| 01-04-2007 - Traces, n. 4
Washington, DC Event The Aftershock of a Presence A concert and a reception offered upon the occasion of a prestigious promotion. Above all, a chance to witness the beauty that unites life and work by Thomas Tobin Recently, my friend Maria Teresa Landi offered a reception to her friends and colleagues upon the occasion of her becoming a tenured cancer investigator at The National Institutes of Health. In attendance were leading figures in cancer research from the most prestigious centers in America: NIH, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Stanford, and the Mayo Clinic. “Only Wonder Knows” titled the program, which included a quote from Fr. Giussani that helped to clarify what was so exceptional about the evening: “When a person begins to feel the expectation of the heart that is awakened by music, his soul immediately harkens to await another thing…and here the search begins.” In his comments before the concert, Dr. Joseph Fraumeni, a prominent researcher and discoverer of a cancer syndrome that bears his name, pondered the origin of Tere’s great passion, which he described as exceptional “even after adjusting for her Italian heritage.” Then Neil Caporaso, supervisor and long-time colleague of Tere, in speculating about why talented minds work in research, posited that there is an attraction to the mysteries in reality, what he called “the intractable, unsolvable problems.” The concert of classical, jazz, and traditional music was a small miracle of beauty that left even the musicians–Chris Vath, Valentina Oriani Patrick, Jonathan Fields, Emily Yang, and Marta Pettenella–surprised by the outcome. Chris talked about the ultimate desire for happiness that cries out in each of man’s actions, even in the most dramatic situations, like those recounted in the Yiddish songs sung by Marta, filled with love and with poignant memories from the concentration camps. Many of Tere’s colleagues are Jewish, and they were very moved by these songs. Before the concluding piece from Rachmaninoff, a section of Chapter Ten of The Religious Sense was read: “If I were to open my eyes for the first time in this instant, emerging from my mother’s womb, I would be overwhelmed by the wonder and awe of things as a ‘presence.’ I would feel the aftershock of a presence…”–and no words could express better the event we were participating in. At the end, Tere, simply thanked Fr. Giussani, “the man who taught me a way, a method to look, to judge, to know, which is at the basis of my research.” Tere added that that very day–February 22nd–was the second anniversary of the death of that man who made her seek the beauty we tasted that night. Her colleagues applauded for quite a long time; as some said afterwards, they were grateful for something they all experienced, but could not explain. Among the many notes Tere received after the concert, one colleague wrote, “Dear Tere: I told the others about this wonderful experience that will change, from now on, my way to work.” Another researcher wrote to Tere: “It was as beautiful as you are. I am trying to remember, but can not, any celebration of life that I have ever been to. Only births, funerals, weddings… But this was something else… What?” The challenge |