, of a conversation and a soliloquy with those who have gone; it is a place of comfort whether you believe in the afterlife, of spirits and ghosts, or of nothing at all.

Sometimes, in the rural lands we pass so quickly by, you can see the old family cemetery lost in the overgrown weeds and woods of timeless echoes; or where new developments have cast them into roadside byproducts overshadowed by buildings and new houses; and where once they held a prominence in people’s lives, cemeteries have become vestiges of a world now too modern to notice.

It is well that cemeteries remain silent; for, if they were to speak, even in a whisper of barely audible voices, they would tell you of past regrets, and where time slipped away in foolish endeavors where people forgot about other people.  The silence of cemeteries betrays the agony of regrets throughout the long march of history’s cruelty.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal Service workers who suffer from a medical condition where the medical condition no longer allows you to continue in your career of choice, it is likely time that you considered your own health and well-being.  Preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application under the FERS system does not require that you are one step closer to the silence of cemeteries, but it does certainly remind you of your mortality and the health which is otherwise deteriorating.

Contact a FERS Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and consider whether or not the silence of cemeteries might not be a reminder that our own health is what we take for granted, too often.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
Lawyer exclusively representing Federal and Postal employees to secure their Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

 

Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) Disability Retirement: Paradigm Phases

Society generally has paradigm phases which everyone accepts without much thought: The baby/toddler phase, where feeding and thriving occurs; the early-to-late school years, where educational needs are met; the young adult phase, where further education and skills are acquired; the 20 – 30 phase, where independence is asserted, boundaries are tested, relationships are solidified and one’s “place” and “identity” within the community is developed.

Then, from there on, the cycle often begins anew: A family is started; middle-age sets in; careers become established; old age is on the horizon.  There are, of course, disruptions which can occur, where the paradigm phases of life must by necessity meet challenges, and we then have to shift and adapt.  Medical conditions are one of those “disruptors” — a circumstance which may arise at any time and interrupt the paradigm phases of life.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through OPM may be the “replacement phase” needed to modify the interrupted flow of the paradigm phases.

Contact an OPM Disability Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law under FERS and begin the process of getting back into the natural flow of those paradigm phases still to be enjoyed.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Lawyer

 

Federal Employment Disability Retirement: The Un-Factor

Why is it that the prefix, “Un”, often connotes and implies more than merely a negation of the root word?  It doesn’t merely give a negative or opposite meaning in adjectives, as well as their derivative adverbs, nouns, etc.

Look at words such as “unceremoniously” — such treatment doesn’t just mean that a person was treated in a fashion negating any ceremony; rather, it often implies that a person was mis-treated and ill-used, as in, “The individual was unceremoniously kicked out of the building, accompanied by security guards and other personnel.”  Or, how about the word, “unknown”?  Does it mean the opposite of “known”, as a mere negation of knowledge or comprehension?  Or, does it often have the added connotation of some mysterious, dark force that hides and conceals nefarious and evil intentions?

The Un-factor is a natural consequence of how we exaggerate and enhance the negative, and life often reflects that tendency — of a magnified fear of an opposite and an exponential exacerbation of the commonality of an otherwise normal event.  Medical conditions tend to do that — of becoming an “un” factor in that the undoing of one’s health begins to undermine the stability of one’s life. It begins to skewer a person’s balanced perspective by making the world around you unbalanced.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition begins to prevent the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, it is a good idea to consult with an OPM Disability Attorney to get the proper perspective, to receive a balanced opinion and get a legally sound opinion on whether or not Federal Disability Retirement is a viable option to the Un-Factor.  For, the unfairness of it all will only worsen if you remain uninformed in this unseen world of unfitting individuals in the uncharacteristic universe of Federal Disability Retirement, unless you unravel the un-factor.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement Benefits: Remakes

Some hate them and vow never to view or accept them in any way, being purists at heart and unable to fathom any possibility that improvement can be had upon an old classic; others — the opposite side of the coin — welcome anything new and will relish all updated versions where the old can be replaced by the new.  Still others remain in a somewhat “neutral” frame of mind: Acceptance in the form of saying to one’s self, “Well, any remake is merely a new and different movie; you can’t compare the two because they are different interpretations by different people.”  Or, perhaps a more moderated tonality: “Let’s just give it a chance.”

