Say my name!

You can find my name in lots of places. Check out LinkedIn and you’ll find all the places I worked; pull up Substack or WordPress and you can find a list of all my blogs. Navigate to PubMed, and you can locate my name on scientific papers I have authored or co-authored. My name is even on plaques in public schools commemorating my service on School Boards and Referendum Committees.

But yesterday, I found my name somewhere I never expected it to be— as an answer to 67 Down on page 62 of Weekend Getaway Crosswords. The clue wasn’t straightforward or obvious (none of them are in this book.) There are probably lots of ways to answer “Rabble, for short” with four letters. But after solving that the Dixie Chicks and Destiny’s Child were TRIOS (this puzzle was originally published in 2004) and that “Two on a par four” was an EAGLE, I had the R and the A. But what were the next two letters?

And then it hit me. RAFF could be short for Riff-Raff. And what is Riff-Raff if not rabble?

I quickly went to work on 74 and 76 across, with the answers DEFILE and GOODFRAY (don’t ask) giving me the two Fs I needed to complete my namesake crossword puzzle answer. And after I had finished the puzzle, a check of the answer key confirmed that I was indeed the correct answer and had been enshrined in another media realm.

I recognize that it’s a small thing and that being called Riff-Raff is not the most complimentary thing. And I don’t know if RAFF or even LESTER has ever made it to the New York Times Sunday Crossword, the Mecca of all puzzles and puzzlers. But if it ever does, it will join my list of famous places, and it won’t fool me!

How a Crossword Puzzle Led Me to the Novels of Tana French

“____ French, Irish suspense writer (four letters).”

That was the crossword puzzle clue I came across three months ago. At first glance, I had no idea who the mystery writer was. I skipped over the clue, confident that when I filled in more spaces on the crossword, I would have the answer. And twenty minutes later, I was proved correct. Solving the adjacent across and down clues gave me the letters I needed to spell “Tana.” Although I had never heard of an author named Tana French, the answer key at the back of the puzzle book confirmed my findings.

The next day, while browsing through the fiction section at the local library, I pulled out a book titled The Searcher. And whether it was pure coincidence, serendipity, or synchronicity, the book’s author was my crossword puzzle solution, Tana French.

I checked the book, drove home, and dove into the world of Tana French. And I discovered that, unlike what I inferred from the crossword clue, she is not just a suspense or mystery writer; she is much more.

Her novels, mostly set in Dublin and its surroundings, do frequently contain deaths, often of a suspicious nature. There are numerous investigations, often featuring the Dublin police’s Murder Squad, or a retired Chicago cop named Cal Hooper (no word on whether he is a White Sox fan). But the themes that occupy at least two-thirds of each novel are about the nature of relationships, families, and the law. Even Broken Harbor’s Detective Michael Kennedy, who is proud of seeing everything as black or white with no shades of gray, is confronted by a situation in which right is inseparable from wrong, and justice is shaded by humanity.

I have now completed seven of French’s novels. Number eight is on my nightstand. It’s another Murder Squad book, but I know that the “who” and the “how” of the whodunit will be secondary to the “why” of the killer, and the inner workings of whichever detective pulls the assignment. That is the way Ms. French keeps us coming back for more.

And when I’m not reading her novels, I will keep doing those tricky crossword puzzles, always on the lookout for another writer to grab me via the clues and send me on another reading odyssey.

Who are your favorite authors? How do you choose new ones? Do you have a preferred genre? Let me know lesrraffblogger@myyahoo.com. Or leave your comments on Substack or Facebook. Feedback is always welcome.

The Day I Got Fired

Exactly twenty years ago, on a Friday afternoon toward the end of June, I drove into the city on a trek that would change my life.

I had been summoned to the office of the Chairman of my group—a mid-tier pathology group at a teaching hospital with aspirations but little prestige, in a city full of giants like Northwestern and the University of Chicago. The nature of the summons was to “discuss my future role with the group.” This was reasonable and welcomed, as the sleepy suburban hospital where I had been stationed for more than 20 years was undergoing a metamorphosis and no longer required an onsite pathologist.

My expectations, as I became ensnared in traffic on that very hot afternoon, were that my new role would involve working with some clinicians who were recruiting me and our group to establish an in-office laboratory, while also teaching pathology residents and covering the pathology service at the university hospital. It would be a change for me, but with the support of my pathology colleagues, I was confident the new venture would be successful. I was also looking forward to the challenge of teaching.

Going into the meeting, I was aware that not all members of our group were my allies. I had become a partner when my suburban hospital affiliated with the larger institution about 10 years earlier and was still seen by some as a less competent outsider. But what I expected to be a conversation about the future quickly turned into something else entirely.

“Your role with our group is no role. You are out.”

I refused the chairman’s proffered handshake and walked out of his office.

