Doug Reads With Friends

Doug talks with his friend Jad Nachabe, a Lebanese endurance athlete he met through the Beirut Marathon. Jad reflects on growing up between Lebanon and Dubai, the complicated question of where home is, and why he resents describing Lebanese people as resilient when they never chose the hardships that demanded it. They also discuss Jad’s transformation from the kid picked last in school sports to an Ironman, the confidence and community he has found through endurance, and what keeps him moving forward. Eventually, they even reach Fredrik Backman’s A Man Called Ove and its lessons about understanding other people, extending compassion, and allowing some of that compassion for ourselves.

Music for Doug Reads with Friends is by Eiren Caffall. Learn more about her work at https://www.eirencaffall.com/.

Chapters:

00:05 — INTRO: Lebanon, endurance and A Man Called Ove
01:32 — A Beirut Marathon friendship
04:33 — Two places called home
09:39 — Resilience he never chose
15:00 — From picked last to Ironman
19:10 — Community, solitude and finding his why
26:46 — OK, now the book: A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman
32:18 — Compassion for others—and yourself
37:48 — The book, the movie and reading beyond yourself
42:52 — OUTRO: A fundamentally decent human being

Doug talks with longtime friend Rebecca Ziegler Mano, founder of Education Matters and USAP Community School in Zimbabwe, about a life spent connecting talented young people with opportunity. They discuss why Rebecca has made Zimbabwe home for nearly 30 years, the complicated roles of language, race and privilege in education, the pressures students carry when they leave home, and the increasingly difficult realities facing African students studying abroad. Then they turn to Simukai Chigudu’s Chasing Freedom, a memoir that opens up questions about colonial history, diaspora, identity and belonging.

Music for Doug Reads With Friends provided by Eiren Caffall.

00:00 Rebecca Zeigler Mano, Zimbabwe & a Life in Education
04:12 A One-Way Ticket, $1,000 & an Unexpected Life in Zimbabwe
08:14 Finding Talent, Creating USAP & Building a School
13:26 Visa Bans, Language & What It Means to Educate Zimbabweans
18:13 Why Stay? Thirty Years of Life in Zimbabwe
20:53 Race, Privilege & Feeling “of Zimbabwe”
24:57 The Empty Chair & Preparing Students to Leave
30:33 OK, now the book: Chasing Freedom by Simukai Chigudu
33:13 Expectations Too Vast, Diaspora, Identity & a Life in Books

Doug talks with Javon Garcia, a clinical social worker in Chicago and former member of the Grinnell Posse Doug mentored, about therapy, masculinity, community, and The Invisible Ache by Courtney B. Vance and Dr. Robin L. Smith. Javon reflects on becoming a therapist, why representation matters, the pressures Black men face around vulnerability and mental health, and why self-care is not enough without community care. They also talk about virtual therapy, Posse as accidental group therapy, shame, faith, and why maybe we should all be a little nosier.

Music for Doug Reads with Friends is provided by Eiren Caffall.

00:05 INTRO: Javon Garcia, therapy, and The Invisible Ache

01:51 From law school dreams to clinical social work

09:25 Who are you as a therapist?

17:13 Virtual therapy, rural Illinois, and the Posse connection

21:24 Politics, fear, joy, comedy, and what keeps Javon going

25:13 Javon as a reader

26:22 OK, now the book: The Invisible Ache by Courtney B. Vance and Dr. Robin L. Smith

29:43 Self-care, community care, and being a little nosier

34:19 The man box: race, masculinity, shame, and barriers to therapy

39:55 Taking off the mask, Posse travel, and what comes next

Jeff Yamada and I met in 1995 as Peace Corps volunteers in Suriname, and thirty years later our friendship has survived marriages, divorces, career changes, and plenty of ridiculous stories. We revisit a lunar-eclipse mud fight, Jeff’s run-in with a piranha, and what Peace Corps taught us about community and connection. Jeff chose Norma Wong’s When No Thing Works, which leads us into seven-generation thinking, “mutual aloha,” his work with Liberation Pathways, and what we owe the people around us—and those who come after us.

Music for Doug Reads with Friends by Eiren Caffall.