Can Jeff Bridges be any better than John Wayne as U.S. Marshal Rooster Cogburn?  Can any modern adaptation recapture the magic in Twin Peaks or improve upon its avant-garde approach?  Can there be a “better” Charlie than Diane Keaton in John le Carre’s The Little Drummer Girl — depicting the emotional turmoil of the Middle East conflict through the instability and confusion of a single person?

Modernity thinks that all previous generations have been lacking in something; perhaps it is just arrogance to think that a “remake” can be better than the original, or is it merely a lack of creativity because the “now” is unable to come up with its own original ideas, and therefore must rely upon that which has already been done once — or twice, or three times before — with an effort to “improve” upon it?

To some extent, it is an inevitability of life’s misgivings, and so we all have to “remake” ourselves at some point in our lives.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, the “remake” that must face is the one that is in real life: Medical conditions force one to remake one’s career, life choices and future plans.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits may not have been a “scene” in one’s life that was planned, but it has now become a necessity.  The movie reel within one’s life — the viewing of one’s future; how one sees one’s self; the “takes” that one shot of a career and a future — is forced to be remade when a medical condition hits one’s life.

Whether one wanted to or not, preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management becomes a necessity when a medical condition begins to prevent the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job.  It is like “remaking” one’s life.

Just remember, however, that like all remakes, it is important to have a good “director”, and seeking the counsel of a Federal Disability Retirement Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law is an important feature of the upcoming film adaptation and remake of the truest of moves: One’s Own Life.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Medical Retirement for Federal Employees: ‘For’ and ‘to’

Do we ever pick up on the subtleties of language’s intentionality, anymore?  Is there a difference with a distinction between the use of the prepositions ‘for’ as opposed to ‘to’?  And, even if intentionally and with deliberative meaning, one inserts one as opposed to the other, would the person for whom it is intended, or to whom it is addressed, catch the difference, or would he or she merely respond as if there was never any difference at all?

Say the person began with one preposition but stopped mid-sentence and corrected it, inserting the ‘other’; would the correction be noticed at all, and even if it was, would that make a difference?  Say, for instance, a person says to another, “I would like to show my appreciation to you,” as opposed to saying, “I would like to show my appreciation for you.”  Is there a difference?  Is there a subtle intentionality hidden – where the “to” is just slightly less personal than the “for”?

What if the person speaking does not believe in any differences between the two propositions – would that make a difference?  Or, conversely, what if the person speaking does know the difference, or believes he does, between the two, but the person being addressed does not; does that make a difference?  Is there, objectively, a difference between the two, and can it be identified, delineated, understood and explained?

When we say, for example, that X is giving a gift to Y – is that different from saying that X is giving a gift for Y?  Or that Sally has shown great empathy to Mary, as opposed to showing great empathy for Mary – can the subtle difference of intentionality be derived?

Language is a difficult tool to master, to begin with, and grammar was once the medium by which correctness of communication could be embraced.  Much of grammar has now been discarded, abandoned and forsaken, and with the detritus of residue left behind, the subtlety of language – both in its usage as well as in its reception – has been lost.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are considering filing a Federal Disability Retirement application through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, almost all of the encounters with the Federal agency responsible for review and determination on a Federal Disability Retirement application – i.e., the U.S. Office of Personnel Management – will be wrought through impersonal “paper” transactions – submission of the Standard Forms (e.g., SF 3112A, Applicant’s Statement of Disability) and medical narrative reports and treatment records, as well as any Legal Memorandum prepared to argue your case – will be through an impersonal communication via language known, language learned and language imparted.

Knowing the subtleties of language, and the correct approach, the context and content driven by legal precedents and argumentation are all an important part of the process of preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application.  It may not have to get into the minutiae of the differentiation of prepositions like ‘for’ and ‘to’, but there is enough complexity in the language of such a strange frontier as Federal Disability Retirement Law so as to justify hiring an attorney who specializes in such administrative legal conundrums, whether to obtain a successful outcome or for attainment of one.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Attorney Representation Federal Disability Retirement: Quiet

Is “quiet” the same as silence?  Or, of lack of noise?  Is it a state of mind-body consonance, where the body can remain calm and unmoving, yet the mind remains racing with thoughts, and in that state of being, do we fool ourselves to think that the outer world will not impact the inner mind?  Or, in reverse order?