I returned home in the heat and the traffic to tell Barb that, for the first time in my life, I had been fired.

In the next few weeks of negotiations, I received permission to pursue the clinician group’s in-office laboratory. That group agreed to contract for my services, resulting in a 17-year, satisfying relationship that ended only with my retirement.

Today is another hot Friday at the end of June. The travels I am planning are to a round of golf and a poker game. Nothing as life-changing as that voyage 20 years ago—but looking back, I see that the drive that seemed like an ending was only a beginning. It was my metamorphosis, and it was my liberation.

I won’t believe that whatever will be will be.

When she was a youngster growing up in Skokie, Barb had two favorite movies. The first was “The Man Who Knew Too Much,” and the second was “On the Beach.”

“The Man Who Knew Too Much” was a 1956 film by Alfred Hitchcock starring Doris Day and Jimmy Stewart. It involved spies, kidnapping, and Ms. Day singing the Academy Award-winning song “Whatever Will Be, Will Be” (Que Sera, Sera). We watched it once together. It was dark, but the ending was happy.

“On the Beach” was a 1959 movie set in Melbourne, Australia. A nuclear conflagration extinguishes the world’s civilization. The Melbournians, far from the rest of the globe, wait for the nuclear fallout to reach them and end their existence. I’ve never seen it — maybe that’s why its sad, haunting premise stays with me.

Barb’s childhood favorite may seem like an old relic of Cold War anxiety, but today, it feels disturbingly current. “On the Beach” was on my mind this morning as I woke up and checked my phone for the latest news on the Israel-Iran conflict. I read projections and background reports, then turned on the TV to watch the talking heads pontificate and prognosticate. And I am scared.

I know (hope?) that the risk of a widespread nuclear war is low. But as the US military increases forces in the Middle East, is it time for schools or summer camps to bring back “duck and cover” drills, cold war relics we once laughed at? Does the Doomsday Clock, currently set at 89 minutes to midnight, need to be reset a few clicks closer to the apocalypse? Do we need to finally create a family emergency plan?

For the sake of my children and grandchildren, for the sake of all of us, I trust sane heads will prevail. We are too intelligent a species to make the tragic mistakes that would end us all. I refuse to believe that “whatever will be, will be.”

And I don’t want our generations to be the last ones standing on the beach.

But Now I Don’t Care as Much

I’ve written before about my dread of being late, an affliction known as “chronophobia.” Just the thought that I might be late for an appointment, a reservation, or a doctor’s visit makes my stomach roil and my knees shake. Genetically speaking, I’m not sure how I got it, but it’s something I’ve passed down to my daughter (she most definitely did not inherit it from Barb, who has perfect timing).

Despite my constant attempts to always be where I need to be when I need to be, the last month has had me on the edge of my timeliness parameters three times. Surprisingly, I survived every incident.

The first episode was on an evening when Barb and I were out to see the new Mission: Impossible flick. Good seats were sold out at our favorite theater, so we booked tickets at the Randhurst Mall in Mt. Prospect, a little beyond our normal movie zone. For a pre-theater dinner, we chose Northbrook’s Charlie Beinlich’s, our favorite hamburger shack.

We reached the restaurant parking lot confident that we had our timing just right. Unexpectedly, the service at Beinlich’s was slow that night. We wolfed down our burgers when they arrived (I brought my own gluten-free bun), threw our money on the table, and raced off, knowing we were impossibly late for the 7:15 showtime.

As Barb is apt to remind me, there are always lots of previews before a feature film starts, and more than a handful of ads, too. The 7:15 time was more of a suggestion than a deadline. But I knew we were running very late, and that if we missed any of the actual movie, we would struggle to follow the plot. With a mad dash through the parking lot, we made it into our seats just as the movie began. Notwithstanding our timing success, we still failed to follow the plot—was there one?—but Tom Cruise looked very cool wing walking on his biplane.

My second late shift this month was 100% my fault. I was scheduled to play pickleball with friends at 10:00 a.m., but was woolgathering at my computer. By the time I looked at my watch, it was 9:50. I sent a quick “Sorry, guys” group text and hit the road, flop sweat coating my face. I was fifteen minutes late, but the boys didn’t seem to mind. I even had one of my better days on the court.

Strike three for me was last Saturday. I planned on attending the No Kings rally in Buffalo Grove and left home in plenty of time. When I reached the designated corner, the crowd was surprisingly sparse. A friendly police officer on a bike rode up to us and let us know we were at the wrong location for the rally. I ran back to my car, shot out of the parking lot, and made it to the right spot at exactly noon, anti-king poster in hand. Of course, being one of hundreds at the rally, it really wouldn’t have mattered if I were a few minutes late. The only one who would have cared was me.