00:05 — INTRO: Jeff Yamada, 30 years of friendship, and Peace Corps Suriname
03:15 — Peace Corps, village life, and learning to improvise
08:40 — Mud fights, blood moons, and a piranha bite
15:36 — Lutheran Volunteer Corps, divorce, and friendship across decades
19:32 — Land-based healing, Indigenous wisdom, and becoming the forest ranger after all
23:27 — OK, now the book: When No Thing Works by Norma Wong
30:20 — Seven generations, future stories, and building in the cracks
35:28 — Mutual aloha, belonging, and the modern village
40:20 — Returning to Suriname—and imagining where friendship goes next
42:14 — Next time: Another friend, another book

This is a very different episode of Doug Reads With Friends. Steve Langerud was supposed to be my guest. He had chosen the book, I had read it, and we were trying to schedule the recording when I learned that Steve had passed. So this episode became something else: a tribute to a dear friend, mentor, advisor, colleague, and world-class laugher. Rachel Bly, Thomas Crady, Meg Jones Bair, Joyce Stern, and Amy Nelson join me to remember Steve’s kindness, humor, loyalty, wisdom, love of Grinnell, commitment to helping people find their way, and gift for making life better just by being in the room.

Steve’s obituary: https://www.smithfh.com/obituaries/steve-langerud

Memorial donations may be made to the Mayflower Community Human Needs Fund, Imagine Grinnell, the Prairie Burn 100, or Drake Community Library.

Music licensed through Soundstripe
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Chapters:
00:00 Intro: a very different episode
03:54 Rachel Bly and MAGBRAHS
07:44 "That did not disappoint"
09:59 Thomas Crady: "That's just Grinnell"
13:11 Defining rock & roll
15:57 Meg Jones Bair: "An unwavering commitment to positivity"
19:07 April Fools!
23:16 Joyce Stern: "How can I make your life better?"
26:58 The best advisor
30:19 Amy Nelson tells the Ursinus story
36:35 Steve wins
38:54 Thank you, Steve

In this episode of Doug Reads with Friends, Doug talks with Illinois State Senator Graciela Guzman about organizing, public service, community care, and Octavia Butler’s The Parable of the Sower. The conversation moves from Graciela’s path from Grinnell to healthcare policy to elected office, into a powerful discussion of fear, hope, burnout, survival, and what it means to care for people when the world feels like it is falling apart.

Music by Eiren Caffall. Please check out her music on Spotify and visit her website at https://www.eirencaffall.com/.

Chapters:
0:00 INTRO: State Senator Graciela Guzman and Parable of the Sower
1:34 AmeriCorps, healthcare, and finding the policy path
4:45 Organizing, governing, and redefining public service
8:52 Running as herself and representing her community
11:29 ICE, rapid response, and community care in crisis
14:30 Working with opposition and staying in relationship
17:54 Grinnell, trusteeship, singing, and reading as imagination
25:21 OK, now the book: Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
27:28 Pessimism, hope, survival, and teaching through fear
36:26 Caring, burnout, and staying whole for the long haul
39:52 Mac Field, radical care, and changing each other’s lives

In this episode of Doug Reads with Friends, Doug talks with Erik Simpson, Professor of English at Grinnell College and one of Doug’s dearest friends from his years in Grinnell. Erik chose Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, giving Doug a long-overdue first read of one of the most beloved novels in English. Their conversation begins with Erik’s work in book arts, paper engineering, teaching, bird photography, and the strange habits of professional readers, before turning to Austen, rereading, Darcy’s listening, Elizabeth’s changing judgment, whether the novel is feminist, and why Charlotte Lucas may be one of the book’s most important characters. Along the way, Erik does what great teachers do: he takes a sentence, a small moment, or a strange detail and opens it up into something much richer.

Next time: Graciela Guzman and The Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler.

Music by Eiren Caffall. Please check out her music on Spotify and visit her website at https://www.eirencaffall.com/.

Chapters:
0:00 INTRO: Erik Simpson, friendship, and Pride and Prejudice
2:13 Paper engineering, book arts, and making books physical
8:42 Reading on paper, ebooks, and audiobooks
11:35 Birds, photography, and becoming a cliché
13:11 Start small, start strange: Erik as a professional reader
18:08 Growing up with books and becoming an English professor
20:11 OK, now the book: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
25:31 Darcy listens, Elizabeth rereads, and Austen’s slow romance
34:19 Feminism, neurodivergent Darcy, and Charlotte Lucas’s choice
41:04 Bath, rereading, and a future Austen reunion
43:48 Next time: Graciela Guzman and The Parable of the Sower

Tammy Draughon joins Doug to talk about The Longest Race by Kara Goucher, but the conversation quickly becomes about much more than running. Doug and Tammy look back on nearly 30 years of friendship, beginning as young teachers at Enloe High School, and talk about teaching physics, coaching high school runners, doing hard things, surviving the Boston Marathon bombing, parenting, faith, and the responsibility coaches have to the young people in their care. Then they turn to Goucher’s memoir and its account of abuse, power, silence, and finding one’s voice inside the Nike Oregon Project. It is a conversation about endurance in every sense: in classrooms, on race courses, in families, in faith, and in friendship.

