Being a Father and Thinking About My Father on...Fathers' Day.

Wow, but it has been a busy summer this far!  Anyway, this post doesn't have a thing to do with microbiology.  Directly.  

June 16th is a very special day to me, and crowded with events.  It is "Bloomsday" from James Joyce's quite unusual novel "Ulysses."  Everybody seems to get in on the Joyce-ian act for that day, such as here and here.   It is also my birthday, which is less and less important to me with every passing year. In addition, it is my parent's anniversary, which seems to be growing in importance to me since my mother's death last October.  And this year, it is also Fathers' Day.  This is probably the most important holiday on that list for June 16th this year, since being a good father is vital, even if we fellows fall short of the goal from time to time.

So I would like to write a few words about my father, Jack Sevard Martin, Sr.  

My father was born in Marysville, California in July of 1931.  He was raised on a small farm, and took care of chickens, milked cows, butchered pigs, picked peaches, and helped feed his family during the Great Depression.  He was too young for World War II, and narrowly missed being drafted into the Korean War.  There is something of the soldier in my father, regardless.  In 1951, he married my mother, Wanda Jean Burton.  

When my father was fourteen, he had to start helping out at home to pay his way, and thus began going to school in the day and working at night.  My father was always, always about the work ethic.  As a boy, he worked as a ticket seller in a theater.  Cleaned floors in a department store at night.  Later, my father was a radio dispatcher for a trucking company.  When he realized that he couldn't really make a good living in Northern California, he moved to Southern California and drove trucks and eventually worked in the oil fields.  First my brother Jack was born, and then yours truly.  Dad worked even harder to provide for his family.

In the early 1960s, when my father was about 30 years old, he joined the Long Beach Fire Department.  There,  he found his niche.  These are my strongest memories of him. When I was a boy and a teenager, this is how I remember my father.

My father worked very hard at his job.  My father is not at all political (well, neither am I!), but continued to advance via hard work and excellence.  Eventually, he became a Captain of the LBFD, and finally a Battalion Chief.  During the run up to becoming a chief, my father finally earned his Bachelor's degree from Cal State Long Beach in his 50s (which still impresses the heck out of me).  After retirement, he worked for many years teaching Fire Science at local colleges, to help men and women prepare for careers in firefighting.  As I have mentioned, there is something of the military in my father, and he blossomed under the organized environment of the fire department.

Plus, he genuinely made a difference.  I mean, I enjoy teaching and doing research.  But I have no illusions about my job:  I save no lives.  My father---personally---has saved dozens of lives and delivered many babies during emergency situations.  Every day, he made the world better in concrete ways that can be listed and applauded.  So I respect him not just as my father, but as someone who is truly a hero.  And why not?  Firefighters run into burning buildings to save other people.  Can you think of a better definition of "bravery" and "hero"?  I can't. 

My father tries to present himself as an "aw shucks" simple man, but he is very intelligent, thoughtful, and introspective.  He despised people receiving special privilege, hated prejudice (despite his salty and non-PC language), and generally stood up for fairness.  When women first began to become firefighters (we used to call people in the profession "firemen"!), my father was at first troubled, growing up where and when he was. Yet when he met young women willing to work hard, and devote themselves to the goal of becoming a firefighter, who were honest and honorable, my father became a big supporter of women in that profession...at a time when that point of view was not common.  

A most unusual man, though he would say something rude in response to that complement, I'm sure.

My father has an unusual sense of humor.  Yes, he loves to tease, and I learned quickly to not take the bait.  I well remember playing the card game "Uno" with my parents on one occasion.  My father kept "saving up" cards that would force me to draw more cards from the deck, passing up opportunities to use them strategically.

"Dad," I finally said, "why are you doing this?  You keep burying me in cards and Mom wins every game."

"You don't understand," he replied with a grin, moving an ever-present toothpick from one side of his mouth to the other.  "I don't care who wins as long as you lose."  And my father would grin his faux-evil grin at me.  

Yes, it was about the teasing, but the teasing was a form of affection.  He never did that kind of thing to people he didn't know or didn't like.

