Famous Psychiatrists I Have Known

As the unseen enemies continue to retreat amid howls about my supposed mental disorder, let us review famous shrinks I have known, and believe it or not, worked with. 

FRED GOODWIN was the director of our National Institute of Mental Health when I shook his hand and talked shop in 1993. In the South Florida vegetarian restaurant, there were spies aplenty, and as usual, I poo-poohed the "Howard thing." Did I mention a Miami bank ate my ATM card at that conference? Persistent me got it back with an armed guard crawling up my back. Shot in the back by a bank guard? Ain't gonna work due to the security CAMERA, ding-dong. TWA? On their best behavior due to a planeload of [wealthy] "NAMI mommies." Yet my former employees just had to clown, nonetheless. How? Over the Ohio river, on a still, clear day at about 30 grand up, I muttered, "Are the (727) engines off?" How did they do that? It's not a glider, folks.

E. FULLER TORREY playing pool with those old farts in T.O.? I complained to neither Jill nor Rachel. Look-alike from Central Casting? I see what I see, and I wrote what I wrote regarding Dr. Torrey's trip. You can look it up at a well-equipped university library. In grade school, they did in fact call me "smarty pants" a time or two. That was not the reason I failed to follow-up on the uncles & aunts number one career path for me: COP. "Nah" said little Billy. Same for USAF. Ouch! Did I mention my last nickname at WORK was "The Detective?"

JOHN CSERNANSKY was a guy who I taught a class with, and now he's at Northwestern University. When my boss wrote a book chapter for John, she gave it to me for review. I said, "Mary, did you write that yourself?" She was not offended at my favorable review of the chapter Ted or Jim probably wrote for her. Mary wasn't much for memos or meetings. She did, however, ask that trademark clue question of, "Bill, what do the psychologists do here?" (Besides keep tabs on me for a decreasingly "secret" organization). And super-hot, painfully single [L----] asked me out to lunch? Ouch!! All of that perpendicular sitting around me looking pretty makes sense now. Meetings? I still laugh when I think of the boss and her tattered cartoon that said, "Want to get out of doing any work? Call a meeting." Guess you had to be there, like certain members of the current Administration.