Music by Eiren Caffall. Please check out her music on Spotify and visit her website at https://www.eirencaffall.com/.

Chapters:
00:05 — Tammy Draughon and The Longest Race
01:13 — Thirty years of teaching, physics, and finding a calling
07:42 — Running, coaching, and becoming California Coach of the Year
11:29 — Do Hard Things
16:46 — Coaching herself, marathon training, and Boston goals
20:09 — The Boston Marathon bombing
24:56 — Family, faith, and the empty nest
27:11 — OK, now the book: The Longest Race by Kara Goucher
30:10 — Power, abuse, and finding your voice
35:18 — Reading Kara Goucher as a woman, runner, and coach
39:33 — Boston dreams and racing together

In this episode of Doug Reads With Friends, Doug talks with his oldest friend, Jeremy Hornik, about nearly 50 years of friendship, ridiculous Shakespeare summers, Chicago improv, slot machine design, family, loss, reading, and the pure comic pleasure of Cocktail Time by P.G. Wodehouse. Jeremy’s choice leads to a conversation about books that do not need to be “important” to matter, the serious craft behind unserious delight, and the strange brilliance of Wodehouse’s language, callbacks, country houses, idiot lords, smart servants, and angry swans.

Next time, Doug talks with Tammy Draughon about The Longest Race.

Music for Doug Reads With Friends is by Eiren Caffall; learn more about her work at https://www.eirencaffall.com/.

00:05 INTRO: A hotel apartment, a ceasefire, and an interrupted podcast

03:01 Almost 50 years of friendship

04:33 Stylin’ Mermaid and stupid Shakespeare

07:31 Chicago improv, famous people, and terrible scenes

10:45 From You Don’t Know Jack to slot machines

17:26 Rockababy, family, and remembering Donna

22:07 Reading, Goodreads, rereading, and creative energy

26:18 OK, now the book: Cocktail Time by P.G. Wodehouse

31:43 The serious pleasure of unserious books

35:16 Wodehouse’s language, callbacks, and one angry swan

41:28 Next time: Tammy Draughon and The Longest Race

Ep 7: AI Ethics, PosseLove & Culpability (with Dr. Lana Mahgoub)

A family survives a self-driving car accident. Two people in another car don’t.

From there, everything gets more complicated.

Doug sits down with Dr. Lana Mahgoub—psychologist, author, and longtime member of his Grinnell Posse—to talk about Culpability by Bruce Holsinger, a novel that uses AI not just as a theme, but almost as a character. What begins as a question of who caused an accident quickly turns into something harder: how responsibility works in a world where humans and machines are intertwined.

Along the way, the conversation moves well beyond the book. Lana reflects on her path from Posse scholar to psychologist, what it means to build support systems that actually last, and how those same ideas show up in therapy, parenting, and everyday life. There’s a throughline here about relationships—how they protect us, shape us, and sometimes fail us.

The discussion of AI lands close to home. Lana sees versions of it already in her work, with kids turning to chatbots for connection and answers. The question isn’t whether AI will play a role—it already does. The harder question is what it’s doing to how people think, relate, and make decisions.

There’s also a quieter tension running underneath everything: the instinct to protect—your kids, your patients, yourself—and the reality that you can’t control everything. Not outcomes. Not technology. Not even the people closest to you.

It’s a conversation about responsibility, but also about limits—of systems, of knowledge, and of control.

Chapters

0:00 INTRO: Meet Dr. Lana and the Posse Connection

01:41 What Is Posse—and Why It Still Matters
04:28 From Grinnell to a Career in Psychology
08:01 Starting a Private Practice and Working with Kids
11:27 Parenting, Therapy, and Real Life vs Theory
13:22 Writing a Children’s Book About Anxiety
20:57 OK, now the book: Culpability by Bruce Holsinger
26:20 From the Novel to Real Life: AI, Kids, and Therapy
32:59 Ethics, Responsibility, and What AI Means for Us
38:22 Next time: Jeremy Hornik and Cocktail Time by P. G. Wodehouse

Next: Jeremy Hornik, discussing Cocktail Time by P. G. Wodehouse.

Music by Eiren Caffall. Please check out her music on Spotify.