I’m back from a week off work today. Spent the time traveling a little, doing nothing a little, and being productive a little. All in all, it was the break I really needed.

Our travels took us first to New York—and we got to use our TSA Pre status for the first time. Beth and I joined modernity about a month ago, and it is pretty nice. Though the whole security ordeal makes me curse Osama Bin Laden every time.

Our “it’s a small world” tale from that flight: We always get to pre-board because of Luna. (God I love Luna.) When we entered the plane both bulkhead rows were already occupied by fellow pre-boarders. Not the end of the world, but the bulkhead is best for the dog. A woman in the right-hand row piped up and asked whether the dog would be better in the bulkhead, and she volunteered to move. She did, we sat down, Beth dug into her bag and fished out a copy of one of the children’s books she’d written recently, this one about service dogs.

She turned to the good Samaritan behind us, and handed the little book to her as a thank you. The woman was audibly tickled, and then a few minutes later asked: Are you the Beth Finke I read about whose husband had Covid? (Chicago Tribune columnist Heidi Stevens had written a piece about our plight the very beginning of Covid.)

“Yes!” said Beth. “And here’s the husband,” pointing to me. “He survived!”

“I can’t believe you’d remember my name.” Our new friend then added that we might have a mutual friend. Indeed, that friend is Leah, whom I’ve known since our college days at the University of Illinois.

It was one of those little encounters that lightened the whole travel experience. And it all started with a small act of kindness.

We flew into the spacious, modern, attractive…LaGuardia airport. It’s the second time I’ve been to the renovated airport, and both times I had to stop and wonder if I was really in LaGuardia. It was a dump forever, it was worse during construction, and now it’s palatial. Well, as palatial as an airport can be.

In New York we visited friends we met through—who else—Beth. Benita was Beth’s volunteer reader during our early years in Chicago. They bonded and then we met Benita’s husband Henry and we all bonded. Native New Yorkers, they lived in Chicago for several years because Henry was a big shot doctor at Rush Medical Center. Upon his retirement, they moved back to New York to a great place in the Upper West Side, a stone’s throw from Central Park and the Natural History Museum.

That’s Hank on the left, me, Pick, and Beth during a vacation we took together in New Orleans.

We hadn’t seen each other since before Covid and it was food for the soul to be together again, even briefly.

From there we took an Amtrak train to Washington, D.C. to see our pals Pick and Hank, whom we’ve posted about more than once before. Pick and Hank have been an item about as long as  Beth and I have, and we’ve seen each other through lots of changes. Our relationships with them have become kind of that old, favorite, comfortable pair of shoes. We usually eat out once, and this time it was at a Greek Restaurant in Old Town, Alexandria, in a perfect outdoor garden and patio. And, a visit isn’t a visit unless Pick plays the piano and sings a little, and Beth plays, too.

We eat, we walk, we drink, we talk. We don’t do anything special during our visits, but somehow, every single visit is special.

It was a Friday night in the fall of 1977. I was a junior in the journalism program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Earlier, I’d gotten an essay exam back during one of my hardest—and favorite classes. I aced it. So, that afternoon, off I went to happy hour at a campustown joint called the Round Robin.

I trust Checkbook’s evaluations because I know how much work is behind them.

I got home around 7:30—home being a classic old rundown house that I shared with seven housemates. Nobody was home when the phone rang. When I picked it up, I heard the voice of Robert Krughoff for the first time. I can say, without exaggeration, that call changed my life for the good, and for ever.

Weeks before the phone rang that night I’d applied for an internship in Washington, D.C. through an agency that shopped potential interns around the Capital—everywhere from congressional offices to federal agencies to lobbyists—and to various nonprofits.

Robert had called to interview me. Now, the first thing I should’ve thought about was this: It was a Friday night at 7:30 CT, 8:30 ET—and Robert was still at the office. But I was so excited that someone was interested that all I could do is answer his questions as best I could. It was like a 45 minute call.

