COA Magazine: Vol 9. No 1. Spring 2013 by College of the Atlantic

COA

The College of the Atl antic Mag a zine Volume 9 . Number 1 . Spring 2013

WAYS OF WELLNESS

COA The College of the Atlantic Magazine

Ways of Wellness Letter from the President

News from Campus

Food for Thought • Surya Karki '16

Wellness 11 The Yin and Yang of Peter Wayne '83

Human Ecology on Steroids • Three Alumni Doctors of Emergency Care

Bloodlines and Bodywork • Carmen Bedard-Gautrais '07

An Integrative Life • Christopher Todd Kitchens '06

The Art of Honnie Goode, MPhil '06

Re(de)fining Global Health • Rachel Snow '81

My Brain Cancer Diary • Bogart Salzberg '96

The Search for Balanced Imbalance • Perspectives from Student Life

Research Successes • Steven King '80 and Clifton E. McPherson '84

Aoife O'Brien '05 • Babycatcher

Discovering Cures

A Life of Kindness, A World of Hope • Father James M. Gower

Alumni and Community Notes

To Err is Human • Year After Year Donors

Japanese Beetles • Poetry by Anneke Hart '16

John Anderson's History of Natural History

COA students Rachel Drattler '14 and Will Fuller '16 practice tai chi (see page 12). Photo by Becca Haydu '16.

COA The College of the Atlantic Magazine Volume 9 · Number 1 · Spring 2013

Editorial Editor Donna Gold Editorial Guidance John Anderson Sarah Baker Marni Berger '09 Rich Borden Lynn Boulger Dru Colbert Ken Cline Michael Griffith '09 Sarah Haughn '08 Helen Hess Jennifer Hughes Katharine Macko Danielle Meier '08 Editorial Consultant Bill Carpenter Alumni Consultants Jill Barlow-Kelley Dianne Clendaniel

Design Art Director

Rebecca Hope Woods

COA Administration President Darron Collins '92 Dean of Admission Sarah Baker Dean of Institutional Lynn Boulger Advancement Associate Dean for Faculty Ken Cline Administrative Dean Andrew Griffiths Academic Dean Kenneth Hill Dean of Student Life Sarah Luke Associate Dean Sean Todd for Advanced Studies

COA Board of Trustees Becky Ann Baker Dylan Baker Ronald E. Beard Leslie C. Brewer Alyne Cistone Nikhit D'Sa '06 William G. Foulke, Jr. Amy Yeager Geier George B.E. Hambleton Elizabeth D. Hodder Philip B. Kunhardt III '77 Anthony Mazlish Suzanne Folds McCullagh

Sarah A. McDaniel '93 Linda McGillicuddy Jay McNally '84 Stephen G. Milliken Philip S.J. Moriarty Phyllis Anina Moriarty Hamilton Robinson, Jr. Walter Robinson Nadia Rosenthal Marthann Lauver Samek Henry L.P. Schmelzer William N. Thorndike, Jr. Cody van Heerden

Life Trustees Samuel M. Hamill, Jr. John N. Kelly Susan Storey Lyman William V.P. Newlin John Reeves Henry D. Sharpe, Jr. Clyde E. Shorey, Jr.

Trustee Emeriti David Hackett Fischer Sherry F. Huber Daniel Pierce Helen Porter Cathy L. Ramsdell '78 John Wilmerding

The faculty, students, trustees, staff, and alumni of College of the Atlantic envision a world where people value creativity, intellectual achievement, and diversity of nature and human cultures. With respect and compassion, individuals construct meaningful lives for themselves, gain appreciation of the relationships among all forms of life, and safeguard the heritage of future generations.

COA is published biannually for the College of the Atlantic community. Please send ideas, letters, and submissions (short stories, poetry, and revisits to human ecology essays) to: COA Magazine, College of the Atlantic 105 Eden St, Bar Harbor, ME 04609 dgold@coa.edu

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There is little that has given me as much pleasure over the past nine years as talking to students about a project, a play, a future, or simply hearing their enthusiasm — their love — for this college. But what does it mean to love COA? Yes, there are the moods of Frenchman Bay, the shifts in the ocean's color; there are the friendships begun, and the insights gained. But I think loving COA is more even than that — more akin to loving something sacred within ourselves — a love of learning, yes — but also a recognition that learning is about awareness, about attending to the world with our whole beings: mind, body, soul. It is working hard, and laughing hard — usually about ourselves; it is heading into Acadia National Park for a brisk bicycle ride and returning to work and think and talk and laugh some more. This fluid intensity shaped at COA is what ultimately forms the healthy balance of a human life. This may have been something I knew — but it took a conversation with five wise students — resident advisors all — to articulate it. Actually, I believe it took the conversation "The Search for Balanced Imbalance" (see page 32), for all six of us to articulate it. This very possibly explains the essence of a COA education, and why we appreciate it so much. None of us knows where learning will emerge: From books? Solitude? Classes? A moment on Dorr Mountain? A talk with friends? Some painful hurt? A joyful recognition? At COA we recognize that the spark that generates comprehension most likely comes from some combination of all of the above. COA's idealism, the belief that lives can be creative, useful, productive, lovely — and healthy — has had a powerful impact on many, including me! With this magazine, I am choosing a different form of balanced imbalance, leaving my full-time position as COA's public relations director, retaining only my role as editor of this magazine, on a very part-time basis. Thanks in part to the constant reminders by students that life is about more than working, I am choosing time to notice the ocean, take walks, read long novels, write, tend plants, and talk into the night with friends, as I so often did when I was a student like them. I hope in this way, I can better shape and model my own imbalanced balance.

Donna Gold, COA editor

Front cover: Witch Hazel (Hamamelis virginiana) by Lilliana Demers '13, from her senior project "A Study of the Local Healing Plants: Form, Color, and Spirit" The bark and leaves of witch hazel are used medicinally primarily for their astringent and cooling properties. Witch hazel is a potent painkiller, has antioxidant properties, and is one of the best wound herbs, used to stop bleeding and soothe internal and external inflammations. It is particularly useful for intestinal bleeding, bruises, varicose veins, hemorrhoids, dermatitis, sunburn, diarrhea, and more. Difficult to prepare, it is best to buy.

From the President: Darron Collins '92, PhD On a recent trip to Australia, some malicious virus found its way into my lungs and left me with one of the worst coughs I've ever had. Weeks passed but the cough didn't. I reached out to the COA community for help. Within thirty minutes, I had fifty-eight responses in my inbox: change your sleeping position, brew this herbal concoction, consume this quantity of alcohol (and a bit of honey), pray, rub Vicks on your feet and in your nostrils, go to the doctor and get a prescription for codeine and sleeping pills. The most important revelation from the experience was the sheer volume of interest in and (real or imagined) expertise in health. The democratization of information in our new digital world clearly has spawned a democratization of information

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about the subject. Everyone seems wrapped up in issues of health and well-being: how to achieve it and how to hold onto it, how to improve it and how to foster it among larger social groups. We experiment on ourselves, we reach out to socially recognized experts, we anoint ourselves as experts. More COA students are going into medical and health professions now than when I was a student twentyplus years ago. But interest in the relationship between human health, community health, and ecological health has been a cornerstone of our teaching and learning and practice since our inception. This issue of COA demonstrates that we've been applying human ecology to human health and well-being for four decades.

The articles that follow indicate that there are many avenues to medical school and other medical fields beyond a formal pre-med major. Our students excel at graduate level work and within the profession because of human ecology, not in spite of it. They bring the hands-on experience, the interdisciplinary perspective, the selfdesigned curriculum, and the passion for making large-impact changes, just as every human-ecologist-as-marinescientist, human-ecologist-as-graphicdesigner, and human-ecologist-aseducator does. Enjoy the issue and feel free to send me your own remedies for a pernicious, enduring cough.

NEWS

from campus

Lindsey Nielsen '12 Blum show combines science and art

Student "pop-up" dinner raises $801 for Share the Harvest

Dan DenDanto '91 turns whale bones into art in portland

November December January The Chronicle of Higher Education features the title, "Tiny College Nurtures Big Ideas." The subject, COA! A $146,032 grant from the Davis Educational Foundation enables science faculty members John Anderson, Don Cass, Sarah Hall, and Nishanta Rajakaruna '94, along with Gordon Longsworth '91, GIS lab director, to create interdisciplinary courses featuring hands-on research on the entirety of the 25-mile watershed of Mount Desert Island's Northeast Creek.

Students transform Gates for a "Reverie"

february Calling COA a place where students are "focused on creating positive change," Princeton Review includes COA in its The Best Value Colleges: 2013 Edition. That's the third time in four years. COA's solar electric car charging station opens to the public with great fanfare â&#x20AC;&#x201D; including a notice in the New York Times. COA now has a fossil fuel-emissionsfree route between our two farms and the college; we also offer free solarelectric charges to anyone in need on campus and at at Beech Hill Farm. 4

COA's 12-member Earth In Brackets delegation apply their learning and passion to organizing and communicating at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Doha, Qatar. Six students and alumni survey birds, mammals, and Great Duck Island itself during COA's first winter study on the island. With high winds, huge snows, freezing temperatures, and rafts of purple sandpipers, the six name their time "The Best Journey in the World."

Alex Borowicz '13 heads to Mount Desert Rock to launch a multi-year grey seal population survey, finding 550 seals in residence. He also assists a sea-spray study by folks from the Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory and NorthWest Research Associates, with Chris Tremblay '03. COA teams up with the international social media platform Project Noah to enhance nature education and citizen science. www.projectnoah.org Dec, Feb, and April images by Sune Anderson '16.

launch of meetmeatthewhaleskull.tumblr.com

March COA divests from all fossil fuel investments! Erica Georgaklis '14, Will Batt '14, and Ian Medeiros '16 receive Maine Space Grant Consortium Research Fellowships for botanical research. Will and Erica also receive Garden Club of America scholarships. And Erica, fascinated by medicinal plants, joins nine other COA students to present to the Northeast Undergraduate Research and Development Symposium at University of New England.

Earth Day 2013

April Louis Rabineau, COA's third president, is remembered in a celebration and dedication of The Lou Rabineau Educational Studies Center in The Turrets. New York Times education editor collaborates with COA for a "pop quiz" in its Earth Day edition of Education Life. On Earth Day weekend, Kyle Shank '14 organizes a Conference on Cooperation, Community, and Complexity: Imagining a New Economy for the 21st Century, in conjunction with the New Economics Institute.

Check out more stories and photos at newsworthy.coa.edu

Camden Challenge When time opened up at February's annual Camden Conference on world affairs, ten COA students were ready. Well-versed in the topic from taking The Arab Awakening and Emerging Issues in the Middle East class with political economics faculty member Gray Cox and political science lecturer Lucy Creevey, they proposed a twohour session, "Alternative Middle Eastern Voices Heard through Social Media." The students presented video clips, followed by an hour of open discussion. The give-and-take was intense says Gray, "tears and all."

Throughout the conference, continues Gray, "the students asked lots of thoughtful, penetrating questions that demonstrated that they could push issues in respectful but forceful ways." They even took the moderator, former ambassador and current Harvard professor Nick Burns, to task with some challenging questions regarding the human cost of sanctions on civilians in Iran — sanctions the ambassador helped design. Instead of being irritated, he publicly praised the COA students for their example of asking tough questions that challenged authority.

Next year's conference is "The Global Politics of Food and Water," and COA is planning another social media session. Stay tuned! COA participation at the Camden Conference: top, from left, Marissa Gilmour '16, Christina Tellez '16, Nada Zidan '15, Michael Santivasci '15, Brittany Cooper '15, Graham Hallett '16; bottom: Kyle Shank '14, Jane Nurse '13, Rachel Wells '15, Taggart Wass '14, Gray Cox.

Come graduation, seniors Lisa Bjerke and Graham Reeder will be packing for a world journey, each equipped with $25,000 from the Thomas J. Watson Foundation and the title of "Watson Fellow," as they spend a year on a project of their dreams. Lisa will look at composting systems in Germany, China, Bangladesh, and Japan for the voyage she calls, "It is a Waste to Call it Waste: Exploring the Culture of Compost." Graham will head to Malawi, Burkina Faso, Bangladesh, Malaysia, and the Maldives for his project, "Preparing for a Changing Climate: CommunityBased Adaptation Strategies." For her quest, Lisa asks, "What would happen if we adopted nature's model that nothing is ever wasted; therefore, there is no such thing as food waste?" She will be investigating traditional and modern municipal composting systems "to understand how

Photo by Becca Haydu '16.

COA's Two Watson Fellows

composting might become an integral part of human culture so we can continue to create this life-sustaining resource." While Lisa has been a hands-inthe-dirt activist, Graham's focus has been on diplomatic efforts to reverse climate change. This year, however, he'll be hands-on, assisting small, vulnerable communities in projects geared to addressing the rising sea levels, increased temperatures, decreased rain, and overall unpredictable weather patterns of climate change. "If every

Check out more stories and photos at newsworthy.coa.edu

UN negotiator or NGO worker started their day thinking of a time they spent participating in a community adaptation project … I am convinced that the decisions made in cities like New York and Geneva would move a lot faster and in a much healthier direction," he writes, explaining his longing for hands-on work. The two are among this year's forty fellows chosen by the foundation from thirty-one colleges. Since 1984, COA has sent thirty-two Watson Fellows off on dream journeys — including President Darron Collins '92. 5

Energy Framework The word is out. COA is no longer "carbon neutral." While the college works hard to reduce and avoid carbon emissions, mostly we achieved neutrality through purchasing offsets. Spurred by students, COA came to realize that as useful as offsets can be, they were making us lazy — we weren't really working on getting our campus up to snuff. We also realized something else: COA's greatest contribution to the environment is our students. So our energy framework focuses on eliminating the use of fossil fuels on campus while involving students in each step of the process

so they can head out into the world as energy-savvy proponents of change. "Our goal is to make COA a laboratory where students, faculty, and staff can explore the diverse prospects of a more sustainable future," reads the preamble to COA's new energy framework. "A central part of our energy plan will include classes and project-based learning where students practice the interdisciplinary skills needed to promote responsible energy use. Students will be involved in the design, construction, maintenance, and monitoring of all

necessary changes on our main campus, islands, and farms." It continues, "These experiences will prepare students to become advocates for the ecological integrity of the climate and the planet [helping] to shape a sustainable world for countless generations to come." First step? Installing 204 photovoltaic panels this summer on the Kathryn W. Davis Student Residence Village and at the Peggy Rockefeller Farms to provide about 7 percent of our annual electricity.

Healing Turrets COA's beloved icon, The Turrets, is ailing. The very turrets for which it is named are cracking; its slate roofing shingles are slipping off. And the energy efficiency, well, when Curry Caputo '95 of Sustainable Structures Inc. measured the building he discovered that it operates as if we had a 61" x 61" opening to the great outdoors.

Naming opportunities, original roof slates, and Save Turrets bumper stickers are available as a means of supporting the project.

E TURRETS V A

COA first restored and renovated The Turrets in the 1970s after years of disrepair. Originally, one hundred men spent two years building this stone treasure, quarrying the 42,500 cubic feet of granite from near Eagle Lake, using draft horses to drag the blocks over the five miles. It was built in 1893 as a wedding gift by candle and soap magnate John Josiah Emery for his bride, the 18-year-old Lela Alexander. Architect Bruce Price designed The Turrets while also creating the storied Château Frontenac in Québec City.

Beyond the roof and turrets, ninetynine new windows and a parcel of new doors will improve energy efficiency. Additional work includes a new copper drainage system and roof flashing, twelve-inch repointing of the granite over 40 percent of the exterior and three-inch repointing over another

For more on the restoration, or to assist the project, call 207-801-5620, or go to coa.edu/saveturrets.

A $500,000 gift has spurred the college's fundraising drive to cover the necessary renovations. By publication, more than one-third of the $2 million goal has been raised. The remainder of the project's $3.4 million cost will be borrowed.

30 percent, reconstruction of granite chimneys, and new exterior woodwork.

Repairs have begun. While staff and faculty continue inside their offices, granite chimneys are being chipped out, slate roof tiles pried off — and earplugs have become more prized even than a Morning Glory muffin.