There is a lot to say about my father, because he was and is a very complex and interesting man.  To my father, being honorable and honest were the cornerstones of life.  He might try to cheat me a bit at cribbage, but he was as honest as a Roman judge otherwise.  Very, very high standards.  And a burning hatred for unfairness.  My father had seen much unfairness in his life, and insisted on fairness in his own sphere of influence.  I feel much the same way, in my little laboratory and in my classroom.

My father loves little kids, and always has.  Teenagers are a different story, yet he was fair and honest with me.  Remember, this is a tough man who had little, who worked at least two jobs while I was growing up, and was tired all of the time.  Dealing with "Emo" children such as myself who didn't like sports and were not "tough" was probably not his favorite pasttime.  Yet I forgot that, as a Captain on the LBFD (while I was a teenager), my father had a great deal of experience dealing with young men not a whole lot older than yours truly.

Once, when I was sixteen, I had had my adolescent heart broken by a young lady.  Dieseling on testosterone fumes, I asked my father for advice.  My brother was in college, and my mother visiting her own mother in Northern California.  Dad sat down, lit up one of his menthol cigarettes (which he smoked because no one would steal any from him at the fire station), and asked me to explain the situation.  So I did, in all my Emo glory.

My father considered the situation.  Took a draw on his cigarette.  Blew out the smoke like a dragon, and observed "Jeez, kid, you got a lot of free time."

At first, I was angry that he didn't honor my existential despair.  But the truth was different.  My father explained to me that we all have limited time on this planet, and got to choose how to spend that time.  Did I really want to spend a whole lot of time on that particular issue?  Then he laughed at me and clapped me on the shoulder.

My father is kind of an Eric Hoffer type:  a working class type of  philosopher.  Seriously, Hoffer wrote things that my father often said (and Hoffer is well worth your time, incidentally).

Later on, when I attended UCLA, I had some trouble in my classes.  For the first time in my life, I earned some bad grades.  Part of that was due (again) to my dieseling on testosterone fumes, and being too proud to ask for help (after all, I did pretty well in high school).  This was before the FERPA laws, so that the postcards with my college grades would arrive home for parental review each quarter.

Times have changed.

So my second quarter grades arrived that winter, and they were, um, decidedly not stellar.  My mother, rest her soul, let me have it with both barrels.  I dreaded my tired, overworked father getting home from the fire station after a 72 hour shift and giving me the business, only more so.

I will never forget sitting at the small table in our kitchen on Poinsettia street in Long Beach, California that day.  My father, toothpick in mouth, tapping the postcards on the table top.  

"Is this the best you can do?" he asked evenly.

I started to defend myself, to explain myself.  Working up some righteous indignation, since no one could possibly understand my life and challenges.  Forestalling all of this, my father held up his other hand.

"If this is the best job you can do, son," he told me, "then I am proud of you.  No one, and I mean no one, can ask for more than your best."  He paused, and tapped the postcards again on the tabletop.

"So one more time," he asked, his green eyes on mine, "is this the best you can do?"

I mumbled a bit, and allowed that I could have done better.

"Very good," my father replied.  "Now, how can I help you to do better?"

He found out about one of the jobs I had taken on campus, because I felt badly asking for spending money.  My father worked out a deal with me. He would give me a little money under the table, and I would quit the extra job, and study more.  

Bit by bit, my grades improved, though not like the grades my much smarter brother earned.  I had to sweat it more, and that is okay.  My mother would point this out (I miss you, Mom, but it is true).  Dad never did.  Not once.

As a senior in college, I was amazed to learn that I had gotten into PhD programs all over the country (my brother had talked me into applying to places I would normally not have considered possible).  My grades were good in my Biology major, but overall quite pedestrian.  I had done very well indeed on the GRE.  And I surely did love research.  I guess some admissions committees saw my potential.  So I was so happy to share with my father all these acceptances.

My father almost never cries.  But there were tears in his eyes when he said, "Son, I am so very proud of you.  But I am ashamed to tell you that I just can't afford to send you to places like Yale or Stanford.  It's a big honor, but I just can't do it."  I could see how much that cost him to say.  Pride is expensive, but my father worked so very hard, and pride in what he had created for his family was reasonable.  

I explained to him that each letter referred to a stipend that would pay my way (modestly).  At Yale and Stanford, there were NIH training grants, for example, that would pay my tuition, fees, and provide a (very small) living stipend.  My father couldn't get his brain wrapped around that concept; when my brother went to law school, the idea of loans made sense....despite what my offer letters explained.  In fact, when my father drove up to Palo Alto with me to start my graduate career, his last words before he drove off were "If they screw you over, kid, call me collect and I'll get right up here."

And that's the point about my father.  The life I chose made no sense to him at all...yet he did his best to help me out.  I wasn't as hard of a worker.  I wasn't athletic.  I wasn't tough.  But what I was, was my father's youngest son.  That counts for much more than a father who did understand academia, I think.

I could tell my going to graduate school and earning a PhD was a big deal to my father.  He even got me---one of the few "surprise" gifts I have ever received---a graduate school class ring!  He bought an old book, hollowed it out, and hid the ring inside.  I wear it in his honor.

As my father grew older, and retired, and helped my mother with her long struggle with cancer, I think that I learned to appreciate and understand my father better with each passing year.  What most people do not understand about my father (and it is true for my brother and I both) is that he likes to make people laugh, but is in fact a very serious person...and not particularly upbeat.

But we do like to make other people laugh! 

Here is my father with one of the few genuine smiles I have seen on his face, except when he is hugging his grandchildren.

That is not quite the faux-evil grin, but similar.  He is a character, my father.  My goal, growing up, was to make him laugh.  From time to time, I was successful.    

My father is from a generation that was decidedly not "touchy-feely."  Thus, there were many things I could not comfortably discuss with him.  Yet, we bonded over my becoming a father.  I was late to the fatherhood game, having my sons at 42 and 45.  When I called my father with news of my first son Anson's birth, my father said "Kid, now you have the tough job:  you have to be his father, not his friend."

It took me a while to realize that he wasn't talking about me being a father, at all.

Years later, I was standing in front of my parent's house in Mission Viejo, California, chatting with my father.  Down the street, I saw a man cross the street with two little children, heading to the local park.  

My father pointed at the distant figures with his cigarette.  "That fellow," he told me, "got laid off six months ago.  His wife went back to work, and he looks after the kids."  After a couple of puffs, he said "What must the kids think?"

Without thinking myself, I replied "That their father is taking them to the park."

It took me a while to realize I wasn't talking about the people down the street, either.

To my father, work was everything.  And because he worked so hard, he missed a great deal of his sons growing up...and knew it.  But he had to provide for his family.  That was Job #1.  

In 2005, when my sons were small, my wife and I moved to Tacoma, Washington.  And from that distance, my father got to see my children growing more quickly than I did, since I was there every day.  For example, here are Anson and Zachary the day before we moved to Tacoma:

And here they are on Friday, the last day of 7th grade for Anson, and the last day of 4th grade for Zachary:

There is a saying I like:  Time doesn't fly, it flees.

In every conversation with my father, he has emphasized being a good father, the best father possible.  He always cautions me that no one is perfect, but to do my best.  Even as my mother became very ill, and finally passed away.  And afterwards.  In each conversation I have with my father, he discusses how to be a good father with me, the ups and downs, the challenges and the successes.  I treasure those conversations.  I never thought I could have had those conversations with him, growing up.  

It was very sad to lose my mother, of course, and I have written about it before.  But I am glad that I talk with my father frequently, and that he came up to see us last Thanksgiving.  Here is a shot of he and I (with my hambone youngest son photo-bombing us in the back).

And here he is with my sons.  That is probably the most genuine smile I have ever seen from him.

Starting in January, my father has been fighting respiratory diseases.  He has been hospitalized twice, and has good days and bad days.  Our goal is to get him home, as soon as he can take care of himself (with some folks to help out with physical therapy and such).  

Hospitals are not fun for patients.  My uncle arranged for my father to have an iPad, and my brother's son Justin Martin has been teaching my father how to use it.  I hope that will help my father feel more connected.  Here he is today, enjoying some, um, non-hospital approved food (well, Carl's Junior is pretty good).

He is tired, and on the mend, but that's my Dad!

So, Dad, let me take this opportunity to say "thank you" for providing me with a home, for honoring my education (and helping out a lot), for standing by me through thick and through thin.  I would like to be 50% of the father you have been to me, to my own sons.  Whenever I feel stressed, I remember what you dealt with, and successfully.  Salute!

I read a lot of science fiction.  There is a great novella, written by Steven Popkes, called "The Egg."  In this story, a little boy is looked after by a strange alien creature called Gray.  Gray teaches the little boy important lessons, and none so important as what the alien calls "the three loves."

To Gray the alien nanny, the three loves are "Love of family, love of work, and love of duty...and always, always in that order."

My father would say much the same.

Happy Fathers' Day, Dad!  I can't wait until you get home from the hospital, so we can play some cribbage.  My family up here in Tacoma loves you, and most especially so do I.

Graduation, Richard Feynman, and Choosing the Right Career

Because we just had graduation here at the University of Puget Sound (even though I was out of state at the ASMCUE and ASM meetings), the idea of student potential and career choices has been much on my mind.  Especially as a I grade final exams of freshmen!

Then I saw this wonderful image on Facebook.

Thanks to advice from talented science artist and all around cool dude Glendon Mellow, I have been trying to chase down images and give them proper credit in blog posts and elsewhere (it makes sense:  I don't like it when people steal images from my CafePress site---it's insulting to the wonderful artist Kaitlin Reiss as well as yours truly).  It turns out the image was to be found here, with a nice explanation I suggest interested folks marvel at as they read.  The image of an atom itself, complete with wave function---a tiny periscope into the spooky quantum world!  Amazing!

This image reminded me of a wonderful essay by the late, great Richard Feynman (background information here and here).  Feynman's books, essays, and videos have long had quite an impact on me.  

But first, a typically Feynman story, that actually happened to me as an undergraduate.  In the 1970s, when dinosaurs ruled the planet (according to my students), I was an undergraduate at UCLA.  I had always loved science, and the ideas of astrophysics enthralled me.  Even though I struggled with higher mathematics, I felt drawn to the field.

After winning his Nobel Prize in 1965, the always iconoclastic and unusual Feynman came to hate the adulation and attention he received.  So he would often give seminars "incognito," using an assumed name, to actually meet with real students instead of acolytes.  Thus, he came to UCLA to give a lecture on "The Structure of the Atom," but I had been clued in by a friend in the Physics Department:  it was Feynman, he of the "Feynman Lectures in Physics!"

Oh, such a lecture that day!  Feynman was exactly, precisely, as he was in the videos that many of you have seen, and that I adore:  theatrical, fast, irreverent, and full of fun.  Not at all stodgy or arrogant, though he was clearly brilliant beyond words.  Complicated things like quantum electrodynamics suddenly seemed straightforward, real, clearly correct as he paced the stage.  Feynman was a little younger at the time, but this video gives the best flavor of how he talked with undergraduates like myself.  The lesson in that particular video has stayed with me for a lot of years. If you haven't seen it, I recommend you watch it, and smile...as I always do when I see it.

And I got to talk with Feynman after his talk, Styrofoam coffee cup in my hand, untasted.  He looked at me, really looked, and for once I wasn't tongue tied in front of famous people.  Feynman was interested in what people thought.  Even me.  So I told him that I loved his lecture, but that I was sad, because though I could see the outlines of his ideas (such as his wonderful artistic manner of describing quantum electrodynamics), I didn't "speak the language" of mathematics.  And I was coming to the sad conclusion that I never would.  I was a blind man admiring a rainbow, or so it felt to me.

My wife is a mathematician, and doesn't believe me, but I strongly feel that "getting" higher mathematics is a knack, and that you must have the talent for it, like music or athletics.  And I could see the forest of what physics meant, but not the trees themselves, to mix my metaphors.

Feynman just smiled at my emotional outburst.  "Kiddo," he told me (and he talked just like that), "Don't sweat it.  Find what you love in science, and do that.  You'll know it when you see it."

Then he looked from side to side, that impish grin growing on his face, and back at me.  "Besides," he said, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, "Most physicists?  Putzes."

I didn't know any Yiddish, but I got his point. We both laughed, and he shook my hand. 

And so I delved into biology in the coming years, and found my One True Professional Love:  the microbial world.  I believe what Feynman told me:  you have to have a passion for the science you do, and you will know it when you find it.  You can't help it.  You will burn to know more, to "get it," to tell everyone about it.  The New Age writer and pseudo-guru, Carlos Castaneda, called it "a path with heart."  And so it is, for me.  I knew, just knew, that microbiology was my calling.  Which is why I get called a microbial supremacist, I suppose. 

Which brings us back to the photograph of the atom, above.

I have read a lot of books about Richard Feynman, because I admire much about his approach to science, and clear love of life.  Plus, he just makes me laugh.  But there is a book about him that means a great deal to me personally:  "Feynman's Rainbow:  the Creative Mind," by Leonard Mlodinow, written in 2003.  Mlodinow was a postdoctoral scholar in physics at Caltech toward the end of Feynman's life.  Mlodinow kept looking for wisdom from Feynman (and who can blame him?), even though his efforts sometimes appeared to irritate the scientist, then ill with cancer.  At the end of the book, Mlodinow talks with Feynman about how a person can know she or he are studying the right thing in science, both as a topic and as a career.  

I have read the excerpt that follows to many people in my life, and handed out dozens of copies of the book to undergraduate students.  To me, it is like a lamp shining the way to, again, a "path with heart."   The passage summarizes how I feel about science and about life.  I know that my brother Jack Martin understands why this is so important to me.  I'm pretty sure that my friend Gregory Benford sees it clearly, since he is a physicist, too, and has known me for many years.  I hope that my wife Jennifer Quinn sees how this is at my center as a person.  And I pray that my sons learn the lessons contained.

I don't know if it actually happened the way that Mlodinow describes, but it is very reminescent of my own short conversation with Feynman so many years before.  Regardless, it hit me like a ton of bricks.  Mlodinow starts first, with Feynman replying.

"Okay, then . . . thanks for all the . . . conversations we've had. Whether or not you've taught me anything, I've enjoyed them." 

"Look, if you're going to insist that I've taught you something, I guess I should give you a final exam." 

"Really?"

"One question."

"Sure."

"Go look at an electron microscope photograph of an atom, okay? Don't just glance at it. It is very important that you examine it very closely. Think about what it means."

"Okay."

"And then answer this question. Does it make your heart flutter?"

"Does it make my heart flutter?"

"Yes or no. It's a yes or no question. No equations allowed."

"All right, I'll let you know."

"Don't be dense. I don't need to know. You need to know. This exam is self-graded. And it's not the answer that counts, it's what you do with the information."

We locked eyes. His younger face flashed in my mind. The energetic, smiling bongo drum player I had seen pictured in the front of his book, The Feynman Lectures on Physics. A question popped from my lips.

"Do you have any regrets?" I said.

Feynman didn't snap back that it was none of my business. He didn't do anything for a moment. I wondered if he would open up about his frustration with quantum chromodynamics. But then his eyes welled up with tears.

"Sure," he said. "I regret that I might not live to see my daughter, Michelle, grow up."

That passage always makes me emotional on a number of levels.  Which brings me back to career choices for students.

It's easy for students to begin research projects like a job, instead of a calling.  But science is an unusual profession:  it's like a love affair with the universe.  Sometimes the universe loves you back.  Other times, it is unrequited love.  For me, I just knew...even if I am not at an RO1 institution with graduate students and postdocs.  So I teach undergraduates, and have a small research program with them.  There are many things I cannot do, but at the same time, many things I can.  

And I know in my bones that it is the best, the only, job for me.  So I tell my students as they graduate, hoping they will find the same path I did, to a profession that they adore.

And Feynman was right:  ask yourself if what you plan to do for a career excites you.  If it makes your heart flutter.  Because, if it does, it is indeed a "path with heart."  

ASMCUE, Citizen Science, and a Surprise!

It's important to go to scientific conferences, especially if one teaches and does research in a small liberal arts institution.  It can be easy to lose that "spark" of enthusiasm for science, or the ability to network/share experiences with colleagues, otherwise.  I try to go to two sets of meetings per year:  the West Coast Bacterial Physiologists conference in Asilomar, California in December, and the dual American Society for Microbiology General Meeting and the American Society for Microbiology Conference for Undergraduate Educators in May or June.  The latter two conferences are usually back-to-back or overlap for one day.

I have been attending ASMCUE meetings for quite a few years now.  I have developed strong friendships and a network of colleagues with whom I can share ideas or gain advice about microbiology education.  This year, the ASM-sponsored conferences were both held in Denver, Colorado.  It was a lovely time---I had a chance to attend exciting "cutting edge" talks, catch up with old friends and colleagues, make new friends, physically meet with fellow microbiology enthusiasts from Twitter (whom I call "microtweeple" or "microtweeps"), and even visit with former students attending the meetings (which is the big payoff for me, as an educator) or otherwise living near Denver.

During ASMCUE, I was quite excited to attend a wonderful talk on "Citizen Science." This idea---outreach of science to the public, or even how to obtain a bit of funding from the public---is increasingly important, not simply because external funding is difficult to get these days.  More important, I think, is the ability to inform the public of what we do in the lab, that it is exciting, and why they should care that we do science in the first place!  We often hear that the public doesn't "understand science."  This may or may not be true; what is true is that we scientists can and should do something about it.  Outreach can be a large part of this strategy, and it is increasingly clear to me that the public is receptive.  

Dr. Nicole Garneau, of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, has a fascinating project in which she involves the public:  the genetics of taste perception.  Dr. Garneau was enthusiastic, energetic, and a superb spokesperson for "citizen science."  During her talk, she described the myriad ways in which the public could become involved with science, and the benefits---direct and indirect---of doing so.  During her talk, Dr. Garneau briefly mentioned how students could explore the connection between science and art in an educational setting, and showed a familiar image from my own past!

  
Yes, that is an image of my former student Kayla, who extracted pigments from bacteria and then created paintings using those pigments---joining microbiology and art in an effective and evocative fashion.  I took the above photograph myself, and realized Dr, Garneau had found it on my own blog post describing the linkage of art and pedagogy and microbiology!

Surprised and a bit excited, I stood up during the talk, and exclaimed "I know that student!"

Dr. Garneau (whom I had never met) smiled and replied "And I know you, Mark Martin."  She then had a few kind words about my blog and that particular post.  In fact, I asked Dr. Garneau if she would pose next to that slide after her talk.  She did so, charmingly, as you can see:

The point here goes beyond my feeling flattered that anyone, let alone Dr. Garneau, reads this blog.  It demonstrates that we are all connected via social media, and often in ways we might not expect.  And it underscored Dr. Garneau's larger point, that there are many ways in which science and the public can engage one another in productive and interesting ways.

It was quite a nice feeling for me, to be honest.  And I contacted Kayla who was very excited to learn that a small side-project she and I had carried out a couple of years ago still created some buzz outside Tacoma, Washington.

Albert Einstein is reputed to have said "If you cannot explain what you do to your grandmother, you do not understand it yourself."  There is much truth to that, regardless if it is an accurate quotation. As scientists, we must "preach" about our science to students and the public.  We rely on science in modern society, and increasingly so.  One way to help the "outreach" of science to society is by approaches such as those championed by Dr. Garneau and others involved in "citizen science."

I should add that there was an entire (and quite exciting) session on "Citizen Science" at the ASM General Meeting later that week.  Dr. Jonathan Eisen of UC Davis co-Chaired an entire session on that topic, which was quite remarkable.  He describes it here.

Do give some thought about how to best explain the excitement of your field of research to others---other scientists, students, and the educated layperson.  It is an important part of being a scientist, I think.  Perhaps one of the most important parts of being a scientist, in fact.

Mothers' Day, Marcus Aurelius, and Microbiology

Just a quick post on this particular day, which is more than a little bittersweet to me.  It is Mothers' Day, as it happens, and it is also my first Mothers' Day without my being able to call my mother, Wanda Jean Martin, to thank her.  On the other hand, I get to celebrate how my wife, Dr. Jennifer J. Quinn, is a wonderful and beloved mother to our two sons Anson and Zachary.

My mother died last October, after a long and extraordinarily brave struggle against ovarian cancer.  I wrote about my mother and her struggle here, and discussed her relationship to my interest in microbiology.  My mother, unlike the mothers of some scientists, understood little of my love of science.  But she did her best to support it, in the ways that mothers always have, and hopefully always will.  My mother would gamely sit through all those PBS shows on science, come to science fairs, and listen perplexedly as I prattled on about what I was learning.  I don't think my mother had an easy time raising either of her sons.  I am grateful, and try to remember my mother's example when my own sons develop interests I do not share.

Here is my mother, in a photograph taken on Thanksgiving in 2011, with my eldest son Anson (who is SO much older looking now after not even two years).  She detested her photograph being taken (as I do), but was a good sport about it; this is a photograph that really shows my mother as she was in conversation.

I was teaching my Fall semester Microbiology course during the time that my mother entered hospice care and passed away.  I spoke with her a couple of times a week during the process, but she was increasingly more focused on her pain and the latter part of her journey.  I cannot complain; anyone who survives over ten years with Stage IIIC ovarian cancer is "Chuck Norris" tough (though, again, my mother did not think she was tough).  

Losing my mother impacted me, of course.  And my microbiology students noticed.  They made for me this shirt.

 It's kind of a visual pun.  My initials spell "mom" which seems endlessly amusing at first (I'm philosophical about it).  So I am often called "Dr. Mom" or something similar by students.  But the shirt is about my mother, about me, and about microbiology.  I don't often get gifts from students, and never from a class.  

I was deeply touched, and grateful. 

Two memories about my mother are particularly relevant on this special day, and I would like to share them.
  
When I was in junior high school, I carried out a science project investigating the memory of planarians.  Briefly stated, I was able to train these flatworms to associate darkness with an electrical shock.  Because they are so skilled at regeneration, I was able to cut the flatworms into two, and the pieces grew new heads and new tails.  The "head portion," after regrowing a tail, "remembered" the conditioned response (perhaps not so strange, given the presence of a primitive brain).  But so did the "tail portion," once regeneration was complete!

I did not know that this underscored the "distributed location of memory" theory that was all the rage in neuroscience at the time.  So, as an 8th grader, I was recognized with a national award (along with several other members of my class).  I received letters from congresscritters and faculty members from universities, encouraging me to go to graduate school and become a scientist.  

That was when I first became utterly certain about a career (though I ended up a microbiologist, rather than a neuroscientist).   

This project was weird beyond belief to my parents.  Since I was unable to type at the time (long before word processors), my long suffering mother typed the application and report (putting aside her beloved "Laverne and Shirley" on television).  She told me not to get my hopes up, and kept asking me how all of this applied to people.  To be kind to the flatworms (which confused my 13 year old brain).   I did my best to answer her questions.  And I didn't have my hopes up about winning any awards.
  
But instead, I received exactly the kind of encouragement with that award that I needed to solidify my career choice. So, like most people on this day, I have much to thank my mother for.  She was awfully humble.  I would like to close with an interesting comparison.

My brother, Jack S. Martin, Jr. (a retired contract attorney and now a budding novelist) was always encouraging me with new books, new ideas, and endless stories.  It was my brother who first introduced me to a wonderful book of philosophy by the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius.  His "Meditations" (which he called "To Myself," since he had written the book as self-reflection) was a revelation.  The Stoic philosophy seemed to "fit" so well into my psyche, and his words engraved themselves into my heart and soul.

My brother Jack recognized and encouraged my interest in this Emperor, his philosophy, and his reign.  For that reason, he got me a silver denarius minted during the reign of Marcus Aurelius as a gift.  I carry it with me daily.

I remember, many years ago, discussing Marcus Aurelius with my mother (probably after "Gladiator" came out, which gave an, um, unusual view of that period of Roman history, and Marcus Aurelius in particular).  My mother asked me why I liked the book so much.  I told her it has so much deep philosophy to it.  Like what, she asked?  So I quoted:

"Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be.  Be one."

My mother's forehead wrinkled a bit and she frowned.  

"That's not such a big deal, Mark," she said.  "Pretty obvious.  Everyone should live that way.  And he was some bigshot philosopher?" 

You and the Emperor are right, Mom.  We should all live that way.  Thank you for being my mother.  You---and your lessons---are not forgotten.

Love and miss you.