So now I am trying to think of time in a new way. Yes, being on time is a virtue, but in most instances, a few minutes one way or another won’t really matter. I can skip the heart palpitations and acid reflux. After all, Tom Cruise won’t even know if I show up late for the next Mission: Impossible or Top Gun 3!

⸻

Our family of ten have been spending the past five days in a magnificent VRBO house in the Smoky Mountains. We have enough bedrooms for everyone, enough board games for anyone who wants to play, and a refrigerator-freezer plus ample counter space stocked with all our favorite foods.

The only downside to this wonderful trip has been my suffering from a bad head cold that started the day before we left and has lingered through today. Knowing I need to be at my best for the long drive home tomorrow, I decided not to join the crew on today’s trip to Dollywood—the area’s famed theme park and the highlight of any stay in the Smokies, especially when you’re traveling with four grandchildren, all age 11 or younger.

This morning, I sat quietly in the corner of the living room, unobserved, as the rest of the group made their final preparations for the day of fun. It felt like theater unfolding in front of me.

The rapid-fire dialogue was natural and unrehearsed, with parents checking on kids and on each other. Bags of cereal, pretzels, and other snacks—stage props in this production—were packed into gargantuan tote bags. Water bottles were filled and their lids carefully tightened.

As Act II began, the kids went on quests to find their Crocs and bathing suits, and then headed outside for the mandatory application of sunscreen and bug spray. Hats were grabbed, sunglasses perched on noses, and travel directions coordinated. Finally, with our middle granddaughter belting out Dolly Parton’s “Jolene,” the entire cast exited stage right.

No curtain fell, but I was left alone, marveling at the wonderful family Barb and I have been blessed with. Watching them in action filled me with a joy deeper than any Tony-winning performance ever could!

Democrats Replaced Biden with Robots—and Not Even Good Ones

If you have been following Truth Social, you know the Democratic Party has blown it again. According to a post shared by President Trump, Joe Biden was “executed” in 2020 and replaced with “clones doubles & robotic engineered soulless mindless entities (sic)?”

Robots? Haven’t I been telling the party for years that when they needed someone to replace Good Ole Joe, all they had to do was call on me? Just like Kevin Kline in the movie Dave, I have always been at the party’s beck and call to be Biden’s stand-in, just a single pre-Qatar Air Force One flight away from whatever DC area airport is operational at the time.

I have the look, the style, the sense of humor, and dare I say it, the grace to have filled in for Joe. I even have the stumbles. And let’s face it, I would have been a much better match for Jill than those robots. We’d have matching code names—DrPotus and DrFlotus. What a team!

Instead, you replaced Joe with automatons, less realistic than the mannequins in Disney World’s Hall of Presidents. And you did this before ChatGPT was even available! No wonder “Joe’s” logic sometimes seemed a little sketchy.

Of course, by the time of the first debate at the end of last June (can it almost be a year ago, already?), the wheels were totally off the Biden bus. The cyborg’s embedded software was clearly hallucinating, just like machine learning modules are apt to do. No wonder the party apparatchiks had no choice but to pull the plug on the great android experiment!

In any case, I am still in the hinterlands of Chicago waiting for the party to give me a call. When the time comes, I can be the “Backup Dave” for Gavin, JB, or Pete. It might be a little tougher for me to fill in for Kamala, but with some good makeup, the right clothes, and soft focus lenses, I could probably pull it off.

And hey, if the Dems want to put my name on the ballot, I’m ready to do that too!

A Former Board President Reflects

It’s Graduation Season.

When I was President of a high school Board of Education, I always looked forward to this time of year, the special Sundays when I would lead the processional into the auditorium, hand diplomas to each graduate, and have the privilege of making the commencement address.

What did I say to the graduating class in those 3-minute orations, some 20 years ago? Unlike my predecessor, I made it a point of honor to create something fresh each year, to use a new viewpoint, or comment on a new aspect of the graduates’ lives ahead, whether it be in school, the military, or other types of service. I recall horrifying the school superintendent one year, opening my remarks by discussing our pet dog. I believe I eventually made a point that coincided with the school’s mission.

Looking back, I wondered what themes truly stood out. So with curiosity, I logged into an old backup hard drive and found the text of three of my speeches. I used AI to list the most common words in them. Not surprisingly, “education,” “class,” and “students” were at the top of the list. They were closely followed by “vision” and “values,” the school’s buzzwords. A third V word, “village,” was there as well (Hillary Clinton had made her impact), and so were “community” and “opportunity.”

I am proud of what I said each year, and just as proud of what I didn’t say. There were no attacks on enemies, no barbs at underachieving faculty, no threats of retaliation. In fact, except for my one dog story, the speech wasn’t about me. Graduation was a time for the young men and women before me to savor what they had accomplished and look ahead to what they hoped and dared to achieve.

I hope Graduation Day can still be about all that, and nothing more.