AT L AN

T IC B A R H A R B OR , M

WW A I NE

CO W.

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Food for Thought

Surya Karki '16 and the Maya Universe Academy in Nepal Surya Karki is on a mission. He wants the people in his home country of Nepal to have the resources necessary for a full life. Food, yes. But also education. While still a teenager, Surya, now 21, co-founded the Maya Universe Academy, or MUA, with fellow countryman, and former COA student Manjil Rana ('12). MUA is the first free private elementary school in Nepal recognized by the government — a country where nearly 40 percent of children still do not complete primary school, in part because families cannot afford tuition. There are now Maya Academies in three towns. The hands-on, community-centered approach inspired other COA students to get involved. Urs Riggenbach '12 set up an open-source solar- and steamgenerated electricity system for the first campus. He now serves on the Maya board with Joseph Leyden '11. To support the schools and bring more sustenance to the villages, two of the schools have farms attached. Parents are asked to work two days a month on these farms. Forty percent of the profit from food sales — whether it be coffee, fruit, or cardamom — goes to the community; 60 percent to Maya Academy. This summer, Surya returns to Nepal to create a sustainable farm at the most recent school. His expenses will be paid by a $10,000 Kathryn W. Davis Projects for Peace award. Surya's not stopping there. When he met Nobel Prize winner Muhammad Yunus at the Clinton Global Initiative University this spring, Yunos was so impressed with Surya's dreams that he signed on as an advisor and offered Surya an internship. A few weeks later, Surya was in Bremen, College of the Atlantic Magazine

Germany at Jacobs University, as a finalist for a business plan for yet another project. Surya attributes his vision and dedication to his mother, a single mom with no education who taught Surya math by lying on a hillside counting the stars. She insisted her children dream big — up to those stars. "She would say, 'If you don't aim, you are lost,'" says Surya who was barefoot when he left his rural farmland for a boarding school in Kathmandu. There are few roads in the Sankhuwasabha district south of Mt. Everest where he was born. "You walk up a hill, then you walk straight along the hills, then you come down the hill, and walk straight some more," he says, describing his walk to the road that would take him to Kathmandu. He doesn't mention that the "hills" he is describing are the height of Mount Katahdin, the "walk" took seven hours, and that Surya was only eight. The bus Surya climbed onto that day was the first he had seen. Shortly thereafter, a bloody civil war broke out in Nepal and it became unsafe for boys to travel; it was nine years before he saw his mother again. Surya left soon after for Venezuela to attend the former Simón Bolívar United World College of Agriculture, receiving an associate degree in agriculture — while mobilizing fellow students to expand the school's industrial agriculture curriculum to classes in sustainable agriculture. When not raising funds, writing grants, creating proposals, or engaging youth at the United Nations, Surya is studying economics, calculus, and international policy at COA. Surya Karki '16, in green, is surrounded by students at Maya Universe Academy. Co-founder Manjil Rana ('12), in a hood, is above him. Photo by Joseph Leyden '11.

Nadia Rosenthal Re-Imagining the Body and the Campus By Donna Gold

For most of her life, COA trustee Nadia Rosenthal, PhD, has spent her summers on the shores of Sutton Island, watching the tides ebb and flow, wandering moss-covered trails through its woods, noticing the small miracles of nature — among them the regenerative powers of starfish. Those summers nourished a powerful place within her. Now an esteemed international scientist, Nadia led the European Molecular Biology Laboratory Outstation near Rome, Italy, for a dozen years, leaving it only recently to launch an Australian branch outside of Melbourne. She's a busy woman, her journey to the recent COA board meeting included stops in London, Beijing, Shanghai, Singapore, and Perth. But Nadia travels most joyfully to Maine because Mount Desert Island remains her touchstone. And those starfish that cling to the rocks surrounding the island? They are her inspiration. 8

A starfish missing one of its rays can regenerate it. But a human being certainly cannot regrow a finger. Like a true philosopher pushing the boundaries of the possible, for Nadia the mystery isn't that starfish can do so, but that humans can't. "Why did we drop that particular attribute?" she wonders. Why can't a human regenerate an arm — or even a heart? Nadia has devoted much of her life to investigating this question. Her work — as a biomedical researcher at Harvard Medical School (where she received her PhD), later in Italy, and now also as founding scientific director of the Australian Regenerative Medicine Institute at Monash University — focuses on the developmental genetics of heart and skeletal muscle, the molecular biology of aging, and the role of growth factors, stem cells, and the immune system in tissue regeneration.

Passionate and practical, a mélange of science and philosophy, Nadia recently told Australian journalist Michael Short, "My early and abiding question has been, 'What is life? What is the reason for having animation in the universe, as opposed to merely inanimate matter such as rocks or water? What was that initial impetus that brought us to the point where we are now, in which some chance collection of molecules found it more convenient, more pleasurable, or had an appetite for getting together and forming a cell, which is our basic building block?'" Clearly, this is a woman who sees beyond what is, asking the creative questions that swiftly move from why to why not as she works with other scientists to expand healthy lives far beyond what we expect of ourselves today.

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What fascinates Nadia about COA are similar questions. Built into COA's genetic structure is the practice of going beyond the limitations of individual disciplines, combining the arts, humanities, and sciences to create a truly integrated education for students and continual challenges for faculty.

JOIN THE BLACK FLY SOCIETY

This resonates with Nadia, who is an artist as well as a world-class scientist. In Italy, she collaborated with a pottery studio, painting her interpretations of the heart on ceramic plates. Now, as editor-in-chief of the scientific journal Differentiation, she illustrates the cover of each month's issue. "I've spent my whole life trying to figure out how to merge these two somewhat competing interests," she says, bringing art even into her graduate classes. "A visual approach helps people grasp concepts." There's science behind that, she adds. "If you post an image with something that clearly has been drawn by hand, the eye responds to that differently than to a computerized version." The mark of the hand changes the impact, makes it feel more real; and so it carries greater meaning. "My incentive to pull art and science together derives from an urge to give people a sense of science that feels real to them." As an educator, scientist, and writer, Nadia works to make components come together. Which brings us to the why not question Nadia asks about COA. She'd like COA to regenerate itself. "How can we export the COA model?" she asks, seeing the possibility of even more students enjoying a vibrant, transdisicplinary education in more small, dynamic, hands-on, integrated COA-like campuses around the world.

Honoring COA's mascot, The Black Fly Society was established to make donating to COA's annual fund easier and greener. We hope you'll join this swarm of sustaining donors by setting up a monthly online gift! It's the paperless way to give to COA. Go to coa.edu/donatenow and under "gift frequency" select "monthly."Â If you want to give to the annual fund by mail: COA Annual Fund 105 Eden Street Bar Harbor, ME 04609 Please make your check payable to COA.

COA trustee Nadia Rosenthal's inside view of Michelangelo's Adam appeared on the cover of the December 2012 journal Differentiation, published on behalf of the International Society of Differentiation.

Questions? Call 207-801-5622.

Photograph by Dru Colbert, arts faculty member.

WELLNESS It is nearly peony season at COA, a time when the flowers' lush layers begin to open — slowly, petal after petal, one layer a day — until suddenly the gardens are gleaming with dozens of huge, radiant blooms. When I think of the creation of this magazine's current theme of wellness, it is the gradual unfolding of the thick peony petal that comes to mind. For those featured in this issue, each revelation seems to open into a new understanding, another path. Peonies, by the way, are an ancient herbal healer in the East and West, China and the Mediterranean, used to enhance mental function, ease nervous conditions, improve liver function, relieve muscle cramps, lower cholesterol, and much more. The unfolding of this issue began with wondering who our alumni MDs are, discovering that for a school without an official pre-med track, College of the Atlantic has educated quite a few medical doctors. Not surprisingly, many alumni combine the best elements of several areas, bridging practice and research in diverse traditions. Peter Wayne '83 begins as a botanical researcher, then finds himself at the cutting edge of medical science, analyzing the health values of tai chi. Steven King '80 stays the course in botanical research for twenty years, shepherding latex from the Amazon rainforest into the medicine chests of those living with HIV/AIDS. Public health efforts on HIV/AIDS in Africa lead Rachel Snow '81 to the streets of Detroit. Meanwhile, Carmen BedardGautrais '07 and Todd Kitchens '06 are forging separate paths bringing integrative practices into institutional settings. From botany to cancer research, from painting to counseling, our students and alumni are continually exploring, questioning, probing — unfolding the petals of the peony to discover more petals, more ideas; sifting and learning and giving back to the world their magnificent presence. – Donna Gold

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The Yin and Yang of Peter Wayne '83 Harvard Professor, Medical Researcher, Tai Chi Instructor By Michael Griffith '09

By day, Peter Wayne, PhD, is a clinical researcher, assessing the effect of tai chi, acupuncture, and other therapies on such problematic conditions as chronic heart failure, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, balance instability, thinning bones, lower back pain, depression, aging, and more. Peter is the overall research director of the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital. This work places him at the cutting edge of integrative medical science, combining Western and alternative practices. But when the sun sets, Peter transforms into a tai chi instructor who doesn't always know — or care — how the Eastern art works: it just does. Peter has walked the S-shaped line between yin and yang since he was fifteen. That's when he discovered tai chi, which he calls "a mind-body exercise rooted in multiple Asian traditions ... that aims to strengthen, relax, and integrate the physical body and mind, enhance the natural flow of bodily energy, or qi, and improve health, personal development, and self-defense." An avid Frisbee player as a teenager, Peter turned to tai chi in search, he says, of "something that gave me a little bit more flow and grace," an advantage on the field. But his new practice gave him much more than that. It spoke to his interest in nature (he was reading Thoreau) and sparked a fascination with Eastern healing arts that would shape the course of his life. This March, Peter published the Harvard Medical School Guide 12

to Tai Chi, the result of years-long research, rigorous clinical trials, and a human ecological vision that sees science and spirituality as not only compatible, but complementary. Acrobatic human ecology The child may be father to the man, as William Wordsworth wrote, but what about the young adult? His first year at COA, Peter fell in love with plants, thanks, he says, to "gurus and mentors" Bill Drury and Craig Greene, late faculty members in biology. During an independent study with Bill spent identifying trees on Dorr Mountain, Peter managed to hike Acadia National Park every day of a winter term. It was a turning point.

from multiple perspectives, to see the parts as integral components of a whole, and to see the whole as sometimes being more than the sum of the parts. The philosophy of education at COA not only impacted me as a plant ecologist; the core ideas were transferable." They were also in tune with the philosophy and practice of the Eastern arts. Peter never stopped doing tai chi, and began teaching it during his final years at COA. When he moved to

"I decided to make a significant career shift,

"COA was such a great environment for me," Peter says. "I grew up in Brooklyn, New York, which is as far from Bar Harbor as you can get, energetically and socially; as a scientist studying nature, it was an amazing place for me to be in closer proximity to what I was intuitively drawn to — both in terms of seeing my place in nature and having a fantastic laboratory."

bringing my two worlds

Courses in ecology with Bill Drury and former President Steve Katona, and environmental philosophy with the late Dan Kane, founding faculty member in law, "shaped a very deep, implicit way of looking at the world — a deep philosophy," which Peter carried through to a Watson fellowship (the first for a COA student) in plant population biology, and then to Harvard, where he earned a PhD in evolutionary biology. "What I really grew to appreciate at COA, and it continues to grow on me," he says, "is this idea of looking at problems

medicine, including

together and employing my research skills and ecological framework to study the clinical and basic aspects of Chinese tai chi." From Peter Wayne's The Harvard Medical School Guide to Tai Chi

Boston in 1985, he founded a school of tai chi. Since then, Peter's "personal balancing act" between science and tai chi, or "acrobatic human ecology," as he calls it with a chuckle, has only become more interesting — College of the Atlantic Magazine

and integrated. As he focused on researching climate change and forest biology, Peter's engagement with the Eastern healing arts only grew. Then in 2000, a trip to China for additional training in tai chi and qi gong threw the yin and yang into a new balance. Bridging cultures In his book, Peter writes that following the trip, "I decided to make a significant career shift, bringing my two worlds together and employing my research skills and ecological framework to study the clinical and basic aspects of Chinese medicine, including tai chi." The birch trees and ragweed of his formal education had given the man what he needed to incorporate the interests of the child â&#x20AC;&#x201D; science and tai chi, yin and yang â&#x20AC;&#x201D; moderated by a powerful vision of interconnectivity. Peter began a research program at the New England School of Acupuncture, established and led a formal collaboration with Harvard Medical School centered on Asian medicine, and in 2006 became a faculty member at Harvard Medical School. But it was at the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine that Peter found his dream job. "Both as a scientist and a tai chi thinker, I love looking for connections and building bridges," he says. And that is what he gets to do now, every single day. Not that it's always easy. By its very nature, Peter's work is about tensions â&#x20AC;&#x201D; within the body, yes, but also between the healing traditions. "Medicine today is very bifurcated," he says. "It's very reductionist: divide and conquer. You go to your doctor with a foot problem but he or she COA students Will Fuller '16, Sasha Dunbar '13, and Rachel Drattler '14. College of the Atlantic Magazine

Photo by Becca Haydu '16. 13

won't be the same person you see for a back problem, and of course that isn't related to your jaw." Holistic elements have been implicit in the history of conventional medicine, according to Peter, but they've been overshadowed by modern approaches to defining health, treating disease, and training doctors. "Reductionism in modern medicine has led to tremendous successes," Peter writes in his book. But the habit of breaking up the body into "smaller, simpler parts, or into more tractable units," has its disadvantages — especially when one's aim is wellbeing, not just the absence of disease. "Eastern holistic and ecological views of the body, mind, and health now are becoming increasingly appreciated and adopted within the Western medical community," continues Peter, but it is still rare to find an MD who can help you make well-informed decisions about alternative therapies. "Part of why I think doing research is useful is because it's a bridge between different cultures," he adds. "The medical culture, the policy culture — they want to see evidence from sound, rigorous trials" that shows whether alternative therapies work. The sacredness of minimizing bias So Peter walks the S-shaped line, seeking objective ways to describe the center's findings, using randomized trials and objective physiological measurements, "but still capturing this bigger picture, that we think that there's some value added in mindbody types of interventions." Peter stresses that he is not an "advocate researcher," looking for particular outcomes. He is committed to "figuring out what's really happening" within the framework of clinical research. "Maybe there is no impact in a particular population doing a particular type of tai chi," he says. "That's OK. There's sacredness to minimizing bias, and to being objective. Science has a whole set

of rituals for achieving that: the way you design your trial, the way you have checks and balances between your colleagues." The emerging field of systems biology, familiar to Peter from his work on the environment, provides useful models for making tai chi's holistic approach to the body intelligible to scientific methodology. "In systems biology we developed quantitative and conceptual tools for characterizing the dynamics of ecosystems; when I came to study tai chi scientifically it was really obvious: 'Wow, here's

"What I really grew to appreciate

COA

—

and it continues to grow on me — is this idea of looking at problems from multiple perspectives, to see the parts as integral components of a whole, and to see the whole as sometimes

being

than the sum of the parts." a really unique set of ecosystems in this classroom, or this clinical trial, and we're approaching them with a very complex intervention.' … And so I started designing conceptual frameworks on how to study tai chi from a systems perspective, looking at mechanistic processes and physiological processes, and that's the heart of my work now: working within a systems framework, doing very rigorous clinical trials here at the medical school." At the end of the day, Peter rebalances himself, shedding his scientific

objectivity. "When I leave my office, I go home, have a short meal, and go teach for about two and a half hours; I change my clothes, and I change my rules." He says there is a "dynamic balance" between his daytime and evening "rules of order." They influence each other, and both represent parts of the "larger whole" of his persona, but just as Peter is not an advocate for tai chi in the lab, he is not an advocate for medical science at the tai chi center. The human ecology of tai chi Sometimes things that happen in a typical class can't be explained in a lab — at least not yet. "I may go a little bit beyond the edges of science — to things that we just have no idea if they happen, or why they happen," says Peter. In his Guide to Tai Chi, Peter adapted a mandala-like diagram created by the late plant ecologist William Dwight Billings to tai chi. Billings portrays a plant surrounded by "spokes" of sunshine, water, wind, thermal energy, root bacteria, and fungi, enclosed by a circle representing time. The "spokes" move in time, each influencing the other: wind speed affects temperature, temperature affects humidity, and so on. "It's a beautiful picture: the survival, growth, physiology, and evolution of a plant is due to this complex environment," says Peter. Adapting Billings' diagram to tai chi, he continues, "is a literal example of how my training in human ecology translates to many different areas as a conceptual framework." In his approach, the "eight active ingredients" of tai chi — including factors such as awareness, flexibility, breath, and community — directly affect the practitioner, as well as contribute to a complex system in which everything is interdependent. It's the human ecology of tai chi — and increasingly, thanks to researchers like Peter, the human ecology of Western medicine.