Quiet is that which we strive for, in a world where din is the normalcy of life.  Can medical conditions that betray that which we strive for be understood by those who do not experience it?

Consider Tinnitus – that condition where there is a constant “sound”, whether of ringing, hissing or clanging that disrupts any consistency of a person’s striving for quiet, and this, despite everyone else in the “objective” world being quite oblivious to the “hearing” of such sounds.  Or, of the person who is deaf or progressively losing one’s acoustic acuity – can the rest of the world understand such a state of reality?

We assume, as we operate throughout the world on a daily basis, that because others appear to act in similar ways, that their inner beings and states of minds are similarly situated.  To “think alike” is to remain comfortable; and to attain “quiet” is not just to avoid the constant rush of living, but to reach a plateau where life is consistent, predictable and somewhat boring.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who experience the disquietude of a medical condition, where a combination of multiple factors come to the fore: Of a medical condition that prevents one from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal positional duties; of “noises” from one’s agency, supervisors and managers of deficiencies in performance, attendance or quota goals; of being placed upon a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP); of receiving a “warning” memorandum concerning one’s use of leave, whether Sick, Annual or LWOP; of harassment even when one has invoked FMLA rights; or of the step just prior to the last one – a proposed termination, then a termination; it may be time to prepare, formulate and file an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be ultimately submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

“Quiet” is not just a state of how things are in one’s home; one can lose that goal of quiet by bringing home the stresses of work’s harassment and adversarial environment, and it doesn’t have to be an actual medical condition such as Tinnitus or progressive deafness – although those may also be a qualifying basis upon which to file a Federal Disability Retirement application – but multiple other medical conditions, as well, that result in the disquiet of robbing one’s quiet.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Disability Retirement for Federal & Postal Employees: Clarity of purpose

It is always a burden when the passageway beyond is a mist of obscurity.  It helps to possess it, even in partial shades of inane generalizations; but lack of it, especially in youth, is neither a crime nor a blot of misdeeds upon one’s reputation so early in a life or career.  We have known them, whether as a “type” or an individual; that rarity of endangered species where the target-point of life is an unwavering straight line directly from birth to death (or at least for the moment when a career goal is sought).

Clarity of purpose is something one “ought” to have, but rarely manifested in the lives of ordinary people.  We talk of a nation’s “manifest destiny”, or of the importance of having some “foundation” in life; of faith, purpose and a desire or motivation to – what?  That is often the problem; not so much that we have no purpose in life, but that clarity of that essence is too often subverted by events unasked for and circumstances untold.

In W. Somerset Maugham’s novel, The Razor’s Edge, where Larry merely wants to “loaf” after his traumatic wartime experiences –  does lack of clarity of purpose as defined by conventional society evince a mere deviation of acceptable behavior, or constitute a complete violation and breach of man’s destined existence harkening from the residues of Puritanism and religiosity in general? (Note the comedic definition of Puritanism from H.L. Mencken:  “The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy”).

Modernity no longer believes in destiny, fate, or purposeful existence; and thus do we lack great figures, anymore – as Churchill who consistently defied death in war because of an inherent belief that he was destined for greater things, and thus the gods would not dare to undermine that predetermined fate of life.  Instead, the insidiousness of Darwinian belief – a foundation where reductionism to pure materialism and life lived by sensation, pleasure and tactile responsiveness:  these are the purposeful endeavors for us all.  It is, however, still a requirement that, in order to reach a destination of accomplishment, we “clarify” the “purpose” for which we engage to act.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal position, the need to define, refine and clarify such a purposive action is a crucial component in the successful formulation and filing of a Federal Disability Retirement application.

Wandering and meandering with merely a general sense of what needs to be done, like Larry Darrell’s search for meaning in Maugham’s masterpiece, will likely result in a denial by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.  There are legal statutes to consult; case-law that should be cited; and a streamlining of medical evidence in order to pinpoint, with circumscribed accuracy, the argument and methodology for approval of an OPM Disability Retirement application.

