Columnist Ruthe Deskin: Illness cause for reflection

"You have to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em."

Those words from a popular song of a few years back are symbolic of my current situation. Retirement begins to sound like a good idea. Maybe, after 45 years, it's time to fold 'em. Then again, it's mighty hard to sever the cord that holds me to the Sun.

I've had several weeks to consider my dilemma because of some unexpected developments. It appears I had been walking around with a pneumonia bug setting up housekeeping in my lungs. Add a serious heart condition and I landed in the emergency room at Sunrise Medical Center.

(Just for the record, if you have to be sick, Sunrise is the place to be. Nurses, aides and support staff are compassionate and professional.)

Confinement in a hospital room offers plenty of time for retrospection, and hours spent at home in recovery provide a sample of what retirement can be. Well-meaning friends and relatives offer advice about relaxing and enjoying the "golden years." Others advise against dropping out.

Roaming a newsroom inhabited by reporters who weren't even born when I began at the Sun is evidence that a few generations have passed me by. And if that weren't enough, I look at Sun Vice President Danny Greenspun and recall his very pregnant mother looking at me one day and saying, "I think I'm going to have a baby." If there's one thing I've learned, it's the truth of the axiom, "this too shall pass."

Take the Sun as an example. The newspaper was started by a group of union members locked out by the Review-Journal. As the Free Press it was facing a quick demise until Hank Greenspun took command, changed the name and hired a talented news staff.

Few gave the maverick publisher a chance for survival, but he inaugurated an aggressive news policy that included exposing a sheriff and county commissioner for taking bribes. It was much simpler to influence public officials in those days.

Hank went on to be one of the first to unmask the menace of McCarthyism and Sen. Joe McCarthy, who had a penchant for tagging enemies with a Communist label.

At one point, the Sun incurred the wrath of all the high honchos on the Strip for daring to defy their anointed public officials. When the Strip hotels withdrew all their advertising in a boycott, Hank went to court and won a judgment that kept the Sun afloat.

Day by day, the Sun was making its place in the news world, both locally and nationally. Then came disaster. While Hank and family were vacationing abroad, the Sun was destroyed by fire. Loyal subscribers, dedicated staffers and sheer determination kept the Sun on the streets, albeit often late.

There have been good days and bad days, but it's been one great ride. Through it all, Hank's widow, Barbara Greenspun, has been the glue that held everything together, a task she continues as publisher of the Sun.

How does one retire from 45 tumultuous years at the Sun? I'll need a crystal ball for the answer.

Friends tell me the mayoral debates on Las Vegas 1 were a reprise of "Saturday Night Live." The program did give viewers an opportunity to view the entire slate of candidates -- minus one. However, political prognosticators have somewhat autocratically limited the race to three -- Arnie Adamsen, Oscar Goodman and Mark Fine -- any one of whom would be a credit to Las Vegas.

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