***** Michael Griffith '09 lives in London, where he is completing an MA in English at King's College. More of his writing can be found at theantefix.com. 14

College of the Atlantic Magazine

Human Ecology on Steroids Three Alumni Doctors of Emergency Care By Donna Gold

The way Dr. Douglas Sward '96 describes it, being an emergency room physician is like human ecology on steroids. "You're in this interface between the hospital inpatient system and the rest of the community." Maybe there's a rash of synthetic marijuana use by teenagers, maybe there's been a multiple-car collision, a serious apartment fire. An emergency room doctor has to be able to communicate with everyone involved — parents, fire rescue, patients, families, law enforcement. "You're dynamically interacting with a broad spectrum of humanity, with totally different perspectives and needs, from the most affluent to the homeless — and they are right next to each other. You're dealing with older demented people who can't remember what happened to them, and young people who talk so much, you can't make anything of what they're saying, you're going from someone cursing at you because you're not giving them narcotics to doing CPR on a thirty-year-old — and having to tell his family that he has died. All of this is happening at once. It's human ecology in your face. And it's fascinating, difficult, frustrating — terrible." Nearly half the COA alumni who have become doctors of medicine have chosen to work in emergency care. Curious about whether this interest was an extension of the wilderness medicine training so many students receive, I contacted three alumni MDs to probe the connection. But though the outdoors plays a role in the choice, it's also about the schedule — an ER doctor is seldom on call, allowing the doctor time for family, for hikes, for maple sugaring — for life. But the common fascination for all three doctors actually lies elsewhere. It's the problem solving. Above, Dr. Matthew Daul '98 pauses for a moment at the end of a shift at St. Joseph Hospital in Bangor, Maine, where he serves on the staff of the emergency department.

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Biology 101: What is a cell? Matthew Daul '98, MD 1 2

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3 4 5 6

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ANIMAL CELL 1. The cell membrane is a thin semi-permeable membrane that surrounds the cell fluid (cytoplasm), thus enclosing its contents. 2. The nucleus stores genetic material in the form of DNA (see page 39), and is surrounded by the nuclear membrane. Inside the nucleus is a nucleolus. Here ribosomes are made. 3. Ribosomes are responsible for assembling the proteins of the cell. They consist of RNA and proteins. 4. Mitochondria are the cell's power plants; they convert energy into forms that are usable by the cell. 5. Lysosomes hold enzymes used to digest food or break down the cell when it dies. 6. The centrosome is the production center for microtubules â&#x20AC;&#x201D; fibrous, hollow rods that help to support and shape a cell, and are also involved in movement within a cell, especially during cell division. Endoplasmic reticulum, or ER, is a series of interconnected membranebounded sacs within the cell fluid. There are two kinds: 7. Smooth endoplasmic reticulum (SER) contains enzymes important for synthesizing and metabolizing fats. 8. Rough endoplasmic reticulum (RER) is covered in ribosomes that synthesize proteins; the RER can transport these proteins throughout the body. 9. The Golgi apparatus is the shipping department for the cell's chemical products. It modifies proteins and lipids, or fats, that have been built in the ER and prepares them for export outside of the cell or for transport to other locations within the cell. 10. Vacuoles are storage bubbles found in cells that might store food or any variety of nutrients a cell might need to survive. In addition, they store waste products so the rest of the cell is protected from contamination.

Dr. Matthew Daul emerges from the Emergency Department of St. Joseph Hospital in Bangor, Maine, wearing navy scrubs, a serious expression, and a manner that is just what you want from a doctor. He's fully present, almost intense, and yet quite soft spoken. Medicine, for Matt, is career number three. The son of a carpenter, at COA he interned as an apprentice to a San Francisco furniture maker, and continued to focus on furniture and design for his senior project. After he graduated, he realized that being a self-employed craftsman was not the life he wanted. So he and his soonto-be wife Kara Fanning '96 climbed into his red Cabriolet convertible and headed to Brooklyn, New York. They arrived in August; by September they both had teaching jobs. At the time, you didn't need a teaching certificate to start teaching in a New York City public school, he says. After a summer backpacking through Italy, they discovered they had enough experience to get a job in an international school, so they remained in Europe, teaching in Milan for several years. The work returned Matt to his high school fascination with science and math â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and to a craving for a different challenge. That's when medicine came up. With no savings, two children and one soon to come, they decided to risk it all. If Matt could get into a good postbaccalaureate program for the necessary pre-med courses, they'd move back to the States and take the plunge of additional schooling and some debt-ridden years. Matt first went to Bryn Mawr, then the University of Rochester Medical School in upstate New York. With the position at St. Joe's, they've come full circle, returning to live at what has become a family compound on Mandala Farm in Gouldsboro,

Maine, along with Matt's father, his stepbrother Genio Bertin '97, and Genio's wife, Sara Faull '98. For Matt, emergency medicine is about discovery, problem solving, decision making. "I get to be Johnnyon-the-Spot and that is satisfying. I like making decisions when there's a crisis. It's action-oriented." Each day is new. Even though Matt did not seek out pre-med courses at COA, he finds human ecology to be a fitting gateway to the hospital’s many personalities and complicated structures — with the microcosm of each individual human body at the center of the scene. "Having an education from COA, and coming at this from a career change, makes me better suited to empathize with some of those who come in," he says.

Ann Clemens '96, MD

"Every patient that comes in here has a story and a background and a connectedness that reaches far beyond the exam room," says Dr. Ann Clemens '96. "Their story plays a key role in their health, their social situation, their ability to maintain health, follow our recommendations, and their ability to get better — it's the human ecology of medicine; there's always a connectedness to consider in treating a patient." Ann is an urgent care physician working in a clinic in Bend, Oregon, and sometimes also on the ski slopes of nearby Mt. Bachelor. Her clinic handles the less acute issues for which people often go to the emergency room — flus, rashes, broken limbs, even chest pains. There are no appointments; there's no continuity of care. It's a model that many believe will expand as the new health care reform laws encourage more medical visits because while more patients will have insurance, there aren't enough primary care providers to handle them — at least not currently.

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The daughter and granddaughter of doctors, Ann originally shunned medicine, then became intrigued by international health. For her internship, she served as a medical assistant at Shirati Hospital in Shirati, Tanzania, basing her senior project on the experience. But after receiving a medical degree from Philadelphia's Jefferson Medical College, and completing her residency in family medicine, "life happened," she says. With two daughters, urgent care allows her a stable schedule and the intellectual challenge she loves. As for international medicine, that's for the future, when her daughters are older.

Medicine in Bel Air, and the other half as a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Hyperbaric Medicine at the University of Maryland Medical Center Shock's Trauma Center.

Shifts on Mt. Bachelor connect Ann to wilderness care — and the wilderness. She takes her Nordic skis to work and heads into the snow before donning scrubs to work onsite with the ski patrol, swiftly triaging patients, airlifting those with serious trauma by Life Flight for more intensive care. Though she misses having relationships with her patients, she says, "I really like the medical part of what I do. We are the first person that a lot of people will go to, so there is a good deal of problem solving. Urgent care work is a good pace, and an intellectual challenge, figuring out what the problem is."

There's also an element of outdoor experience in Doug's interest in hyperbaric medicine, as SCUBA divers experience this form of pressure. But the specialty, which handles what happens to gasses, especially oxygen, under pressure, is most involved in carbon monoxide poisonings — whether from faulty appliances, attempted suicides, or other issues. The flip side of the field is that pressurizing gasses within the body can be useful in complications from radiation and diabetes. And it can be a mechanism for handling the rash of MRSA, or methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus infections, that recently have invaded hospitals.

The kind of questioning encouraged at COA has helped Ann throughout her medical career, she says. Asking questions "is a critical piece in medicine. The obvious could be just the obvious, but frequently it’s more than that and we have to keep looking for answers."

Douglas Sward '96, MD

Training in wilderness medicine and work in Acadia National Park as a wilderness first responder convinced Dr. Doug Sward '96 to pursue medicine. Now he spends half his time as an attending physician at the Upper Chesapeake Medical Center Department of Emergency

Having recently completed a fellowship in wilderness medicine, Doug is also medical advisor for Maryland Search and Rescue and faculty advisor for the University of Maryland Wilderness Medicine Student Interest Group. His training, following his 2004 graduation from the Medical College of Virginia, was a residency in emergency medicine at the UM Medical Center.

Doug was the last of the three COA doctors I interviewed, allowing me the courage to ask one final question: Can you just leave everything at the hospital, or do you worry? In other words, What's your drive home like? Doug laughs, a bit ruefully. You can't just leave it all at work. "I worry about what I did, or didn't do, what I missed or did wrong. A lot of issues you can leave behind, but there's usually one case each shift that torments you on your drive home."

Bloodlines and Bodywork Carmen Bedard-Gautrais '07, Traditional Chinese Medical Practitioner By Sarah Haughn '08

"She came to me for relief from sciatic pain," explains Carmen BedardGautrais, practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine. The pain, which worsened after menopause, was now so severe the woman was struggling to walk properly, to sleep. But Carmen — whose work relies profoundly on narratives of pain as well pain's physiological presentation — wanted to dig deeper. From where was the pain coming? Why? Exploring the history of the woman's sciatic pain, Carmen learned she had been diagnosed with hemochromatosis — an excess of iron in the blood — and, per one of the last surviving examples of bleeding in allopathic 18

medicine, was having a liter of blood removed every month. So Carmen began thinking inversely — of blood deficiency and how it manifested. Blood. What else in the woman's life was connected to blood, to traumas of blood? Menopause, the point after which the woman's sciatic pain had manifested. Menses. Childbirth. The woman had experienced multiple serious miscarriages during which she lost tremendous amounts of blood. Now her daughter was pregnant. As her daughter's pregnancy progressed, the woman's own pain worsened. Carmen wondered whether her anxiety for her daughter caused

her to relive the stress of her own loss — both blood and baby — expressing itself in sciatic pain. Carmen began treatment — helping the woman dig through the emotions of her miscarriages as well as treating her blood — balancing long-term healing with short-term relief. She used methods such as acupuncture and cupping (a traditional therapy involving localized suction), and also administered internal formulas. According to Carmen, the woman's spleen system was not nourishing her muscles, leading to stagnation. In traditional Chinese medicine College of the Atlantic Magazine

the spleen system also includes the pancreas, with the capacity to digest, then transform the food into transportable nutrients which are delivered to organs and muscles. Imagine a river, she explains, with little water left in it: things don't move through it very well. But as they worked together to process her emotions and nourish her blood, the woman no longer had to have blood removed — her iron levels evened out. After several months she was able to mourn the loss of her miscarriages and celebrate her daughter's impending birth of a healthy baby. The neurologist she had been seeing for herniations in her lumbar spine was shocked to see that her condition had not degenerated as he had expected. "She was one of my first long-term patients," says Carmen, "Everything is theoretical until we see it in practice. … It was a really big learning experience for me to see a very physical pain that we could describe in Western medicine as disc herniation and sciatic pain, where the nerve is being irritated and it's radiating down the leg and that's what it is, period; versus yes, that's presenting, but there are a huge amount of emotional factors under it: life experiences, nutrition experiences, many other factors triggering this pain to worsen at that particular time. You learn to see the body as a constant communicator. It's very exciting." Diagnosis via color, texture, sound, smell, feel Carmen came to TCM, or traditional Chinese medicine, circuitously and somewhat serendipitously. While at College of the Atlantic, she worked with Gray Cox, faculty member in political economics, to compare various approaches to healing. Her senior project was based on work she had done on traditions of healing in Kenya. After COA, Carmen intended to study naturopathic medicine, but upon matriculating into a program felt a disappointing lack of connection. While struggling to understand where she belonged in the world of healing, she visited College of the Atlantic Magazine

Above from top: Ju hua, a flower used as an eye bath, or as a decoction for cold/flu symptoms, hypertension, and eye pathologies such as conjunctivitis. Huang qin, a root used as a broad spectrum antibacterial anti-inflammatory herb, especially for upper respiratory tract infections. Shi chang pu, a root used as a sedative, also against seizures and epilepsy. Shan zha, a fruit, used as an antibacterial, antihyperlipidemic, cardiotonic, and immunostimulant, as well as in cooking. 19

Pacific Rim College in Victoria, Canada, where complementary and integrative medicine is taught, and felt immediately at home. She committed to five years of rigorous study and travel to China to obtain a doctorate in TCM, completing her degree in April, 2012. "We use many tools for diagnosis: subjective intake with a specific series of sixteen classical questions as well as observation — from color to texture to body position, similar to Western medicine," she explains. Also "sound, smell, palpation; we look at the tongue. This in-depth intake allows us to diagnose a pattern. Headaches for one person can be due to a very different physiological pattern than someone else with a headache, and appropriately we would treat it quite differently. This is where human ecology comes in. We observe not only the patterns within the individual but also how this fits with the environment in which the individual lives, emotions, lifestyle, seasons, life cycles, spiritual state, diet, etc. Then our treatment modalities can vary accordingly, from nutrition to massage, from acupuncture to complex herbal remedies and formulas. It's lots of fun, very in-depth. I think a lifetime isn't enough to master the subtleties." What resonates with Carmen about traditional Chinese medicine lies in the foundational differences between it and conventional Western medicine: how we define health. "When we're looking at the definition of health and well-being, often in Western medicine it's an absence of disease, perhaps an absence of symptoms at least — most of those being physical. And if they are emotional it gets tricky because

then even in depression it's looking at depression as a disease in and of itself, so each aspect is very isolated. Health as harmony "In traditional Chinese medicine the definition of health is broad; it comes down to the purpose of life, almost. You're looking at aspects of being in harmony with your environment, your relationship not only with yourself but with those around you, and following the patterns. It's looking

You learn to see the body as a constant communicator. I think a lifetime isn't enough to master the subtleties.

at the patterns that exist in nature, that exist within ourselves." Western culture's individualistic focus, she continues, "pervades our definition and approach to health. However, as we learn in human ecology, we are only a piece of a vast puzzle. Not only are we individually affected by many aspects of our surroundings, we in turn influence our environment." And this intricate exchange is fundamental to TCM practice. "So when we see disease we see a presentation of symptoms that are demonstrating a larger pattern at work. If someone comes in with pain, it may be that they have

experienced a physical trauma. But with chronic pain you often see a greater pattern connected to past events, emotional factors, nutritional factors, cultural factors, and activities of daily living. Equally as important as their internal environment is their external environment — is the pain worse in a particular season, climate, or temperature? What we consider reaches far beyond merely focusing on the presenting symptom. We appreciate the interconnection of all aspects, similar to a human ecology approach." During Carmen's doctoral training at Pacific Rim College, she studied at a teaching hospital in Shenyang, Liaoning Province, China. "It was my version of Disneyland," she says, describing a pharmacy so massive it occupies an entire floor of the building with drawers reaching the ceiling. The seven-story hospital houses both outpatient and inpatient services, and blends traditional Chinese treatments with approaches from Western medicine — taking the best from both, depending on each patient's unique history and symptoms. Carmen is currently pursuing a master's degree in physical therapy at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, where she lives with Ian Illuminato '06. Inspired by her study in Shenyang, she hopes to carry her TCM expertise into hospitals, working within Canada's public health system. Her desire is to offer a form of healing informed as much by life stories as by symptoms to those who otherwise couldn't access it. Ultimately, she seeks to redefine what health is and how we speak about our bodies even within the mainstream medical community.

***** Sarah lives in and writes from Davis, California, where she is enjoying the arrival of baby Malcolm Afaayo Nambale. She looks forward to beginning a master's in creative writing (poetry) at UC Davis in September.