In sum, there needs to be a tactical and strategic clarity of purposive action throughout, in preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Medical Retirement from OPM: Dreams, daydreams and nightmares

Of the first in this triplet trope, the concept can envision two distinct avenues:  in a state of somnolence, to have them with minimal control of appearance; or, in another sense, to possess aspirations beyond one’s station in life or current circumstances that may impute dissatisfaction.

The second in the series is somewhat connected to the second concept branching from the first; it is a moment of reflective escape, where the reality of “now” and the encounter with Being is temporarily averted and subsumed in a meditative silence of self-repose.  Some have the capacity to embrace and become lost in such quietude of an alternate universe, despite a clutter of noises or the distraction of tumult.  Then, some would counter that it is precisely in such moments that fleeing into a parallel universe of a mental cocoon is necessary in order to maintain one’s sanity in a world replete with a curiosity shop full of random violence.

And, of the third, we again branch into a duality with the proverbial fork in the road; for, such infamy of uncontrolled images and voices while in a sleeping slumber constitutes the primary definition; but, whether in metaphorical terms or engaging in trifling hyperbole, we attribute traumatic and frightful events by describing it precisely by the term at hand.

Dreams, daydreams and nightmares are all part of our daily lives, whether awake, half-aware, conscious or sub-conscious in multiple and mysterious modalities of living; but they serve a purpose which, whether explained away by psychologists, therapists, pseudo-intellectuals or just plain people of tremendous insights and uncanny foresights, they continue to remain the foundation for maintaining the sanity preserved within the insanity of the greater universe.

Without nightmares, how would the inner psyche expiate the images and sense datum we have involuntarily ingested?  Without daydreams, what would man hope for, live for, in circumstances of squalor and decadence?  And of dreams, how would the subconscious sift through the visual and information overload experienced daily and in voluminous onslaughts of quantitatively overwhelming constructs?

Or of the second branch, where aspirations and hope for a better tomorrow, though derailed by screams of destitution and unhinged by crying babies, drunken realities and unsavory circumstances, yet to dream for a better tomorrow is sometimes the only thread which separates the crumbling heart from a tinge of a fading smile.  It is precisely these that allows for man to wake up the next morning and seek a better tomorrow.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who find themselves with shattered dreams, escaping into a greater cauldron of daydreaming, or rustling in sleepless fits of nightmares unavailing, all because one’s career is on the proverbial “line” resulting from a medical condition which may cut short one’s dreams, daydreams and creating a chaos of nightmares, preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, may be the first step in the aspirational discourse needed to regain one’s equilibrium.

The importance of trifurcating between dreams, daydreams and nightmares is a prescient step towards recognizing that the reality of one’s present circumstances may be described as a “nightmare”, and perhaps those sleepless nights are filled with them; but in order for the Federal or Postal employee to dream of a better tomorrow, the leisure of daydreaming must be allowed, but always tempered by pragmatic steps which must be undertaken in the reality of day-to-day living, in order to reach a specific goal:  That of getting an approval from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, in order to reach that light at the end of the proverbial tunnel, which is neither defined by dreams, nor attained by daydreaming, and certainly not a nightmare to avoid.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Federal Employee Disability Retirement: A traveler’s perspective

How is it that a tourist can see the same building which local people pass by every day, as something of an attraction worthy of encapsulating and embalming for posterity’s sake, with a click of the camera?  What is it about the eye of the traveler which is different from the staid repetitiveness of the citizen occupying for decades, centuries, and eons long forgotten, which challenges the uniqueness of stability and contrasts it as against the unwanted forces of change?

Like tectonic shifts, mass migrations armed with Smartphones and caravans of conscious interests move about like little mini-quakes barely discernible; Europeans fly to the New World; the Americans travel to Asia, Europe and beyond; then, at the end of it all, excepting those ex-patriots who are hounded for their untaxed outlays, everyone marches home to the warmth of intimacy and familiarity, where security of the known overrides the curiosity of the unseen.