Somehow, I must have done OK. I was offered the spot and by January of 1978 I was living in a shared apartment on Rhode Island Avenue and 14^th NW.

A year or so earlier, Robert and a partner had founded Washington Consumers’ Checkbook. At some point, after a bad experience with a car repair shop, Robert concluded that there should be something like Consumer Reports—but instead of products, it would rate services.

Today Checkbook operations serve seven metropolitan areas with ratings and advice on choosing services like roofers, plumbers, repair shops of all ilks, and the like. It also evaluates health care providers—surgeons, hospitals, dentists, and veterinarians.

That may sound quaint today when we have customer ratings everywhere online. But it was novel back then. And Checkbook’s work still stands superior, in my view, to any popular online ratings sites. That’s because it surveys only its and Consumer Reports subscribers—there can be no ringers or ballot stuffers. It uses actual survey research science in its methodologies. In addition, it does exhaustive price comparisons, and researches complaints (or lack thereof) against firms it rates.

I’m still a subscriber, and still use it regularly.

Robert was an exacting editor and researcher. As my friend Kevin (current executive editor) once said: “Do not ever answer a Robert question unless you are absolutely sure that you know what you’re talking about.” Otherwise, as I learned way back when, you would undergo an exhaustive grilling that would expose you for not knowing your stuff. I can still hear Robert’s deep voice, and his distinctive stammer, as he picked my work apart. It wasn’t cruel, but it was tough.

Robert graduated from the University of Chicago Law School—where he discovered he really didn’t want to practice law. After working at the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW—later split into Health and Human Services and the Department of Education), he founded Checkbook in 1976.

Robert was precise by nature and by necessity: when you publish information that makes a business look bad, that information better be perfectly accurate.

I interned through June of my junior year. A year later, after my senior year, they offered me a full time job—in the 1979 economy, jobs were hard to come by so I was grateful.

I spent three years driving around the D.C. metro area, visiting supermarkets and hardware stores and other retailers, carrying a clipboard doing market basket price surveys. More than once I was shooed out by managers. I made countless calls posing as a consumer getting price quotes for specific repair jobs. I visited local consumer offices around the region and camped out for days at a time to go through physical files of complaints that had been lodged. I wrote articles—on a typewriter. I stayed late to call subscribers for donations in the evening hours. I even knocked on doors to solicit donations a couple times.

To borrow from an old Peace Corps slogan, it was the toughest job I’ll ever love. And the experience has served me throughout my career stops.

I share all this because I just learned that Robert Krughoff just retired. He left with his organization in great shape. The magazine is just part of the operation now. There is a health care research unit whose clients include federal and state governments, as well as large insurance companies. Way back in my day, Checkbook sued to make public data about health outcomes—data that helps consumers make better choices and that previously had been closely guarded by the industry. (I actually used that data when my dad was looking at open heart surgery.)

You can learn more about my old boss by reading this press release, and/or his open letter. All I can tell you is he had enormous positive impact.

Including on me. Thanks Robert.

PS: Checkbook serves these metro areas:

Chicago
San Francisco Bay area
Delaware Valley
Minneapolis-St. Paul
Boston
Seattle/Puget Sound
Washington, D.C.

If you live in any, check Checkbook out.

Trainers at the Seeing Eye school encourage us to talk to our dogs as they guide us. “Remind them you’re there,” they say. “It keeps them focused.” Since the pandemic hit, I’ve been taking one, and sometimes two, hour long walks with Luna every day. What happens when I run out of things to talk to her about? I sing to her instead. This blog idea came up on one of those sing-along walks. I narrowed the titles down to songs I listened to as a child and in my young adulthood, and my focus here is on the title of the song, not the lyrics. Here goes:

1. Every Breath You Take (The Police) Before 2020, I took breathing for granted. Not anymore.
2. Fever (written by Otis Blackwell and Eddie Cooley, performed by everyone from Peggy Lee to Beyoncé) High fevers are a common symptom of COVID, and when Mike took sick on March 17, his fever spiked at 103 ° and stayed there.
3. I Can’t Get Next to you (The Temptations) Mike and I separated into what he referred to as our “two kingdoms” at home for a week before he collapsed from fever and was taken to the ER.
4. Gimme Shelter (Rolling Stones) Sheltering in place became the norm.
5. We’re All Alone (Boz Scaggs) With Mike in the hospital, new Seeing Eye dog Luna and I were at home alone for ten days.
6. Puppy Love (Donny Osmond) See above.
7. And I Miss You (Everything but the Girl) I missed Mike.
8. Telephone Line (Electric Light Orchestra) I worked on my skills with VoiceOver (the speech synthesizer that comes with every iPhone) to text and answer the phone when Mike called, or when caring doctors, social workers, friends and family contacted me to see how Mike was doing.
9. Don’t Stand So Close to me (The Police) Determining just how far away six feet is without being able to see is not easy. I give it my best guess when out alone with Luna.
10. Signed, Sealed Delivered (Stevie Wonder) Mike still in the hospital. Friends and family members signed me up for gift cards at small local establishments, restaurants sealed hot meals into to-go bags, nearby friends picked them up and delivered them to our lobby. You know who you are, my friends: thank you.
11. Does Anybody Really Know What Time it Is? (Chicago) Is it just me? I have a hard time keeping track of what day it is, too.
12. Only a Fool Would Say that (Steely Dan) January 24: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China and we have it under control. It’s going to be just fine.” March 6: “The tests are beautiful. Anybody that needs a test, gets a test.” May 21: “So when we have a lot of cases, I don’t look at that as a bad thing. I look at that as, in a certain respect, as being a good thing because it means our testing is much better. So I view it as a badge of honour. Really, it’s a badge of honor.”
13. Makes Me Wanna Holler (Marvin Gaye) Chicago Tribune columnist Heidi Stevens quoted Mike in a column when he was still hospitalized and I was waiting to be approved for a COVID test. He told her it was frustrating to watch the news from his hospital bed and hear President Donald Trump deny that the United States lacks sufficient tests. “Setting aside partisanship,” Mike said, “That’s really insulting. It’s insulting to be lying here and hearing that. It’s insulting to me, but also to all the people working here so hard and having to figure out who to give tests to and who not to, because they don’t have enough of them.”
14. Here We Are (James Taylor) Mike gets released from hospital, spends three nights at a COVID Hotel, and finally comes home COVID-free.
15. Dizzy (Tommy Roe) COVID-free doesn’t necessarily mean symptom-free. A “longhauler” now, Mike still gets dizzy while taking walks.
16. We’re Gonna Zoom, Zoom Zoom The theme song from a 1970s PBS children’s show becomes my theme song for the memoir-writing classes I lead.
17. Long Ago and Far Away (Joni Mitchell) Running into old friends out and about, giving them hugs, traveling to visit out-of-town family and friends, having people in for dinner, visiting elementary schools to give presentations…Seems like decades ago now.
18. So Far Away (Carole King) See above.
19. Happy Together (The Turtles) Neighbors start bringing chairs down to local park, and on hot days little kids bring sprinklers, too. While wearing masks and social distancing we catch up with each other. Temperatures are falling now, but hey, we all own warm winter coats! We pledge to continue meeting outside this winter.

Have a song title to add to the list? Leave your suggestions in the comments!

Behave, everybody!

I think we’ve mentioned Half Sour, our neighborhood restaurant-tavern, more than once here. It’s become our new local—at least when we could have a local.

While I was in the hospital, Beth ordered takout from Half Sour fairly often, thanks to all of you who treated us with gift cards! After I was released from the COVID hotel and certified disease free, I was able to do pickup duty, too. It was fun to see the owners and check in on how they were doing — through a takeout window — even if we all wore masks. A life-size cutout of Mayor Lighfoot was there at the window just to make sure we were being good.

Well, it’s been open for service since early June now. And it’s been nice to enjoy semi-normal times there since things opened up. First it was outdoor patio plus tables next to big windows only. Now it’s 25% occupancy, including sparce seating at the bar.

We’re taking a calculated risk when we go there — but it doesn’t feel like it, because their staff is terrific about wearing masks, making sure customers wear masks (anyone who walks in without one gets a free new mask!), and generally doing what we all should be doing. The windows are wide open whenever possible, and, like I said. it’s nice to every once in a while feel just a little like we did back in say, 2019.

Last week, though, there was a scare. I got a text from a friend saying Half Sour was closed — did I know anything? Welp. Here’s a classic, maddening story from 2020:

One of the owners had to go out of town because of a family emergency. So, a friend, who is not an employee, came in for about four hours on a Saturday. She served as hostess during brunch and wore a mask the entire time.

Last week she started having some symptoms and got tested. It came back positive.

So, Half Sour closed for two days, hired an industrial cleaning crew, and paid $150 a pop for testing 15 employees who worked that day. They also put the news out on the Half Sour social media outlets to make customers who were there that day.

Happily, none of the employees’ tests came back positive. Oh, and on her second testing, the original person who tested positive tested…negative. The first one was a false positive.

The bad news is our favorite local lost two days of business and a chunk of change on testing. (Also bad news: really, we still have to pay for tests? What a country.)

The good news is Half Sour is back open, and they continue to model responsible behavior. For them, it’s not a calculated risk to let people in, it’s survival.

If everyone is as responsible as they are, Illinois can stay open—and so can Half Sour.

Wear the mask, wash the hands.

It has come to my attention that the post I Published yesterday about teaching memoir-writing classes was somewhat garbled at the end – sorry about that! Those of you who missed the stunning ending can read it in its entirety below, and as a bonus to this version, I am including a piece of writing Wanda came up with while whiling away the hours sheltering in place these past weeks. “It’s just a squib,” she told me over the phone. “But I think you’ll like it.” I sure do, and know you Safe & Sound blog readers will, too.

The Issue is Toilet Tissue

by Wanda Bridgeforth

Why the run on toilet paper? Is it our solution to be clean after using the bathroom facilities? Is it because we feel there is no substitute for this product?

Today’s water saving commodes clog up on all toilet tissue substitutes, even the beloved Kleenex. Bathrooms of today are mostly cubby holes -saving toilets that accept only toilet tissue, I hark back to the days of the pull-chain toilet.

Back in the pre-depression and during the depression days the substitute for toilet tissue was newspaper, All of the bathrooms were large and their floors were covered with newspaper. I remember lingering in the bathroom reading the newspaper that covered the floor! We crumpled the newspaper and wet it under the facebowl faucet, it was as soft as today’s tissue. I wonder now if any ink print was left on the wiped area?

PS: If the tissue issue becomes acute and the newspaper sales increase? Josephine et-al Man the snakes and plungers.

And now for the reblog of yesterday’s post. Enjoy!

Benefits of Memoir Classes: Teaching Online

by Beth Finke

Over the 15-plus years I’ve been leading memoir classes in Chicago many many people have suggested I offer an online course as well. “You’d get people from all over the country,” they say. “You could charge a lot, and you wouldn’t even have to leave home.”Not leave home? Being with my writers is what I love most about teaching memoir. Hearing Wanda’s classmates scramble to find her a seat when she arrives; sensing the drama of passing a bag of Scrabble tiles around to determine who picks “Z” out of the bag (usually “A” goes first, but sometimes I go backwards!); Bindy’s delight to hear an assignment that inspires a limerick; Janie reading an essay out loud for a fellow writer whose low vision prevents them from doing so on their own; the collective gasp when Bruce recites a particularly poignant phrase; hearing updates on our new Grail Café from writers who stopped there before coming to the class I lead in the neighborhood; taking in the ooos and ahs whenever Michael brings a show and tell to passs around as he reads his latest essay.

“Being right there to sense writers reading their stories in their own voices, watching how trust grows in a group of people who share life stories…to me that’s the most important part of what I do,” I tell the online pushers. “Eavesdropping before and after class tells me a lot, too, and you just can’t eavesdrop like that online.” I thank the friends for the online class idea. “But it just won’t work for me.”

Those online pushers are a determined bunch.

They power on, describe a site or program or app or whatever it is you call it where you can see everyone’s face on the screen. “You can see everyone there and watch their reactions right from home,” they reason.

“But I can’t see!” I remind them. That’s usually where The conversation ends.

Writers join the memoir-writing classes I lead for all sorts of reasons. Some want to hone their writing skills, some hope it will improve their memory, others want to collect their essays as a gift to their relatives. Some like the weekly deadline, some hope to get their essays published, others count on sharing time every week with a group who likes to hear –and share — their life stories. This post written by Dr. Jeremy Nobel in the Harvard Health Blog presents scientific data supporting a benefit many writers don’t anticipate when they first sign up: the idea that writing and sharing stories about your life can be “even lifesaving in a world where loneliness — and the ill health it can lead to — has become an epidemic.” From his blog:

Picking up a pen can be a powerful intervention against loneliness. I am a strong believer in writing as a way for people who are feeling lonely and isolated to define, shape, and exchange their personal stories. Expressive writing, especially when shared, helps foster social connections. It can reduce the burden of loneliness among the many groups who are most at risk, including older adults, caregivers, those with major illnesses, those with disabilities, veterans, young adults, minority communities of all sorts, and immigrants and refugees.

Dr. Nobel did not specify in his blog whether the sharing had to be done in person to fight loneliness, or if sharing online would work just as well.

When it was determined that the Thursday afternoon Village Chicago class would not be meeting in person for their fifth and sixth classes of this session, I decided to try an experiment: send an email with their prompt, assure them I’d still edit essays for anyone who wanted to send their assignments my way, then encourage them to “reply to all” and email their completed essays (whether edited by me or not, that didn’t matter) to their fellow writers to read at their leisure. I would email my comments to every writer who sent an essay, and Comments from their classmates would come to them via email, too rather than in person. I made it clear that students were not required to read the essays they received via email, but I encouraged them to do so and respond to help us keep in touch while classes were cancelled. Results?

• During week one, 20% of the writers sent essays to their fellow writers via email, and 6.66% of writers emailed their classmates with a comment.
• During week two, our final class of this six-week session, 6.666% of the writers sent essays to their fellow writers via email, and 0% emailed that classmate with a comment.

I know, I know. This is just a personal non-evidence-based very short experiment, and maybe it’d work if I used one of those apps, but really, I’m too busy washing my hands and spraying the knobs on the radio to learn how to download one right now. So I’m sticking to my guns. If I’m the one teaching, it’s gotta be in person.

Or so I thought.

I’ve mentioned Wanda Bridgeforth, our 98-year-old memoir matriarch, in this post and want you blog readers to know she is doing well. “I am not really affected,” she told me during one of our phone calls these past few weeks. “I stay home most of the time anyway!”

For the past three years, Wanda has been participating in the University of Chicago Medical Center’s Comprehensive Care, Community, and Culture Program and receives a personal phone call every three months to ask about her health and the quality of care she has been receiving. “But this past week it was different,” she told me over the weekend, marveling at how the doctor who called this time managed to be on the phone with all the study participants at once. “He could answer all our questions about the coronavirus and all that, they had 15 of us all on the phone line at once!”

I had questions. Could everyone on the phone actually hear each other? Wasn’t it scratchy? Was everyone polite? Didn’t people interrupt each other? “Oh, no, it was great! All very clear,” she assured me. “So listen, okay with you if I make some phone calls Monday morning, you know, to se how that works and if we can set something like this up for our class?”

Of course I said yes!