College of the Atlantic Magazine

An Integrative Life: One Doctor's Journey Christopher Todd Kitchens '06, DO By Marni Berger '09 It is 2001 and Christopher Todd Kitchens is hiking the Beehive Mountain in Acadia National Park with friends when, with an odd specificity, one friend tells him he would make an excellent osteopath. Todd's professional career up until now has consisted of art and animation, and so the suggestion seems offhand, but he considers the new occupation for the first time along the steep trail. By the time the friends make it back down, the idea has solidified with uncanny speed into a decision. He will become a doctor. The dozen-year journey It is February 2013. Over the phone, Todd and I discuss this decision of twelve years ago. I have asked a slew of questions that shed light on those years, questions about osteopathy, about integrative medicine, about being an artist, about his professional journey. (I do my best to avoid soliciting free medical advice after a two-week bout with the flu.) In particular: What made you want to be a doctor? Todd tells me about the mountain, about his friend's suggestion, and adds, without hesitation, that after deciding to pursue his passion to help people by studying medicine, "I have not for a second looked back." Now an osteopath with three young daughters and a degree from the University of New England, Todd is months away from finishing his residency in family medicine at Lewiston's Central Maine Medical Center. He focuses on primary care, College of the Atlantic Magazine

using alternative methods, such as yoga treatment. He also employs therapeutic lifestyle interventions and osteopathic manipulative medicine. The credo behind osteopathy not only asserts that the structure and function of the body are reciprocally intertwined, but also that the body is capable of selfregulation, self-healing, and health maintenance. Todd emphasizes the link between osteopathy and human ecology â&#x20AC;&#x201D; both defined by how humans connect to each other, themselves, and the environment. He says at College of the Atlantic he was able to customize a pre-med track, making his undergraduate studies something of a human ecological approach to medicine. Osteopathy Osteopathy is a branch of medicine once considered alternative. In the late nineteenth century, Andrew

Taylor Still, MD, followed his impulse that there must be something more to medicine when his three children died of meningitis. He dedicated some thirty years of his life to better understanding the human body. But despite his medical degree, he was met with dissent from the mainstream medical community that, with its strict sense of tradition, considered his new perspective a threat. Todd points out that it is different today. Now osteopathic doctors undergo training identical to that of allopathic doctors with the exception that osteopaths are required to complete additional hours of osteopathic manipulative training. Although modern DOs often drop the hands-on approach pioneered by Dr. Still, Todd embraces it with his focus on integrative medicine, which he describes as "a combination of the best evidenced-based medicine, 21

both complementary and alternative to traditional Western medicine." Putting theory to practice, Todd advocates treating the individual and the body as a whole, rather than symptom by symptom. The idea is to get to the root of the problem. He says, "When somebody comes to see me and tells me, 'I have reflux and I have this back pain,' I don't separate the two. I ask myself: Are these related? Is it mapping in the way I would expect it to map on their body?" Everything is connected Todd's treatment process can be likened to long- and short-term conflict resolution. "I've had several patients who came to me with a visceral complaint — gall bladder pain or back pain," he says. "So of course I rule out the big bad things: are they having a heart attack? Then we talk about their diet." For shortterm needs, he is not afraid to use medication or other mainstream approaches; he emphasizes that by seeing every patient as an individual, he is modeling the expansion he'd like to see throughout health-care networks: that everyone would have access to customized care, short-term as well as preventative. "Everything is connected," Todd tells me. I wonder what he means, specifically, and before I ask, he elaborates: "Medicine is really just an extension of how I approach life." Todd grew up in Florida and lived in Atlanta for twelve years, where he met his wife, Honnie Goode — who earned her MPhil at COA in 2006 and is now finishing her second master's degree, in mental health counseling (see page 23). After a stint in New York, the two moved to Maine in 2001. Until then, Todd's professional training was primarily in multimedia design, web animation, music, and video. He played and produced electronica sounds in the studio and for his bands — most notably the band Fascia that he formed with Honnie in 1997 — while he and Honnie also created site-specific installation work. 22

"I am probably the last person my family thought would do anything like this … become a doctor," he admits. "I'm the first person to graduate from college in my family." In reflecting on his path through an integrative lens, he understands that all aspects of life and self are connected. Find it, fix it, leave it alone Todd recalls always wanting to help people. In 1998, three years before his hike up Beehive, he created an installation that involved a pair of metal beds ten inches off the floor and a projection screen lowered to wheelchair height for an exhibition held at the Dalton Art Gallery of Georgia's Agnes Scott College. "People would approach the screen," Todd says, "but the space would force them to lie down on these beds, and the projection was from above. [On the screen] there was a swimmer swimming in these rhythmic movements, with music we had produced that was very atmospheric." After the show, a viewer who had lain on the bed for a half an hour approached Todd and said, "I just want to let you know, this is the most relaxed I've felt in years." It turned out she had lupus.

on it. Todd began his work, as he would on any patient. Three days later, the woman returned, elated. Not only was she not in pain, but she could arch backwards. The pain that Todd believed was acute turned out to have been chronic — the woman revealed that this was the first time she had not felt back pain in over a year. "She seemed like a different person," Todd says, "a happier person. It's in those moments I know I'm doing the right thing." As part of the pilot program at Central Maine Medical Center offering integrative medicine, Todd works with practitioners in the community. In regard to osteopathy and integrative medicine in general, he says, "I personally feel it's where medicine is headed." Todd remains hopeful that integrative medicine — and by extension greater access to customized healthcare — could become a focus in the United States medical system, rather than the current symptom-based care. "I feel," he says, "like I am in the perfect situation to assist in that transition." *****

"I don't see what I am doing now as that much different than what I was doing then," says Todd. "In fact, I see it more as a direct extension of what I was doing, even though medicine was the furthest thing from my mind at that point." Today, Todd finds himself emphasizing this popular adage of osteopathy: "Find it, fix it, leave it alone." Let the body heal itself. "Finding health should be the object of the doctor," he paraphrases the words of Dr. Still. "Anyone can find disease." "I try to approach every treatment with these concepts in mind," Todd says. He describes an encounter with a recent patient, a medical assistant who asked Todd to work on her upper back. She said she had "slept wrong"

After graduating from COA, Marni Berger '09 received an MFA in writing from Columbia University. Her essays, short stories, and author interviews can be found online at The Millions, Fringe Magazine, Litro, and The Days of Yore. Her short stories have been finalists in three Glimmer Train fiction competitions, as well as a New Millennium Writings short story contest. Her poetry is forthcoming this year at Crescendo City. Currently, Marni teaches writing at Manhattanville College and lives with her fiancé in New York City by Central Park; most days you will see them in the park failing heavily at keeping their two adolescent dogs from swarms of self-assured squirrels.

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Kara, combined process on wood, 66" x 84", 2003. Photo by Mike Jensen.

Honnie Goode, MPhil '06

A tactile, intuitive, spiraling, and yes, rational journey College of the Atlantic Magazine

Horizon, combined process on wood, 48" x 36", 2005. Photo by Mike Jensen.

Life's journeys are often not linear, but circular, or even spiraling; we change and grow, acquiring new skills, but retaining our essential core. By the time this magazine is published, Honnie Goode, artist, COA MPhil, and mother of three young daughters, will be well on her way to becoming a licensed clinical professional counselor, or LCPC, another passage on a journey that remains integral to her creative center. "Creativity is the core of me; it informs everything else," says Honnie. She came to COA in 2004 as a graduate student, seeking to find deeper connections between the painting that had been her livelihood and the world around her. "COA helped me to learn to see the world in a bigger way," she says. Now, working with clients, she mingles a creative approach with an ecological perspective honed at COA. In therapy, she says, "I take a strength-based approach." Frequently, practitioners see the disease, not the person. This one's the cancer patient. That one is the bulimic. The relationship begins on a negative. Honnie looks for her clients' health, drawing upon environmental, feminist, creative, cultural theories. A woman comes in. She's not "a depressed homemaker," for instance, but a Catholic woman of sixty whose husband has just left her for a man.

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Circles Series #9, combined process on wood, 40" x 30", 2009. Photo by Honnie Goode.

When making art, Honnie focuses on the creative kernel. Her artist's statement offers this declaration: "By combining the emotional with the rational, I aspire to achieve a balance within myself." She begins by pouring paint onto wood, then embedding objects â&#x20AC;&#x201D; glass beads, bits of metal, paper, fabric. Eventually she returns to the piece with oils and varnishes. "I rarely use brushes," she says. "I like to literally push paint." She'll pick up an electric sander, heated metal, even a blowtorch to make her marks, moving constantly. "I'm interested in representing layers: the body, the land, space, and time." Human ecology enters Honnie's thoughts frequently. "COA put words to the way I was thinking. It helped to shape my world view in such a way that I can be a really good problem solver. It primed my brain to think quickly in very different ways â&#x20AC;&#x201D; you can't put a price on that." Ultimately, Honnie's journey will include collaborating with her husband, Todd Kitchens '06, DO (see page 21). And she'll continue her art-making, applying her intuition to the techniques she has acquired over the years. â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Donna Gold

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Re(de)fining Global Health Rachel Snow '81 on HIV/AIDS and the Ironies of Social Equity By Sarah Haughn '08

Among crises in public health, HIV/ AIDS is as serious as it is persistent. As such, it has garnered much attention and funding. But what if the solution to this crisis is not, in fact, public health? So suggests Rachel Snow, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Health Behavior and Health Education at the School of Public Health, and a research associate at the Population Studies Center of the University of Michigan. Following her doctorate in population studies from Harvard School of Public Health, Rachel conducted clinical trials of contraceptives with the World Health Organization. Then HIV/AIDS emerged and resources immediately shifted. Rachel was called to Nepal, then South Africa. It was there that she realized that public health was just a part of the crisis. Three-quarters of those suffering from HIV/AIDS live in Africa, where women remain among the most severely affected. In Uganda and South Africa, where Rachel works, the greatest urgency has been to provide life-saving therapy, and to prevent mothers from transferring the disease to their newborns. But HIV/AIDS constitutes only part of the crisis for infected women. They tend to be poorly educated, have limited access to household wealth, reside in female-headed households, have at least one HIV-infected infant, and experience higher rates of divorce, separation, and widowhood. While pharmaceutical treatments are available, says Rachel, "we are left with what has been neglected — the problems of human behavior, poverty, and inequality: women and children still trading sex for food." And so, she

says, "we are up against an absolute failure in preventing new infections, despite public health interventions." "I believe in public health; it's my life's work," Rachel continues. "But the reality is that what probably matters more are livelihoods and education. Healthcare is an important third, the other two its antecedents." Rachel sees the crucial need for a shift in the focus of public health — not only incorporating a more holistic understanding of the epidemic, but also addressing its third-world designation in academia. "Students tell me they want to do global health in Ethiopia. That's not global health; that's Ethiopian health. Global health should be something thematic, something that is a problem in multiple places. Its study should illuminate truths toward solutions that can be broadly applied." Rachel's current work brings her knowledge of the epidemic in Africa to bear on the HIV/AIDS crisis in Detroit. Awarded funding from the Ford Foundation, Rachel and a team of anthropologists, public health experts, and community development workers have established Detroit Youth Passages. This project researches the impacts of deindustrialization, addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic among residentially unstable, ethnic minority youth involved in sexual commerce — a population with one of the highest infection rates in Michigan. In Africa, Rachel works at the administrative level with hospitals and clinics; in Detroit she also spends time on the streets. It is incredible, she notes, how similar to one another poor urban crises look, regardless of the continent.

"Detroit. Uganda. South Africa. The HIV risks are similar because they reflect inequality, under-employment, and sex as currency. In poor cities of America, the parallel economy of drugs and sexual commerce can be devastating, and the human vulnerability in neighborhoods of New York, DC, and Detroit are as bad as the barrios of Latin America, as bad as the worst slums in Africa. "I wanted a degree in human ecology because it was a statement about values, and in the human and social environment those values are social equity, fairness, and vulnerability," Rachel adds. She hopes COA students and faculty take as much interest in the health of Maine communities as those in Africa and Latin America. "Maine is not untouched. Kids grow up in these small, rural communities and get side-tracked into drugs and alcohol. They have ambition, but they're attending weak public schools. A parent may be addicted to meth or pills, and life's choices get awfully narrow. Those with access to wealth and privilege can surely do more to broaden opportunity," she says. "In these neighborhoods and towns where there are problems with drugs and incarceration there's also all kinds of creative potential." It is this richness, this potential that Rachel wants to see the college community recognize, embrace, and nurture. The whales, yes. The climate, certainly! But the people, too — not only those requiring a plane ticket and a visa to visit, but also the communities nearby whose struggles surround us daily. To read about Rachel's work, visit detroityouthpassages.org.

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"Detroit. Uganda. South Africa." "â&#x20AC;Śâ&#x20AC;&#x2030;The HIV risks are similar because they reflect inequality, under-employment, and sex as currency," Rachel Snow '81 said to COA writer Sarah Haughn '08. But what does that mean? What does Rachel find on the streets of Detroit? In reply, she sent some of her raw notes interviewing sex workers in Detroit. Here is the briefest of reports, one encounter out of many over several weeks of interviews.

Monday, August 20, 2012 "We pull into a dark shaded area beside a park. AR,

receiving anal sex three to four times a night, as he

who is organizing the session, leans into my window

needs the money. It's never planned, it's not a job, his

and speaks softly. 'Just wait here, it's best that you stay

time horizon is very short, it's about food and bills. He

in your car.' Then he steps under the trees, and young

describes stress levels through the roof, constant fear.

men gather around him quickly. He brings a young man

He's homeless, just staying with friends. He cries at one

to me, letting him into the passenger side, introducing

point, and rests for a while. When we finish the interview

us. The man is cautious, shy, in his early twenties.

I realize the men have started lining up under the trees,

Desperately poor. The encounter is heartbreaking; as

hoping for a chance to earn the $20 for an interview."

he settles in and starts to feel safe, he tells me he's

Above: Maternity ward, Mbarara National Referral Hospital, Uganda. Photo courtesy of Rachel Snow.