Parables abound about the unwary one who enters into the strangeness of the foreign land; most reveal the welcoming hand of courtesy, hospitality and the receptiveness of presumed brevity.  Modernity defies such intercourse of comforting eyes; a seemingly abandoned piece of luggage no longer results in a frantic search for its owner, but a call to armed inspection and mechanical robots with detonation devices and close circuit monitoring to sniff out the contents of deadly emissions.

If doors can no longer welcome the weary traveler, what hope is there in mankind?  It was but for the door seen uniquely, the fountain forgotten of its historical eminence, the cornerstone marked for the brief encounter with revolution, and the lost etchings down voiceless corridors where the figure of foreign accents once dominated but where now the laughter of innocence peeks down dusty pathways of trodden sights that matter to each of us.

Where is that uniqueness of a traveler’s eye, when dangers thought to lurk in airports everywhere and bus stops no longer congregate with greetings to strangers and small tidbits of conversational reminiscences dot the quietude of breaths icily frozen in the morning mist of a cold winter’s day?  We have lost that capacity to welcome, that narrative of embracing, and instead have replaced it with the cynicism of modernity.

For the Federal employee or U.S. Postal worker who is contemplating filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management because of an ongoing medical condition, the feelings felt must be likened to that modern-day traveler who re-enters his own neighborhood, and finds the suspicion and decay insinuated by strange lands to have infiltrated and invaded one’s own place of abode.  For, it is the difference displayed by the medical condition which results in the treatment by coworkers, supervisors and the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service, to suddenly treat the neighbor next door as a suspicious traveler hitherto unknown or unfamiliar.

When that peculiar feeling grows in ponderous weights no longer tolerable, it is time to prepare, formulate and file an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset; for, in the end, a traveler’s perspective is no different than the Federal or Postal employee who must exit from one’s own career because the comfort of a once-familiar workplace has become a cauldron of fear and angst.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: The centrality of fringe

In whatever definition one wants to adopt, the meaning is clear:  It is that which is on the outer periphery, and not central to the essence recognized.  But what if the reversal occurs?  Can that even be imagined?  Can the fringe constitute a substantive centrality, and yet retain the stability of its essence?  And, once the mirror conversion occurs, does the identification remain as it was, or do we accept the fringe elements as the convention, and the formerly known staid components as outside the normative foundations of an acceptable core?   Can that which was once considered unacceptable, metamorphose over a sufficiently quantitative linear heritage to the extent that the bizarre can become the best and brightest?

In Darwinian evolutionary hypotheses, the concept of a sudden mutation occurring as a result of environmental pressures forcing an alteration for the benefit of the organism’s survival, is often rejected because, as a general rule, nature does not favor large-scale transformations, unless there is a concurrent catastrophic need arising with little time for adaptation.  Yes, in cultural transformations, where artifice of choosing may occur by the quiet assent of a silent majority, the fringe elements may dominate by sheer vocal exuberance in drowning out any meek protest by will of volume.

Most people want quiet lives uninterrupted by forced decay of choosing; the sheep follow in drones of silent consent, if only because each can see only the limited perspective of the backside inches before, and stoppage of movement would mean being accosted in the rear by another follower of mindless assent, where discomfort is the greater evil in comparison to refusing to take another step.

At what point does an insignificant minority take upon an appearance of greater dominance, where the cacophony of shrill voices exceeds the disproportionate echo of seamless quietude, and we simply give in because the comfort zone of silence is shattered by the discomfort of resistance?  Those threads which flow freely – the ones which give an added “touch” to a piece of clothing, the Persian rug or the shawl which warms; what distinguishes that from a frayed mind, a singed material where residue of ashen leftovers appear as dangling limbs from a cauldron of confusion?

At some point, each of us becomes mere fringe elements, despite our best attempts at remaining relevant.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition has cast the Federal or Postal employee into that pot of “otherness” because of an inability to perform one or more of the essential elements of the Federal or Postal job – it is time to do something about having been re-categorized as a “fringe” element.  Preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether the Federal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, may be the only way in which to cross back over into the essence of what it means to be central to the essence of life’s hope, and not allow others to castigate us into being the centrality of fringe, when that is not where you belong in the first place.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire