Monday, Feb. 16, 2004 | 8:59 a.m.
A few days ago I was talking to a friend about Ruthe Deskin. I mentioned that Ruthe's birthday was approaching -- on Feb. 20 -- and that she would be 88 years old.
I also said that in January she started her 50th year at the Las Vegas Sun.
"God bless her," my friend said. "I see her column still runs in the paper. Who writes it?"
Wha-a?
"Ruthe," I said, shaking my head and laughing. "Ruthe writes Ruthe's column."
Very well, too. Right up until the end.
Ruthe's final column appeared in the Accent section Jan. 22. In that column she provided a quickie review of Dan Brown's book "The Da Vinci Code" (she found it a bit ponderous), and a touching story about a down-on-her-luck woman named Gracie who was befriended by then-Sun Publisher Hank Greenspun.
Hank had hired Gracie as a newspaper saleswoman and helped straighten out her life. One of Gracie's customers was a young crooner named Johnny Mathis, who also took an interest in this independent little lady and made arrangements for Gracie to have her decaying teeth replaced.
"There are so many stories I could tell where lives have been changed by simple acts of kindness," Ruthe wrote.
At the time we didn't know the Jan. 22 column would be Ruthe's last. We never made firm plans for a "last hurrah," but several weeks ago Ruthe and I did discuss her writing a true send-off column. She was having a difficult time with her health and was feeling, as she said, "really out of it."
We had tentatively planned for her to start work on a column that might run on a Sunday, and she said she had already put some thoughts down on paper. This would be her final retrospective, a final chance to say goodbye. Her Thursday column was put on unofficial hiatus.
But a couple of days later, unexpectedly, I found in my e-mail -- Ruthe always filed her columns by e-mail from her home -- a note with the familiar "Deskin column" in the subject line. It was a regular Thursday Back and Forth column from Ruthe.
I called her to ask what was going on, and she said, "I've got a second wind."
So there was no "farewell tour" for this diva. And I think it was appropriate, because Ruthe wanted to be relevant. She wanted to go out as a working reporter and have her last column to be no more or less relevant than the hundreds of others she had filed during her illustrious career at the Sun.
It's difficult to put into words how I felt about Ruthe. Certainly there was a lot of affection on both sides, and it was a uniquely touching relationship. I was her editor; she was like a surrogate grandmother to me. She entrusted me with her work; I revered her dedication to her job and her skills as a journalist.
We rarely saw each other but became very close; our correspondence was over the phone or via e-mail, and I'll always treasure our freewheeling e-mail messages back and forth. We were pals, for sure.
What I'll take away from working with Ruthe was how driven she was. Near the end she was somehow able to file her column -- high-quality work that didn't need much tinkering on my end -- despite suffering severe pain and discomfort.
I remember her saying, after one particularly harrowing incident with her heart, "I feel like I've been hit with 100 sledgehammers."
Oh, and she turned in her column that week. Ahead of deadline.
When it became clear Ruthe would not be writing another column, I scoured her most recent work -- fresh Back and Forth columns over the past year -- for a final tribute:
Jan. 30, 2003: (Written a full year before the infamous Janet Jackson fallout.)
"Who could have imagined the drubbing the Tampa Bay Buccaneers gave the Oakland Raiders in Sunday's Super Bowl?
"The only thing I enjoyed less than the game itself was the halftime show. How I miss the intricate maneuvers and stirring music of marching bands.
"Instead, we had to watch scantily or grunge-clad singers wiggling their way across the stage. Background music was a cacophony of sound intensified by psychedelic lighting. The whole effect was frenetic.
"Today's best-selling albums usually feature some weird situations to complement the singer's voice. It's distracting and takes away from the music itself."
March 20, 2003: "In spite of all efforts, telemarketing calls keep coming -- even more often than before.
"Occasionally I reach a point of frustration and let the caller know what I think of the intrusion. Around 8 the other night, while I was watching a basketball game, a young woman called to tell me how to decrease payments on my mortgage.
"I usually just hang up, but this time I decided to let her have it.
" 'I don't have a mortgage and I deeply resent you calling me at this hour.'
"Her sweet reply: 'What would be a good time, then?' "
April 24, 2003: (On a long-ago Easter celebration gone awry.)
"It was an event planned in good faith and ended in chaos. At the time I was working in publicity at the Last Frontier Hotel. The sprawling buildings and spacious lawns of the hotel and the Last Frontier Village were ideal for the annual Easter egg hunt so eagerly awaited by children of Las Vegas.
"All the preparations were made. Entertainment Director Helen Connors rallied her troops to hide hundreds of colored eggs. Chef Irwin Schneider was assigned the task of egg preparation.
"The day of the big hunt was weather-perfect. Everything went without a hitch. Moms and dads gave toddlers an assist as the older kids went off on their own.
"Suddenly the air was pierced with a strange sound. Larger boys were hurling eggs at each other, which wasn't too bad until we realized the eggs were not cooked.
"Somehow a batch of Easter eggs got colored, but not boiled. They were scattered around the Last Frontier grounds and became the ultimate prize for the egg hunters.
"The scene was chaotic. Little girls in pretty Easter dresses had egg yolk spattered down their fronts. Boisterous boys were enjoying the entire affair as they aimed the uncooked eggs at innocent bystanders.
"In a matter of minutes the Last Frontier's annual Easter egg hunt was canceled. It was quite a day, and I imagine there are a few longtime Las Vegas residents who might recall the last great egg hunt at the Last Frontier.
"Those were the days, my friend."
June 19, 2003: "Ordinary people trying to solve extraordinary problems.
"That could be a summation of the recently recessed session of the state Legislature.
"There is too much of the two D's -- demand and deficit. At this point it would take King Solomon to balance the equation.
"There's an old adage about paying the piper. If we want better schools, highways, law enforcement, parks and perks, the piper must be paid.
"When Gov. Kenny Guinn calls the Legislature back in special session, let the members adopt the policy of 'something's got to give' and get on with the business of government. Politics, they say, is the art of the possible."
July 31, 2003: (On the sensitive issue of senior drivers.)
"I feel completely at ease discussing this matter because I have voluntarily -- with a little nudge from my doctors -- given up driving. ... Certainly there are elderly persons who should not be driving on our public streets. The question is, how elderly and how incapacitated?
"I know seniors who are excellent drivers and I know young adults and teenagers who need a continuing education in the art of navigating an automobile."
Aug. 28, 2003: "They have referred to Las Vegas as Sin City.
"The more I see of the new Las Vegas the more convinced I am that we are trying to live up to that reputation.
"An example would be the new show, 'Zumanity,' which has opened on the Strip to mixed response.
"The show definitely takes freedom of expression to the limit. It's definitely not recommended by old prudes like me."
Nov. 6, 2003: "A favorite nephew is headed for Iraq, which has personalized the war for our family and raises the same old questions:
"What are we really doing there? How long will it last? How many casualties before someone has the courage to tell President Bush and egomaniacal Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld that enough is enough?
"The answers we get from the administration continue to be baffling and misleading, yet the president's popularity has not diminished as much as one might expect.
"As Shakespeare would say: 'Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.' "
Nov. 20, 2003: Are there others who feel that Britney Spears' latest release is near pornographic? It leaves little to the imagination. If her purpose was to outdo Madonna, she has exceeded far beyond her greatest fantasy.
"There was a time when Spears' kind of entertainment would have been confined to brothels. Today she has, unfortunately, become a role model for many impressionable young teenagers. How sad.
"Add the trials and tribulations of singer Michael Jackson and you have a warped idea of what has happened in the entertainment industry."
Dec. 4, 2003: "The new year will find the TV news managers having to be selective in the choice of coverage as sensational cases await time onstage. Their main objective, of course, is topping the ratings. Newsmen and newswomen will have a tough job sorting through the sensational stuff waiting on the back burner. ...
"Local media will be faced with some decisions on news coverage as Sandy Murphy and Rick Tabish get a new trial in the Binion murder case. The scandalous conduct of some city and county officials continues to make news. And the state Board of Regents has a mess to clean up, which may bring more startling revelations."
Jan. 8, 2004: "Way back in 1999 I had one mission in mind -- make it to the year 2000. I had received some rather distressful and serious news about my general health, but I was determined to be around to welcome a new century.
"Thanks to excellent doctors, caregivers, modern medical advancements and (sometimes) trial by error, I am now extending good wishes to all for the year 2004.
"If I have learned one thing about the aging process it is that we need formal education to teach us how to cope with the unexpected ... There are so many changes that call for adjustments in our lifestyles. A class at the university, titled Aging 101, might be in order so we can learn to cope with problems and accept the fact that aging takes one day at a time.
"Make all those days count in 2004."
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