May 6, 2011 A neurosurgeon is marking my skull with a Sharpie to make a little window to my brain, to my brain tumor. My wife, Ava Moskin '95, sits beside me on my bed at Maine Medical Center. Our son's at school. Just a couple of days ago we appeared to be a normal family, but I knew I was ill. My right foot was numb. I lost peripheral vision in my right eye; I walked into walls. My head was in a fog. Then, early yesterday morning, I woke to a surge of nausea and promptly threw up. My head was pounding. I dismissed it, but Ava, who is also a doctor, sent me away in a taxi and stayed at home with our sleeping boy. The ER didn't know what to do, except dull the pain. Ava lobbied the department chief, by phone, for a CT scan. While I rested inside the machine I couldn't help thinking that I wanted an answer to this mystery, that I wanted them to find something. And they did find something. And I was relieved. And I hated myself for it. When the neurosurgeon saw the scans, he judged the tumor inoperable. A cheery social worker entered my room. An MRI produced a clearer and more fortunate picture. The surgeon changed his mind: he would operate. The social worker disappeared. â&#x2030;&#x2C6; I'm alive. I'm in a noisy room, but the curtains are drawn around my bed. I'm alive. But what's left of me? I've got an arc of metal staples in my scalp and an 28

IV in each wrist. My throat is sore from intubation. I search myself desperately for a sign of enduring intelligence. It seems a man in a nearby bed is having his bladder drained, because "urinary retention" is the phrase I clutch like a life preserver. I lose it. I find it again. May 7, 2011 I'm discharged, going home. But home is not the same. I strike my head on the door frame as I climb out of the car, then stagger up the walk. I want to go to bed, but I can't find the stairs. They were on my right, and I didn't see them. I dream of a snake. But it is lifeless, charred black. The day is punctuated by pills: steroids, anti-seizure, stool softeners, sleep aids. Ava tells me I'll need chemotherapy and radiation treatments. I have a grade IV malignant gliosarcoma. Am I not rid of this cancer yet? The surgeon said, of the tumor, that he removed "all of it," but some cancer cells would inevitably remain, would inevitably grow, would inevitably kill. It seemed my life expectancy was halved and doubled and halved again each day. "All of it." Those words had been my prize but they had not been earned. June 8, 2011 Tomorrow I begin radiation therapy. My head will be pinned to a padded table by a form-fitting plastic mask. A fabulously expensive machine will focus an intense beam of energy on my tumor cavity with the goal of shredding the DNA of remaining tumor

cells, sterilizing them. It will also kill some normal brain cells. It could cause a genetic mutation and a new tumor. There's a 10 percent chance of "cognitive impairment." And it's not expected to cure me, only to extend my life by some weeks or months; some fabulously expensive weeks or months. June 17, 2011 "You are washed in healing light." I repeat this to myself, over and over as the Varian Clinac iX 2100 linear accelerator lights my brain with the power of a thousand X-rays. The technicians have fled and secured a radiation-shielded door behind them. I imagine myself in the shower, rinsing my hair. Think positive, right? It is uncertain how this will play out on a molecular level. The machine makes a faint whirring noise. I feel nothing. I come for radiation treatments five times a week, and take chemotherapy pills at home. I've escaped bad headaches and nausea, for now. The faucet-shaped photon blaster rotates over my head. I see its aperture set in the shape of my tumor, and I see my reflection in the glass, turning as if I'm on a skewer. August 3, 2011 Three months after brain surgery, and two weeks after completing radiation treatments, I feel strong and capable. I'm visiting my old friends at the old lake house. They're taking a day off to rest, grill some burgers, and drink some beer. But "a day off" means College of the Atlantic Magazine

My Brain Cancer Diary living with gliosarcoma By Bogart Salzberg '96

nothing to me. While I sit idly by, the government deposits money into my bank account. I could say I retired early, while I still have time to enjoy it. Technically I'm "disabled" and today I'm not enjoying it. I'm sitting in the warm sun on a sandy beach, but I'm restless. I yearn to be alone in silence. I walk into the water and swim away. Miles away. I'm desperate to deplete myself. I wonder how far I can go before I can't come back. I return sore and tired, cold and hungry; changed. I want only to be in or on the water. I buy a wetsuit, fins, snorkel, and mask. Then a kayak. Then a sailboard. I want to wear myself out, to be dragged down into sleep I've earned. 2012 Winter doesn't start well. An increased dosage of chemotherapy cripples me with nausea. It feels like someone has pulled my stomach out through my mouth. I'm out of tune, hot and cold, dull and disinterested. I want to die. I fantasize about drowning. I want to drown. But I won't do it. It would hurt people I care about. â&#x2030;&#x2C6; Spring limps home. I ought to see summer, perhaps my last. My prognosis, a median life expectancy for my disease, expires in August. It may be my last chance to do something important. I should submit to charitable deeds, but I want an College of the Atlantic Magazine

adventure. I want hardship and perseverance and triumph. I so often see the span of Casco Bay from the hill where I live: a dozen miles of open water. That's the way I want to go: far, far away, over the horizon. It is with this in mind that I conceive my adventure: a journey, by water, from Portland to Bar Harbor. I choose to sail, instead of kayak; it seems wise to harness the wind. I choose to sail my sailboard because it's the only sailboat I have. But it isn't even a boat, really. I make a paddle (my engine), collect safety gear, and stock up on sports drinks and protein bars. Through the height of summer I "train" for my trip. I have the Coast Guard looking for me a couple of times, am almost run over (twice), endure a thunderstorm, lose my sail (temporarily), and almost spend the night on an uninhabited island. Some people are worried about me. What's the worst that could happen? I'll die? August 12, 2012 If I somehow deserve terminal cancer, then this is what it bought me: seven days of exploits I'll remember in my hospice bed. I launch in the pouring rain. The wind is light, but I'm optimistic and excited. I drift with the tide, behind schedule from the very start; I never catch up. There's not enough wind and I'm caught in the currents. There's too much wind and I can't sheet the sail. There are moments

of wonder: settling a tiny unnamed island; bright stars crowding the sky above a dying fire; the electric seams of sunlight on the water. After four days of struggle, my body is broken. My skin is burned, grimy, caked with salt. My fingertips are nearly worn through from gripping the boom. I text Ava: "Meet me in South Bristol." I've covered only a third of the planned route. I crawl into bed around midnight, delirious with fatigue, too tired to regret my failure, knowing I'll try again. September 6, 2012 This time I opt for kayaking. I depart from Pemaquid Harbor, mid-afternoon. Miles ahead, Pemaquid Point appears to spray gaily. But up close, six-foot swells break on the shoals with a terrible power. I keep a wide margin, then turn east to Port Clyde. September 7, 2012 The NOAA weather radio calls for winds and seas to build tomorrow and worsen after that. I'm desperate to reach Stonington. I'll paddle in the dark if need be. But Penobscot Bay is fogged in. Horns at Owl's Head and Rockland are blaring, and VHF channel 16 is chattering non-stop. It's a nervous but uneventful two-hour crossing to the Fox Islands Thorofare, navigating by compass. By the time I emerge on the eastern side, the sun's going down. But the end is dead ahead four miles, Mark Island light and the way to Stonington; the rest of Deer Isle on the left; and the 29

profile of Isle au Haut off to the right, ribbed with wild hills. I swallow a pain-killer: not ibuprofen but Vicodin. I still have a few pills left over from my surgery. I could use some relief from the pain in my arms and upper back. I see myself paddling through the night, stubbornly enduring, spurred to beat the weather. And I can see the headline: "Drugged Kayaker Drowns on Night Crossing." I know I'm setting a bad example, but I press on with my reckless shadow, into the gloom. As I paddle I notice a strange faint light on the edge of my wake as it spreads from the bow. There is no moon, nor any light nearby. Then I see, in the wake of each paddle stroke, a swirling orb of green light. Bioluminescence! Never before had I witnessed the glow of these tiny single-celled creatures. September 8, 2012

Jericho Bay is calm and I make good time to Casco Passage. I text my wife the good news and make plans to meet in Bar Harbor later. She'll be there in time if she leaves soon from Portland. We could meet at Indian Point instead, she suggests. It's closer, more protected and technically within the municipality of Bar Harbor. I see her point: declare victory and go home. I'd rather stick with the plan. "It's personal," I reply. I ask myself, "Why is it personal?" I don't answer. Do I wish to confront my fear of death? Or do I wish to die? Am I racing for the finish, or away from my fate? Might I endure this disease, this day, by sheer force of will? Or shall I die choking, cursing, kicking, drowning … on my own terms? I take a Vicodin. Am I really very sore? Will I be any faster or more successful within an opiate cloud? Perhaps it silences my better judgment, naming it weakness and worry.

High winds and seas today, worse tomorrow, says the weather radio, as it did yesterday. I hear it but I'm not sure I'm listening. My mind is made up. I'm stationed on a run-down ramp on the far side of the Stonington waterfront, packing to go for my final day's journey. An old Blazer parks near a pile of wrecked bricks. A guy steps out. He's about my age. We talk about the weather. "It's supposed to blow," I say. "Be careful," he says. It might be a seed of doubt, but for the way he says it. His voice is measured and sincere, coming from experience. "The sea has no conscience." His eyes are witnessing in memory the proof, won "foolishly," of this otherwise poetic assertion. He recalls urchin diving, years ago, coming to the edge of what a man can survive, and finding there no quarter for regret. He shakes his head, struggling to bear the favor of fate, I imagine. A barge arrives, lowers its ramp, and he drives on. He's headed east. I follow a few minutes later. 30

I reach Bass Harbor Head around four, a little slow in the rising wind and waves. But the last significant crossing is complete, and with three hours of light to spare I feel relieved and optimistic. I rest for a while in the calm, warm sunlight at Ship Harbor. I try an Eskimo roll to test my skill and confidence, though I've never capsized my kayak by accident. I pop another pill and sprint out of the cove, energized and eager for the home stretch. But by the time I'm east of Sutton Island, the scale of this last leg seems misunderstood. Have I not numbered these miles? The sun has thinned. The sea is a shadow. A dim haze of humidity hangs low over Northeast Harbor, the last refuge before the steep, rocky, exposed, and utterly dark headlands of Acadia National Park. I don't want to stop. The seas build. I can't stop. Waves lift me, drop me, turn me, and crash over the deck. They are six feet tall, disordered, bouncing off the cliffs and coming back. They meet in

unpredictable heaps, welling to a peak and collapsing just as fast. For hours, I slap and knife the waves, watching the starboard. The light of dusk drains so completely that I cannot tell sky from land but for shades of black. Dimly I see the waves. Suddenly I am lifted up from the port rear as I finish a portside stroke. The kayak slides sideways down the face of a wave. I'm going over, but I feel no panic. I have to roll up, and I know I can. I am upside-down in the water, in total darkness. For a moment, I feel calm. I've practiced this Eskimo roll countless times. Now I need it to work. Everything's backward now, of course. The air is "beneath" the hull. I need to swing the paddle out to one side, push it "down" to the surface and pull it "up and over" my head. I always practiced it this way, in steps, wearing a diving mask so I could see what I was doing. But suddenly I'm blind. "Where is the paddle?" It must be right in front of me. "Push the paddle." Which side? I am stuck in neutral, suspended. The pieces fall apart. My calmness evaporates. I need air. Without even trying to roll, I pull my spray skirt and push the kayak away with my feet. I bob to the surface and take a breath. How is it that I find the spray skirt release? Is it the power of instinct in desperation? "Don't panic," I say to myself. "Think. Priorities." I find myself holding both the paddle and the cockpit coaming. Instinct. It is not much consolation. The water is over sixty degrees, relatively warm. But it's not for swimming — not with my thin wetsuit. "Get out of the water, or you will die." I flip the kayak rightside-up and secure the paddle under an elastic deck cord. I throw a leg over the stern, straddle it, and inch my way forward toward the cockpit. But the kayak is bobbing erratically; waves break over the side and flood the cockpit. With many gallons of College of the Atlantic Magazine

water sloshing around inside, the hull is unstable. I lose my balance, roll off, and the kayak capsizes again. I flip it over, again, then fail, again. I finally drop into the cockpit when it is full and low, and more stable. I'm half out of the water, sitting in a cool bath: an improvement, not a solution. Only the bulkheads and hatch covers keep the kayak from sinking. Breathing hard, I check my condition. I feel a desperate urgency, but I need to question myself, to temper instinct and favor reason. I pump furiously with my hand pump, but the waves pour in. I can seal my spray skirt and keep the waves out, but my "bathwater" will be sealed in. I try paddling the swamped kayak. With exhausting effort, I turn it around to face the shore. A flare of green sparks follows each churning stroke: bioluminescence, again. A sliver of my attention lauds its amazing beauty. Another takes note of the details of this singularly important moment. But the bulk of my attention rests on the choice of what to do: paddle on, or land. A part of me wishes to paddle on, however slowly and inefficiently, in sheer contempt of my failure. The choice is no less than life or death. "I must land," I think. "I want to live. I want to see my wife and son again." I feel it clearly: I've decided to live. The sea, of course, ignores my change of heart. In the dark I can barely discern a fleeting paleness of surging, smashing water along the rim of a shallow cove. Then I am struck by the terrifying thought that I will die. I understand it now, how a good swimmer is worn down, beaten, rolled over, and choked. And drowned. I breathe hard and deep. I hear the air rushing through clenched teeth, feel it fill my lungs; it calms me. I scan the shore slowly from left to right. About fifty yards ahead, I find a void. I paddle closer and pull a small flashlight from my PFD. Through the glaring mist I see what appears to be a ledge near shore College of the Atlantic Magazine

with a pocket of water behind it leading up to a slope of rock. I turn off the flashlight and hold it in my teeth as I paddle around the ledge. Water floods the pocket and quickly falls away. I will need to land on foot. I jump out of the kayak, grab the bow handle, and kick to shore. My feet touch bottom. I lean into the rock and probe for a hold. Its face is steep but rounds over just beyond my reach. One hand and one step will do it, but it is slick and smooth. The next receding wave yanks the kayak out of my hand. I struggle to stay upright. The closer I come to safety, the more desperately I want it. "I need air!" I still have the flashlight in my mouth. I take it out. My view is so narrow that it seems at first an impediment, then a mere ten-dollar loss. I toss it away. I rest, leaning against the rock. I am out of breath, approaching the limit of my fitness. The pocket's softened waves are still pushing me around. I feel a surge of fear. Again, I think I might die here, how simple and easy it is. Then, suddenly, my foot gains a hold on a little dimple. My hand finds another. I scramble out of the surf. Even then I feel the water reaching. I stumble stiffly, frantically forward. I sit with my legs pulled up to my heaving chest. I am alive, but I don't know the meaning of it yet. I hear the ocean seething. I am shivering slightly, and very tired. I don't want to move, but I must. Taking stock, I find a pocket unzipped. My phone's gone. I pull the radio from the other pocket. It's no use calling for help now. I don't know where I am. But with the glow of the radio's backlight I can see the ground in front of me. My feet sting sharply from barnacle cuts. I've lost my shoes. I step out of my spray skirt and drape it over my shoulders. I hobble over broken rocks to the black woods. Above the bank, the ground is flat and empty. A trail! I head east. Or is it north? I find a trail marker, pointing back the way I came, to Great Head. I

walk an hour. Maybe two. I can't see the shore; then I can. A side path goes down to a beach. Sand Beach. Have I gone in circles? The trail turns inland and I climb for a while. Then I see a faint paleness on my right, easy to miss. Maybe I missed it once already? It's an empty parking lot at the end of an empty road. I've lost all traces of will. I am simply an object in motion. After walking half a mile, a small truck pulls up to a stop sign. I enter the glare of the headlights and wave my arms over my head. The truck edges into the intersection, turning to the right. The driver, a grey-haired man, asks me if I am OK. "Well, I was sort of shipwrecked." It sounds strange, like idle conversation. My urgency seems self-evident, but the truck inches forward. "So, you're OK then?" The truck continues to turn away. "Well, no," I say, with audible panic. I try to explain how I crashed my kayak and stumbled through the woods. I can see myself standing there with a bizarre black garment hung over my head and chest, shins bloodied, barefoot, eyes vacant, casually pondering my "shipwreck." He seems aggrieved as he thinks of what to do. "You can ride in the back. We'll bring you back to town." In town I find the house of Suzanne Morse, who taught me biology my first semester at COA â&#x20AC;&#x201D; half a life ago. She answers her door squinting, incredulous. I blurt out my story and surprise myself by concluding, with some emotion, "I almost died." The next day I recover the deeply scratched kayak and bring it home. That I bring myself home too is a bonus. I know now that I hold my life in my own hands, with no more regret for living it. For more on Bogart's journey, visit mybraincancerdiary.com. 31

THE SEARCH FOR BALANCED IMBALANCE Perspectives from Student Life Within COA, wellness goes far beyond the physical and even the emotional. When Dean of Student Life Sarah Luke, or Sluke as she is known to students, thinks of wellness, she thinks about five interlocking circles that include physical, mental, spiritual, recreational, and aesthetic wellness. On Week 9 of winter term, five current resident advisors, or RAs, took time out from their studies to talk about campus wellness. Our conversation began with a discussion of how they operate as RAs, but soon delved into how they seek to encourage self-understanding for their housemates and for themselves.

Donna Gold: So, what would you say most focuses your time and attention as student leaders? Anjali Appadurai '13: I think wellness is about balance, but my personal take has always been that it's not about total balance all the time, and there's no authority involved because everyone has their own equilibrium. It's not about, "you shouldn't be stressed," because stress happens, and it's OK, but rather encouraging people to be aware of themselves, to know when they are getting to an unhealthy point — and after that finding space and opportunity for finding resources for health. … It's more of an organic approach. Joe Perullo '14: How I interpret wellness in relation to COA's message is that I think it really is important to have this balance between allowing students to go into uncomfortable spaces, and figuring out how to deal with that without letting them go off the deep end — and being very conscious of the subjective

experience that students go through. And yeah, it's kind of this balancing game of encouraging students to push their boundaries, but also helping them in those times.

way. Through the Student Life team we're watching everyone. We have multiple people, because different personalities attract different needs. When something is amiss we know.

Janoah Bailin '14: Maybe total balance actually means being imbalanced sometimes. What I really like about this school is that we recognize that all these areas of wellness play into each other and affect how we work … so it's a very roundabout way to get out the thing we want to get out — your goal or area of focus — but it's a recognition that all these areas will help to get at a more effective person.

Donna: This is not typical of other colleges, is it?

Amber Igasia '15: I see our role as being resources for the community; we confer with Sarah Luke when someone's struggling. We are the points in a web that pull things together. Janoah: Right. And the safety net lies in the dispersal of those points, if you have a wide enough net and connect all the points in the right

Brittany Cullen '14: It's really unique to COA. I have way more responsibility than friends in my role at other colleges. At other schools, the RA might be a resource for referring students to study skills, but at COA we know our residents, we know when they're doing well, and we know when they're struggling; and even after you refer them to help, you have to be there with them as they go through it. Amber: Because we're such a small school, and we have a ratio of about one RA to eight students, we have the ability to build that relationship. It's almost preemptive, because when you have a good relationship with your residents, you are able to see when someone is struggling. We have that

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ability to almost be individualized, to cater our responses to each individual. Joe: I think one of the interesting qualities of how we approach wellness at COA is that it has a really reflexive element to it. We have to usually teach people about how wellness at COA works — which is intentionally organic and ambiguous. Sarah Luke isn't telling us, "This is what you do as an RA." We have to adapt. For a lot of people that's a very confusing system. It's not like, "Here are the laws of COA." Janoah: It gets into how we think about wellness in general — and how we think about human ecology. I came in thinking that all the other stuff is extracurricular. As the Student Life team, we're trying to demonstrate that it's not extracurricular, it plays an integral aspect in our lives. We need to teach that, because it's fairly unique. Joe: Right. A lot of people are coming from systems in which the things you mentally need to do to cope with academics — like sports, or whatever — were treated as separate from academics, whereas I think here we recognize it as an entire process of learning. Janoah: Often those activities were things that you ran to when you came

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to a wall in your academics, like you're studying, studying, studying, and you need to use these extracurriculars as things to get away from the pressure. What I hope we might do is to bring an awareness in prior to that wall, and have a whole network of wellness pushing you to tackle that wall in the first place, instead of it being something that you feel guilty about or ashamed of. Donna: Can you talk about what you have learned as RAs? Brittany: I've learned more about my boundaries. Being an RA can take so much emotional energy. I've learned what I need to do to restore myself in order to be there for my residents. I think that the way we can improve as a community in promoting wellness is to reflect that in ourselves because often we don't lead by example. We're overworked, or don't demonstrate good self-care, and I think that's crucial to what our residents pick up on and how they learn to take care of themselves. I think we can do better to recognize when we are stressed out or when we're not taking care of ourselves, how it ends up impacting our residents. Janoah: And being honest about that with our residents, and showing them how we struggle with that too,

and not creating set images, or goals for people to get to — but giving tools and processes that people might work with and towards. Donna: Is there a concern that we do too much? Anjali: It comes down to what the aim is for an adult who is exiting college and moving into the working world or wherever they are going. Is the aim just to produce a piece of paper that is a degree? In that case we're way overdoing it. But the reason COA exists is for a whole other level of engagement with society, with the world around us, and we aim to be global citizens — well-rounded, engaged, thinking, feeling, responsible people who are — and I would use the word intention or consciousness here, because that is the difference. Going into the world consciously or intentionally to do things with that intent — that comes when you've been taken care of, when you know what it feels like to be part of a community. You know what it feels like to have interpersonal relationships and to have power dynamics that are healthy and mutually responsive, mutually beneficial, and that's what you're going to go out and foster in the world.

Research Successes Two Alumni Receive FDA Approval for Innovative Pharmaceuticals By Marni Berger '09

Blood-red latex exuding from Croton lechleri.

The Significance of Dragon's Blood: Steven King '80 Between 1978 and 1979, Steven King, PhD, spent nine months living with the Angotere Secoya indigenous people in the Peruvian Amazon. A Peruvian non-governmental organization had contracted him to study the diet and medicinal plants of the group for his College of the Atlantic internship. In December of 2012, thirty-four years after Steven's first visit to the region, the healing properties of a purified drug extracted from latex so viscous and red that it is known as sangre de drago, or dragon's blood, have been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration as a medication 34

that can halt the fluid loss caused by diarrhea. It took two dozen years of careful research and experimentation by Steven, senior vice president of sustainable supply, ethnobotanical research, and intellectual property at Napo Pharmaceuticals, but the drug — known as crofelemer and sold as Fulyzaq — now offers relief to those living with HIV/AIDS, many of whom also have to live with severe diarrhea from multiple causes. It is also the first botanical, orally administered, anti-diarrhea

medication — and only the second botanical prescription drug — approved by the FDA. Because it is hardly absorbed into the bloodstream, there are little-to-no side effects, and so it can be taken, if needed, on a regular basis. That's only part of the story. Crofelemer, unlike most FDA-approved drugs, cannot be manufactured by chemical synthesis. It must be extracted and purified from the latex of the Croton lechleri tree growing in the western Amazon basin. Its success requires careful attention to the environment. The extraction is College of the Atlantic Magazine

done sustainably, by local community members. For years, Steven has assisted these communities on reforestation projects. So the FDA's stamp of approval has provided another long-term sustainable source of income from the rainforest to local communities. Steven was the first graduate student at the Institute of Economic Botany of the New York Botanical Garden, earning his PhD in biology from the City University of New York. He learned of the tree's special properties from healers. He speaks of having had "the great privilege to work with, learn from, and conduct research with healers and experts in ethnomedicine in Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Tanzania, Papua New Guinea, and Nigeria; and to work with communities in Peru and scientists on the long-term sustainable harvest of Croton lechleri." He also has had more than sixty scientific articles published and has organized numerous workshops and lectures around the globe. This work showcases just how business, the environment, human health, and one's own passion can intersect. "The cultivation and sustainable production of the Croton lechleri tree and its latex provides income to local communities," Steven says. Culture groups and governments in

the countries where the team works will receive a portion of profits from crofelemer and any other drugs sold. Steve and Napo are now focusing on the use and approval of crofelemer to treat cholera-induced diarrhea, and are working with their partners to gain approval for a pediatric form of crofelemer that can be used around the world to treat children

who needlessly die of fluid loss from childhood diarrhea. Above left: Young Croton lechleri trees growing as a result of natural germination in Chimbana, Peru. Top right: Cesar Lozano and Steven King '80 hold a Croton tree at an agroforestry production site in the Huallaga River basin. Cesar, one of Napo's Peruvian partners, develops and manages reforestation projects. Bottom right: Sunset on the Maranon River, returning from an agroforestry production site. Photos courtesy of Steven King.

Building a Better Flu Vaccine: Clifton E. McPherson '84 Clifton "Trey" McPherson, PhD, is responsible for helping to keep the wheels of a large machine oiled. At Protein Sciences, where he is vice president of product development, Trey works with a dedicated team that has spent the past years developing and producing the first fully eggfree and recombinant flu vaccine, Flublok. Trey currently oversees the work of some fifteen specialized scientists who are developing new vaccines and other products. College of the Atlantic Magazine

To anyone who has ever received a flu shot that didn't "work," Flublok may be an alternative. The Flublok vaccine is not only more sustainably manufactured than egg-based vaccines, it can provide a much more precise match to the seasonal flu. It is created using moth cells, which is preferable in that it reduces potential risks from the vaccine production, since so few viruses affect both insects and humans.

Quite recently, research and theory â&#x20AC;&#x201D; years of work aimed at necessary authorization â&#x20AC;&#x201D; have hit a bulls-eye. On January 16, 2013, the US FDA approved Flublok. Despite, or perhaps related to, his influence in the health industry, Trey has his feet on the ground. "Many of the scientists I oversee," Trey says laughing, "are much more expert in their fields than I am."

Trey recalls he did not find his professional place right away. While at COA, he slowly began to find his niche in the sciences. After graduation, and a year's position mapping the genes of anemia and other blood disorders at The Jackson Laboratory, Trey's interest in biology solidified. He decided to continue, earning a

PhD from Vanderbilt University, then receiving a postdoctorate fellowship in molecular genetics from Brown University. There, Trey published a groundbreaking article in the journal Cell on how DNA is packaged differently around genes that are actively expressed.

Trey has since published nineteen more scientific articles. He continues to actively pursue his calling, currently seeking FDA approval on Panblok, a vaccine for pandemic flu made with the same technology as Flublok. The significant difference between the two lies in Panblok's considerably wider reach.

Biology 101: What is a cell? PLANT CELL

Items 1, 11, & 12 are unique to plant cells.

1. The cell wall is made from dense fibers and forms an extra layer of protection which maintains the cell's shape and prevents it from bursting when it takes on more water. 2. The cell membrane is a thin semi-permeable membrane that surrounds the cell fluid (cytoplasm), thus enclosing its contents. 3. The nucleus stores genetic material in the form of DNA (see page 39), and is surrounded by the nuclear membrane. Inside the nucleus is a nucleolus. Here ribosomes are made. 4. Ribosomes are responsible for assembling the proteins of the cell. They consist of RNA and proteins. 5. Mitochondria are the cell's power plants; they convert energy into forms that are usable by the cell. 6. The centrosome is the production center for microtubules â&#x20AC;&#x201D; fibrous, hollow rods that help to support and shape a cell, and are also involved in movement within a cell, especially during cell division. 7. Smooth endoplasmic reticulum (SER) contains enzymes important for synthesizing and metabolizing fats. 36

5 6 7 8

10 11 12

8. Rough endoplasmic reticulum (RER) is covered in ribosomes that synthesize proteins; the RER can transport these proteins throughout the plant.

10. Peroxisomes contain more than fifty enzymes and play many important roles in cell metabolism, including breakdown of fats and alcohol.

9. The Golgi apparatus is the shipping department for the cell's chemical products. It modifies proteins and lipids, or fats, that have been built in the ER and prepares them for export outside of the cell or for transport to other locations within the cell.

11. The large vacuole stores sap and is especially important in osmosis since it stores water in the cell. 12. Chloroplasts, found in the cells of the green parts of the plant, are where photosynthesis takes place.

College of the Atlantic Magazine

Aoife O'Brien '05 Babycatcher By Marni Berger '09

Aoife O'Brien, CNM, sits with five babies she â&#x20AC;&#x153;caughtâ&#x20AC;? while working at the Midwife Center for Birth and Women's Health in Pittsburgh, PA. The babies are all under four months old.

Aoife O'Brien will never forget her first "catch" of a baby. "I was twenty-two years old, living with fourteen Mayan midwives at a clinic in Guatemala. They told me I was no longer going to watch. I was going to use my hands." She describes the photograph taken just after the catch: "My smile is so big, it looks like my face might split." The work in Guatemala was Aoife's senior project; midwifery, she knew, was her calling. In 2009, Aoife enrolled in Columbia University School of Nursing, earning her bachelor of science in nursing through an accelerated one-year program and graduating with her master's of science in nurse-midwifery in 2011. For a year she saw clients in a freestanding nonprofit birth center in Pittsburgh. She has since returned to Maine to work at Blue Hill Memorial Hospital. Midwives, says Aoife, "strive for health maintenance first, followed by treatment of illness when necessary." Midwifery assumes a holistic approach, with midwives trained as experts in normal labor, birth, and the postpartum period, as well as well-woman care across the lifespan. "When the time comes to have a baby," she continues, the midwifery team "encourages women to listen College of the Atlantic Magazine

to their bodies, and we guide their efforts as needed." Using their medical training and expertise, they focus on reassuring the mother, facilitating position changes when helpful, and managing labor only when necessary. "Decreasing fear greatly decreases the experience of pain and suffering. Being present and reassuring is one of the most effective ways to make this possible," she says. When needed, Aoife connects to specialists. An open, respectful collaboration with obstetricians, for example, "allows for the best possible care of mother and fetus." It is imperative, Aoife stresses, that women and families are aware of all options of care and can make informed choices about their practitioner and environment. "If you don't know your choices, you don't have any." Aoife describes a more dramatic experience in Guatemala the same year of her first catch. It took place in an eight-foot square room, packed with seven people speaking the Mayan language Mam, as well as Spanish, which Aoife spoke. "The bed was so large," Aoife says, "there was little room around it for people to stand or sit." The woman in labor was about nineteen years old, and it was her first baby. "She had been laboring

for a very long time, had passed out twice, and was pouring sweat." When the electricity went out, the woman's family lit candles and "packed around the edge of the bed, praying, as I tried to coax the baby out by candlelight." Finally a senior midwife took over and determined that the woman needed to be in a hospital. Eventually she had a successful vaginal birth. Not all births are this dramatic, of course. But Aoife feels that this experience was the kind that tells a person whether she is cut out for the job, a make-you-or-break-you moment. Aoife found it inspiring. Her time in Guatemala, along with her internship with home birth midwives in Bar Harbor, became the foundation of her work; her memory of those moments informs the choices she makes as a professional midwife. "In the end," Aoife says, "COA and my experience there formed a philosophy that I believe affects everything I do: to be aware of how your actions influence others; to never stop asking questions; to be self-sufficient and creative about your endeavors in order to make them feasible. To never give up, and to know that this outlook can be applied to everything you do after you leave COA."

PJ Smith '11, right, shows a fifth-grader how an Ussing chamber works. This machine is used to measure how much current is flowing from cells tested in the lab. The amount of current emitted is relative to the success of the drug, with the output looking a bit like an EKG.

DISCOVERING CURES After COA, while some alumni interested in health go on to work physically with human bodies, others take a microscopic view, searching genes for cures to some of our most pressing illnesses. Many begin serious scientific research as students, working up the road in The Jackson Laboratory. – DG

Eduarta (Kapinova) Holl '05

Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, postdoctoral scholar: Cancer, inflammation and blood clotting Having completed her PhD in microbiology and immunology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Eda has been a postdoctoral scholar in the field of translational research, bringing drugs from a laboratory setting into the clinic. Her main focus is on drugs that might counteract inflammatory disorders. She also works on science and regulatory perspectives of clinical trial research at the Duke Cancer Center. Recently, she's been focused on a new class of drugs that might stop the formation of dangerous blood clots while still allowing normal blood clotting to occur.

Seth Carbonneau '05

Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research, Boston, Massachusetts: Epigenetic causes of a variety of diseases One of the new frontiers of pharmaceuticals is epigenetics, understanding how the proteins that activate the chemical switches in our cells work so that what is innate in our bodies is expressed. This knowledge can impact many diseases — cancer for one — as well as the side effects of various treatments. Part of Seth's job is to use his holistic training from COA to figure out whether a variety of recent experiments can be replicated, and to make sure that the scientist didn't miss any essential angles. He's also responsible for performing experiments at molecular and genetic levels to determine which protein targets in pathways would be the best to inhibit so as to treat disease.

Anne Czechanski '06

The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Maine: Alzheimer's, deafness, schizophrenia, glaucoma Anne has worked at JAX since she was a student at COA. Currently she creates the sources for further research — developing specific genetic components in laboratory mice so that scientists can pursue further genetic testing. Her current charge is to derive cell lines from mice for researchers to study affected neurons in the cerebral cortex — the area that plays a key role in memory, attention, thought, awareness, language, and consciousness.

Aleksandra "Sasha" Aljakna '07

The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Maine: Cardiovascular disease Sasha works in a group that researches how HDL cholesterol, what we call "good" cholesterol, is regulated at the gene level. People with higher levels of HDL cholesterol seem to have fewer problems with cardiovascular disease, while those with low HDL cholesterol levels have increased rates for heart disease. Scientists are trying to use this information to prevent cardiovascular diseases by developing medicine that raises HDL. But to develop new medicine, scientists need to know how this cholesterol operates. Sasha's group is seeking to discover which genes regulate HDL cholesterol. 38

College of the Atlantic Magazine

Edina Hot '08

Max Planck Institute, Marburg, Germany, completing PhD in cellular and molecular microbiology: Cancer Cell movement — or motility — is essential to many physiological processes. Think embryonic cell differentiation, the healing of wounds, immune responses — and also cancer metastasis. Edina studies one of the regulators of cell motility, small G proteins. For decades, scientists have known that mutations in small G proteins can lead to cancer. But they haven't known the details. Edina is looking at cell motility in very simple cells — specifically, how the small G proteins regulate what is known as gliding motility within bacteria. She has found that in order to glide, the small G protein must be linked to actin, another protein. Knowing this is crucial to understanding the role of small G proteins within cells. This is new — and exciting — because it wasn't previously known that bacteria even had small G or actin proteins. While Edina works in basic — not applied — research, understanding the pathways that these proteins follow in a much simpler system might ultimately make a difference for humans.

Zinaida Dedeic Montenegrin '08

Biology 101: What is a gene? 1

Paul Thomas Smith '11

Flatley Discovery Lab, Boston, Massachusetts: Cystic fibrosis Cystic fibrosis is a life-threatening genetic disease causing a wide range of troubles, beginning in infancy or childhood: children don't grow or gain weight, mucus accumulates in their chests, and they have chronic lung infections. Paul, or PJ, is charged with using computational chemistry to identify and test unique molecules that might slip through traditional means of drug discovery. As he explains it, "molecules are more than just carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen — they're organic backbones carrying important functions that behave like magnets." PJ builds models to find molecules with the same arrangement of magnet-like features on different backbones with the hope that the subtle changes in the backbone might improve drug potency and effectiveness. He says the lab is hoping to advance to clinical trials by the end of this year.

Aly Pierik '14

The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Maine: Immune function Using mice, Aly is looking into how the drug rapamycin acts on immune functions. Rapamycin is currently used as an immunosuppressant for patients struggling with complications after receiving grafts. But when used in short-term treatment, rapamycin can instead stimulate the immune system — causing the system in older mice to act as if it were in a younger mouse. Aly is involved with testing different aspects of the immune response of mice that have been treated with rapamycin to understand how it impacts the immune system as a whole.

T G

University of Oxford, England, completing PhD in experimental medicine: Cancer Since metastasis is responsible for most cancer-related deaths, Zinaida is looking for genes that might be involved in metastasis as a first step in restricting it. A recent discovery might be a breakthrough. Zinaida has been examining the genes that play a role in two physiological developments that share some similar processes with metastasis. Embryonic eyelid development and wound healing both have similar cell migration, proliferation, and programmed cell death to metastasis. She finds that the iASPP gene, which regulates the well-known cancer gene p53, also plays a role in eyelid development. She's also discovered a new link between iASPP and a second cancer pathway, known as EGF R. This is important because when the normal EGF R pathways are disrupted, patients tend to be resistant to cancer therapies. Zinaida will continue to investigate this link, hoping to target iASPP gene expression as a way of regulating the EGF R pathway in future cancer therapies.

A C

Human Gene 1. Genes are found on chromosomes within a cell's nucleus. Chromosomes come in pairs, with one member of the pair inherited from each parent. 2. Chromosomes are made of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). Human cells have about 21,000 genes on their forty-six chromosomes. 3. There are four types of bases in the DNA molecule, and they form complementary pairs: Adenine with Thymine and Guanine with Cytosine. 4. The DNA double helix has a sugar-phosphate backbone with pairs of bases arranged up the middle. The order of the three billion base pairs in every human cell carries genetic information. This information influences how a person develops and functions. Illustrations by Rebecca Hope Woods.

Aly Pierik '14, Yuka Takemon '14, and Casey Acklin '15, 2013 winter interns at The Jackson Laboratory. Photo by Becca Haydu '16.

Yuka Takemon '14

The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Maine: Albuminuria Albuminuria is often a marker for kidney dysfunction. A healthy kidney filters small ions such as sodium and potassium, but prevents blood or large molecules such as albumin from passing into our urine. When people have damaged kidneys, say from type 1 diabetes, the broken filter allows large molecules through. Working in the Paigen Lab with senior researcher and COA adjunct Ron Korstanje, Yuka's project is to identify the non-coding regulatory RNA associated with albuminuria. Until recently, DNA that does not code for specific proteins had been considered "junk" DNA; now it's believed that non-coding RNA transcribed from DNA regulates other genes. Yuka's work may lead to greater understanding of this condition, and could possibly reduce its impact on humans.

Casey Acklin '15

The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Maine: Lifespan and diet restriction Recent reports have indicated that restrictive diets increase lifespan. Casey has been working with the principal researchers, Kevin Flurkey and David Harrison, to discover why this might be. There's a thought that the longevity in laboratory mice stems from decreases in visceral fat â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the fat surrounding and contained within bodily organs. But maybe it's the fat stored under the skin that is reduced. If the mice are keeping their subcutaneous fat, but burning off all of the visceral fat, it could still mean that diet restriction is operating through the reduction of visceral fat. If, on the other hand, the animals are keeping their visceral fat, and yet still showing increases in lifespan, it means that there is another cause of the benefits of diet restriction. Casey is attempting to assess all the mice in this study to see just how much visceral fat they lose as a result of diet restriction to clarify this very hotly debated issue. 40

College of the Atlantic Magazine

A Life of Kindness, A World of Hope Father James M. Gower (August 17, 1922–December 17, 2012) By Richard J. Borden, Rachel Carson Chair in Human Ecology Generosity and compassion are not accidental qualities. They are special gifts from those who believe this world can be a better place. Father James M. Gower was such a person. A spirit of love and benevolent service marked the path throughout his life. Born and raised on Mount Desert Island, Jim Gower graduated from Bar Harbor High School in 1940. As Les Brewer, his schoolmate, lifelong friend, and co-founder of COA recalls: "Jim was always friendly and helpful. He never cared about worldly possessions. He's never changed … certain people are leaders from the beginning." Their high school yearbook, the Islander, affirms the claim: student council president, class president, president of Cercle Franҫais, honors student, member of chorus, drama, and outdoor clubs, four years on the baseball team, and four on football, serving as the lead quarterback — with Les as his back-up. The Senior Statistics section of the yearbook lists "Jimmy" as "famous" for skiing, with outdoor life as a "favorite pastime," and an "ambition" to become a forester. He once described skiing as "the closest to flying you could get without having a plane." He also loved to dance — and never missed a high school dance if he could help it. Jim was a young man of all-around talent. He was, in a word, interdisciplinary — before that term was common. This was during the Depression. Jim's home — presided over by a devout, Irish immigrant mother and a talented, jack-of-all-trades father — was filled with humor, song, and prayer. But his father often would forget to send College of the Atlantic Magazine

out bills, and would just as easily go fishing or pick blackberries as finish the painting job or antique restoration with which he was charged. As the eldest son of five children, Jim began working in grade school, heading downtown every night to deliver a stack of newspapers from the post office to the drugstore, earning 15 cents a week — until another outfit offered 50 cents; he kept both jobs, bringing home 65 cents each week. At the University of Notre Dame, Jim majored in philosophy and received his AB in 1944. Thereafter, as an ensign in the United States Navy, Jim saw action in the Mediterranean, during the final stages of World War II. Following the war he considered

law, but chose the higher cause of the mysteries of faith and ministerial leadership. He studied theology and divinity at St. Augustine's Seminary of Toronto and was ordained into the priesthood in 1953. "I saw the church as the peace movement," he once said. Father Jim returned to Maine, beginning as a parish priest at St. Dominic's in Portland. Within two months he was transferred to Sacred Heart in Waterville, where he served for fifteen years. Then, in 1968, twenty-eight years after leaving Mount Desert Island, he returned to serve at St. Ignatius in Northeast Harbor and St. Peter's in Southwest Harbor. Shortly after this homecoming, Jim bumped into Les on 41

the street. "While I'm here," Jim said, "I'd like to do something other than my church work, I'd like to do something for this island." "Some people have been talking about starting a college," Les offered; Jim replied: "Let's tackle it!" And so they did. It would not be long before they had an initial working group. Early members included Jim's friend Robert Smith and two of Les's local business partners, Richard Lewis of the Bar Harbor Chamber of Commerce and Sonny Cough, owner of the Atlantic Oakes Hotel. The group quickly expanded to form a nonprofit educational corporation that was granted approval in June 1969 by the Maine State Board of Education. Having witnessed Catholic Italians and French killing each other in World War II, and later, seeing both his nephew and his altar boy return in body bags from the Vietnam War, Jim's conception of the college was as an institution for peace. Though first named Acadia Peace College by Father Jim, the new institution took on what he saw as an even more profound mission when it became College of the Atlantic, with its

educational focus of human ecology. The time-honored attribution for establishing COA's interdisciplinary philosophy is given to Jim. He was familiar with the ecological ideas of René Dubos and Ian McHarg. But the addition of "human" to ecology seemed an important rounding out, an idea likewise endorsed by the Rev. Cushman McGiffert, another founding trustee. On January 1, 1970 Edward Kaelber, COA's first president, arrived to begin plans for the new college. For his first six months on MDI, Ed lived with Jim in the Northeast Harbor rectory. Ed recalls that their daily routine typically concluded with a dinner of minute steaks, canned peas, and French fries. Their afterdinner conversations on life, religion — and, of course, the college — went well into the night. Once things got under way, Ed remembers Jim often apologizing for not being able to make income contributions. "But during those early financial discussions, Jim always kept the focus on the mission. He was the soul of the college." Though Jim was later transferred to the campus ministry at the University of Maine Orono and

In this photo that hung in Father Jim's room at Birch Bay Retirement Village in Bar Harbor during his final days, the young priest stands on the right. 42

then to St. Vincent's in Bucksport, he never lost his close connection to COA. He participated at every level, from teaching to offering the commencement speech for the college's twenty-first anniversary in 1993. After retiring from the priesthood and becoming a COA life trustee, Jim was a frequent visitor to campus. He even participated in the Outdoor Orientation Program, or OOPS, celebrating his seventyfifth birthday by climbing Mount Katahdin with incoming students. I will always remember Jim's smiling face at academic policy committee and board meetings while I was academic dean, and the notes of appreciation he penned afterwards. His support was a constant, whether in times of ordinary campus life or moments of great need. On the afternoon of 9/11, when stunned by the events of the day, the college community gathered on the North Lawn, Father Jim stepped forward with gentle assurance. His words that day gave voice to our apprehensions and comfort to our fears. The lives Father Jim touched were many, and in some cases long before the college began. One was John Kelly, who later became chair of COA's trustee board. John attended St. Edward's Catholic School in Bar Harbor. In 1953 he served as an altar boy at Holy Redeemer for Father Jim's first mass following his ordination. It was a great celebration, as John recalls, attended by worshipers and members of the priesthood from throughout the region. When John was later a student at Colby College, Father Jim was his parish priest in Waterville. Their close friendship continued throughout their lives. Marie Stivers, COA's academic and administrative services director, another St. Edward's student, learned to play the guitar in after-school lessons at the rectory with Father Jim. "We loved him … everybody loved him," she recalls. Judith Cox, former director of COA's Educational Studies Program, also attended St. Edward’s. Her College of the Atlantic Magazine

memory is of "a true peacemaker; a radical — in a wise way — who stayed within, but pushed the edges." Jim's first calling was always the church. The sweeping changes that accompanied the Vatican II encyclical in the 1960s transformed the Catholic liturgy. Jim welcomed the increased participation of the laity and conversion of services from the Latin mass to vernacular language. He believed it brought people closer to the church and to each other. He saw many other places the church

Ed Kaelber said it best: "I never knew anyone who lived a more Christlike existence. He was always asking 'how can I do more?'" could lead — though it did not always meet with his hopes. Some of these challenges he took on himself, especially through participation in Pax Christi, the international Catholic movement for peace. He maintained an active role with a variety of projects to support the local poor, expand human rights, and oppose violent conflict. After the Vietnam War ended, he was especially concerned with injustices in Central America and did much to support peace and opportunities there, including personally accompanying the first Witness for Peace excursion to Nicaragua. It was through these activities that I came to know Jim much better. For several years we drove together to monthly meetings of People for Educational Advancement and Community Enhancement (PEACE — International) at Arthur and Marjorie Dole's home in Trenton. The goal of the small nonprofit group was to raise College of the Atlantic Magazine

funds for community development and reforestation projects in the aftermath of the horrendous civil war in El Salvador. We also were making plans to build a new university to commemorate Oscar Romero, archbishop of San Salvador, who was assassinated in 1980. The university would be located in the most severely war-torn region of the country. These were heart-wrenching issues for Father Jim, further amplified by the murder of Jesuit priests at Universidad Centroamericana, or UCA, and the countless thousands of other Salvadorans killed or "disappeared" during the 1980s and 1990s. On-theground leadership for the projects was in the hands of Francisco Acosta, a former UCA seminarian, and his wife, alumna Barbara Dole Acosta. When the Romero University opened in the spring of 1997, Jim urged me to attend on behalf of COA. Plans were made and I was invited to deliver an inaugural convocation speech. It was a remarkable adventure. Equally important was the special bond of sharing the pleasure, with Jim, of seeing the birth of another college. Jim's final months were marked by declining health and memory loss. Nonetheless, his grace and steadfast cheerfulness remained undiminished. I remember our last trip together, picking him up at Birch Bay Retirement Village and heading out over the Crooked Road and past the stone barn on a marvelously crisp February afternoon. As we drove into the setting sun on our way to Ed Kaelber's house to watch Super Bowl XLIV, he recounted memories of old friends and the landscape of his beloved island home. We were joined for dinner and the match between Indianapolis and New Orleans by Mary Drury, wife of the late Bill Drury, a venerated COA faculty member in biology, and architect Roc Caivano, another venerated COA teacher from the early years. We were all enthusiastic fans that evening — whooping and cheering perhaps a bit more for the underdog Saints

who, after the disaster of Hurricane Katrina seemed to carry the hopes of the entire Gulf Coast on their shoulders. Jim, as I recall, cheered for both sides. His face beamed after every touchdown and well-executed play. I am sure it was the same smile he had on a cold fall day back in 1940 when his pass in the final Bar Harbor game sealed the victory over a highly favored rival team from Rockland. It was his winning smile — his gift — an emblem of his love of people, of nature, and all of life. How shall we remember such a man? Ed Kaelber said it best: "I never knew anyone who lived a more Christ-like existence. He was always asking 'how can I do more?' He loved to give — but not in a holier-than-thou way. He could never give enough. He never preached — he just did things. If you could adopt your relatives, I would take him as my brother." Wouldn't we all.

Alumni N o t e s 1977

Frances Pollitt recently began volunteering at the Maine Historical Society cataloging rare cartographic materials. She also is assisting the University of Southern Maine's Osher Map Library staff with an online exhibit of 18th and 19th century nautical charts. In May 2012, she presented a paper to the Rupert's Land Colloquium at the University of Winnipeg about international boundary surveys between 1820 and 1825. Fran is an active participant in Baha'i activities, including junior youth programs, devotional gatherings, and study circles.

1979

Frank Twohill, who received his JD from Vermont Law School, was certified by the National Association of Counsel for Children as a child welfare law specialist. His solo general practice in Branford, Connecticut, includes juvenile and probate cases.

1980

Ruth Hill and husband John Brooks live in Brooklin, Maine, where they design, build, teach workshops, and write about glued-lapstrake wooden boats: brooksboatsdesigns.com. Ruth also writes natural history and coastal life articles for Maine Boats, Homes, and Harbors magazine. Pictured at Tengwang Pavilion in Nanchang, Jiangxi, China, is daughter Hangxiang, 10, who had been with Ruth for three days at that point, and Jack, 8, who joined the family in November 2006. John, son Tie, 11, adopted in 2008, and 44

daughter Leigh, 12, born into the family in 2000, stayed home for work and school. Ruth writes, "It won't be our last trip to China, but it was our last adoption trip! I am always happy to talk about all the wonderful kids (yes, boys too!) waiting for families, and to help anyone interested in adopting from China."

1982

"I'm working with a group of colleagues to create a new elementary school program for children who struggle in the classroom," writes Stu Dickey Summer. "Called EARTH: Education and Renewal Through the Hand, it is a farm- and craftbased addition to the lower school program of Hawthorne Valley Waldorf School in Ghent, New York. It is our experience that many children who struggle cognitively, emotionally, or volitionally in the classroom thrive and become leaders in our outdoor projects. I would be very interested to hear other's experiences in this work via stuart@taconic.net." Liz Cunningham (right) and Laura Cohn '88 (left) finally met in Bali after many conversations about Indonesia this past year. Liz was researching marine biodiversity in West Papua, and small-scale fisheries and the Bajao sea nomads in Sulawesi for her upcoming book Ocean Country. A photo essay about mangroves, "Mosaic of Life," excerpted from the book, was recently published in the winter 2012–13 issue of Times: timespub.tc. Laura makes an annual trip to Bali to continue her connection to the community, and to select handcrafts to bring home

to Philadelphia to sell alongside her own batiks: FromBalitoBala.com.

1985

Chris Hamilton recently left his job fundraising for LifeFlight, Maine's emergency medical helicopter service, and became associate director of the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association (MOFGA). Daughter Becca Hamilton '13, one of COA's proud legacy students, graduates this June.

1987

Tammis Coffin is now education coordinator at the recently renamed Museum of American Bird Art at Mass Audubon. While combining art and nature education, Tammis will help the museum move into expanding opportunities. She is also working with The Fells Estate on Lake Sunapee in New Hampshire to set up a new John Hay Ecology Center. While weaving poetic nature writing by the late John Hay into the interpretation of the landscape, gardens, and historic house, she's enjoyed exploring the educational and research potential of this 1920s ecological time capsule.

1988

Now living in southwestern Montana, Kim Chater is a part-time worker at Headwaters Veterinary Hospital and spending her remaining free time as a felt maker and fiber artist. Her felts can be seen on the Facebook page, Sea Cliff Felts. She also is exploring the art of clay at the Archie Bray Foundation of the Ceramic Arts. Kim writes that she is enjoying all the posts and photos from her COA alum pals.

1989

The summer show at COA's Blum Gallery will feature paintings by David Vickery and sculptural work by Blakeney Sanford '02. Their art will be on display July 12 through August 23. College of the Atlantic Magazine

1990

enjoying the Austin lifestyle. Great music, great people, lots of recreational opportunities, and I love the urban farms and the overall local pride going on in this town!"

Emily Bracale moved to 91 Ledgelawn in Bar Harbor where she has a healing practice, teaches Reiki and small group art classes, and does academic tutoring for beginning through college level reading and writing. Emily enjoys playing clarinet with the COA community orchestra and urges other local alums to consider joining, especially if they are string players.

1991

Rebekah Padgett has been living in Seattle and working for the State of Washington for the past twelve years, currently as a federal permit manager reviewing in-water and wetland projects. She also has shared research on tidal energy at national conferences. In her spare time she volunteers as a union steward in her workplace, as a board member of The Coastal Society, and assisted the American Red Cross in New Jersey after Hurricane Sandy last fall.

1993

Barbara Kent Lawrence has recently published her sixth book and first novel, Islands of Time, an offshoot of her fieldwork on Mount Desert Island and her dissertation about the influence of culture on aspiration. Barbara attended COA as a visiting student to test her ability and commitment to pursuing a doctorate. "COA offered a haven for stretching and exploring, and allowed me to show myself that I was ready." After receiving her EdD from Boston University, she taught at Northeastern and Lesley universities, conducted education research, and wrote about small schools: barbaralawrence.com. Heather Martin has been named executive director of the Maine Wabanaki State Child Welfare Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

1995

Sara Yasner, husband John Mahoney, and their two boys, Seamus and Emmett, welcomed their newest family member, Pamela Sage, on September 17, 2012. They are blissed out and enjoying life in their old College of the Atlantic Magazine

1999

farm house in Clifton, Maine. Sara is also embarking on her new career as a life coach and counselor. She's looking forward to work that matches her passions and also allows for increased flexibility as the family unschools and explores life together: SaraY.AnythingsPossible@gmail.com. Last fall, Derren Rosbach moved to Worcester, Massachusetts, with his wife Laura, and sons Cyrus, 6, and Rowen, 1.5. He joined the faculty at Worcester Polytechnic Institute and teaches in the Great Problems Seminars program. After completing his PhD at Virginia Tech in 2010, Derren taught in Vermont's Environmental Policy and Planning program.

1997

Former staff member George Dickson and Kelly Sheets Dickson, MPhil, are now British citizens, having attended a swearing-in ceremony on March 27. Kelly is working for an organization that helps students with academic promise from disadvantaged backgrounds gain places at leading universities. Rebecca Hancock was elected the first female Grand Lodge president of the International Shipmasters Association.

1998

Working as an environmental planner for Jacobs Engineering in Austin, Texas, Jennifer Zankowski is responsible for research and technical writing of environmental impact statements and environmental assessments for transit and transportation projects throughout the US. She writes, "I am really

In January, Heather Albert-Knopp, director of summer programs at COA, was elected president of the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association board. She had been a board member for five years, and vice president for the past two years. She's also chairing the search committee for MOFGA's next leader, following the December death of longtime executive director Russell Libby. Writes Beth Nixon, "I am still the human behind Ramshackle Enterprises (ramshackleenterprises. net) creating puppet shows, parades, piñatas, pageants, and spectacles across the country in schools, camps, addiction, recovery and mental health programs, and community centers. (If you need a galvanizing, rousing, cardboard-based celebration, please be in touch!) My husband, musician Joshua Marcus, our daughter Ida, 4, and I recently moved to Providence, Rhode Island, where I have a fellowship at New Urban Arts and am working on my own series of suitcase theater shows."

2000

Jaime (Duval) Beranek and husband Rob moved to the Cleveland, Ohio, area in the fall, settling in the quaint, New England-like town of Chagrin Falls. She writes, "We love it down here. We are on an acre and a half, so the dogs love it, too. We are in the 'country' but close to everything. Lots of great shopping, restaurants, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame! There is also a thriving local food scene." Jaime is now a registered yoga teacher at the 200-hour level and has created Breakwater Yoga to converse about the practice and teachings of yoga and 45

the deeper connection it encourages to the earth and to ourselves. Jaime invites all to connect or reconnect with her at breakwateryoga.com. After living in DC for 10 years, Ann Helfrich moved to Portland, Maine, and opened her Five Element AcupunctureÂ practice. She loves the frequent opportunities to meet and befriend COA alumni in the city, where she lives with her partner and their pets. Contact Ann at 207619-2312 or ann@ahamaine.com. Chelsea (Mooser) Confalone and her husband Nick welcomed their first baby, Leo, into the world this November on the auspicious night of Obama's re-election. They also gave birth to a children's book called Ocean Monsters to be released by Penguin Young Readers Group this fall.

Chase and Sarah (Heifetz) Morrill '01 love sharing COA with their kids. On a recent visit they took this photo of their four children and (in pink jacket) the daughter of Rahvi Barnum '09 and Kati Freedman '05.

2002

Anselm Bradford was selected as a 2013 Code for America fellow, codeforamerica.org/2013-fellows, and is currently living in the San Francisco Bay Area where he is on a three-fellow team partnered with the Human Services Agency of San Mateo County. They are exploring ways of increasing access to food benefits and services within the county. In order to fully understand 46

the area and food security issues they are researching, they participated in the Food Stamp Challenge, living on a food budget of $37.25 for a week, the average weekly allotment for a client enrolled in CalFresh, California's food stamp program.

issues surrounding landlords and students. This winter she ran into fellow COA alumna Suzanne von Leuschner ('77) of Chicago, who was in Carbondale for the Illinois State Green Party meeting. Small world! Bradshaw4council.yolasite.com

2003

Doug Lerch married Francesca Preston in fall 2012 at her family's biodynamic farm and vineyard in Healdsburg, California. They live in Petaluma, California, with Cyrus, 10, eight miles from Cyrus's mom, Sara Ridgway. After receiving a master's degree in psychology from California Institute of Integral Studies, Doug founded SEEDS, a non-profit providing social and emotional learning programs to local schools. He also runs Fiddleheads Nature Based Social Skills Group, an innovative therapy group for children based in local parks: douglaslerch.com.

Alana Beard and Josh Hurst were married by former president and founding faculty member Steve Katona on September 22, 2012, the fall equinox, in Northeast Harbor. "It was a calm, misty day and we were joined by friends and family (with a strong COA contingent!) for a simple ceremony by the water, and fun-filled evening reception on Somes Sound. Following the wedding we enjoyed a couple of nights in Lubec, Maine, exploring the Cutler coast by bike, and at the end of March we headed to Banff, Alberta, for our honeymoon." They expect to start construction on their home and Josh's woodshop this fall in Bar Harbor. Alana is the daughter of Judy Allen, registrar and longtime Allied Whale humpback whale catalog director, and trustee and visiting faculty member Ron Beard. Pictured are Sam Hallowell '10, Jericho Bicknell, Jenn Atkinson, Alana, Emily Clark-Usinowicz, Jacob Usinowicz, Sara Levine '05, Kathryn Hunninen, and Rye and Diane Lokocz. Jessica Bradshaw, one of twelve candidates for three seats, was elected to the Carbondale, Illinois, City Council. Since running two years ago, she's become even more involved in community groups. Last October the mayor appointed her chair of the city's Human Relations Commission, geared toward improving relations between African-Americans and the police, and dealing with

2004

Now working for the University of Toliara in southwestern Madagascar, Dustin Eirdosh is piloting an interdisciplinary course merging neuroscience, moral psychology, and youth development for the national teacher training program. University of Toliara is the first African nation member of the EvoS Consortium, the leading international higher education network for transdisciplinary science education.Â Julia Morgenstern Hefner writes, "On November 23, 2012, we welcomed Zoe Ruth Hefner to our family! Wyatt, 5, is a very proud big brother!" Tony Naples is providing his Vermont community with a direct connection to wild Alaska salmon via Starbird Fish, which distributes some of the catch from his summer work as a commercial fisherman in Alaska to Vermont CSAs and markets. "People like to be able to meet the person who's growing their vegetables, or catching their fish," he writes. College of the Atlantic Magazine

Maine game wardens Troy Thibodeau and Sargent Tim Spahr '86 are featured on Animal Planet's North Woods Law, a Maine-based reality TV show, for which Heeth Grantham '94 is a field producer. Lora Winslow is living in Portland, Maine, and attending Vermont Law School through its distance learning program. She'll receive her master's in environmental law and policy by summer's end.

2005

Jenny Jones received her MS in natural resource science management with a focus on early childhood environmental education and a minor in program evaluation from the University of Minnesota in July, 2012. She is living in Philadelphia and working as the program director for the Philadelphia Children Access Nature program run by Riverbend Environmental Education Center, and is the proud aunt of her sweet nephew James.

2006

While rafting down the Colorado River through Grand Canyon National Park this past summer, alumni (left to right) Nicole McKenney, Jamien St. Pierre, Paige Rutherford, Zack Steele '05, and Rachael Gilmartin made sure to

Maine's master's in social work program; she will start this fall.

Theology working toward an ordained Unitarian Universalist ministry.

Elona Rika is completing a doctorate in international economics and finance at Brandeis University. She was granted a research fellowship for the advancement of women in economics at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston where she conducted independent research analyzing international capital markets via international portfolio holdings and country allocation strategies. She and Jake Jolly were married in Napa Valley, California, on December 27, 2012, celebrating

Lauren Nutter, Nat Keller '04, and Ivy Huo '05 (left to right) connected with a contingent of COA students at the Forward on Climate Rally in Washington, DC, in February.

2011

with Napa wines, Albanian dance music, family, and friends, including Eduarta (Kapinova) Holl '05 (left) and Nickilynn Estologa '07 (right). Kathleen Tompkins married Tobias McNulty on New Year's Day at a small ceremony in a converted cotton mill in Saxapahaw, North Carolina. Kate is busy finishing her second year of medical school at the University of North Carolina and raising six chickens in their Chapel Hill backyard.

2009 pile onto a duckie (inflatable kayak) for an alumni photo op. Henry Steinberg married "the goddess of my dreams," Tania Maria Noguera, a native of Ecuador. After spending a few years in San Francisco, they intend to return to Latin America to work in environmental conservation.

2008

Kate Hassett was accepted into the University of Southern College of the Atlantic Magazine

Elizabeth-Anne (Cobb) Ronk married Zac Ronk on New Year's Eve in Birmingham, Alabama. She writes, "We had a big ol' party and were joined by friends and family from around the world. Maggie Mansfield was a bridesmaid and left a trail of broken hearts, Sam Perkins '12 wrangled our dog Atticus, and Brooke Welty, Andy Curtis, Lily Allgood, and Phil Walter obtained copious amounts of confetti cannons and

Tess Faller is the new farm manager at COA's Beech Hill Farm. Tess has studied and worked on organic farms in Ireland, Latin America, the Pacific Northwest, and New England, including Beech Hill. She is passionate about growing healthy and delicious food, employing sustainable methods of farming, and fostering education and community building through agriculture.

2010

Andrew Coate is in the first year of a master's of divinity degree at Boston University School of

glitter bombs. We were joined by Julie Olbrantz '12 and Patrick Davis '13 and everyone danced into the New Year. Will Alabama ever be the same? I am slogging my way through grad school in educational psychology. We welcome all visitors — Alabama is on the way to everywhere!" Philip Kunhardt will be attending Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, studying with Dr. Mark Ashton, and working on a master's in forest science. Hazel Stark was accepted to the Teton Science Schools' graduate 47

Alumni Support Makes a Difference When I think of our class since we arrived here at COA, I am so impressed and proud of all that we have accomplished. I hope these opportunities will be available to future students. As an alumna, it's my role to say thank you. I believe in this institution, I have pride in my class, and so I give back to the college. Alex Fouliard '13

Senior Class Gift Committee Co-chair

The annual fund supports operating expenses, scholarship funds, library resources, technology improvements, faculty development, and facilities management. It is also seen by many as a barometer of the state of the college: •

Many foundations and other grant-making organizations consider the percent of alumni participation as a means of measuring a college's stature and stability.

•

College guidebooks and recruiting organizations see alumni support of the annual fund as an indicator of alumni satisfaction.

Alumni who support the annual fund (at any monetary level) help support the internal operations of COA and augment all of its outreach activities.

program where she will focus on place-based teaching, experiential education, and field ecology. Yiftusira Girma Wondimu has been accepted to Purdue University College of Pharmacy in West Lafayette, Indiana, pursuing a doctor of pharmacy. She currently lives in Seattle, Washington while taking the last few prerequisite courses needed before attending Purdue in the fall.

2012

In October, Michelle Klein gave her first lecture at a scientific meeting, the 164th Meeting of the Acoustical Society of America. The abstract to her talk, "Use of social sounds by humpback whales in the western Antarctic Peninsula feeding grounds," was published in 48

the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America: asadl.org. From January through May, she led acoustic surveys of Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins as a research assistant at the Hong Kong Dolphin Conservation Society for an environmental impact assessment of a major bridge and tunnel construction project. Come fall, she will continue to investigate the dolphins while pursuing a master's in environmental and life sciences at Trent University in Ontario, Canada.

community N o t e s Molly Anderson, Partridge Chair in Food and Sustainable Agriculture Systems, participated in a workshop on the Right to Food at Johns Hopkins University, hosted by Olivier de Schutter, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food. Her article in the Journal of Rural Studies, "Beyond food security to realizing food rights in the US," was part of the background packet. Molly also participated in a "write-shop" in Albuquerque, New Mexico, with seven others, developing a paper on the science needed for achieving sustainability in food systems. Similarly, Molly participated in meetings of the Maine Food Strategy Team of Food Solutions for New England to envision how the region can grow 75 percent of its food by 2060 — while eliminating hunger and food insecurity. Additionally, Molly presented on "Metrics and Indicators of Food System Reform" and served on a visioning panel about food systems at the Northeast Sustainable Agriculture Working Group's annual conference. Nancy Andrews, faculty member in film and video, was featured on the BBC program Newsday, following a Johns Hopkins study finding that about one-third of those released from intensive care units experience post-traumatic stress disorder. Nancy knows this all too well (see the fall 2012 issue of COA). She will shoot a feature-length film related to the topic, The Strange Eyes of Dr. Myes, this summer, using animation,

College of the Atlantic Magazine

drawing, and special effects. Says Andrews, "After a near-death experience, Dr. Myes, researcher in the science of perception, attempts to graft animal senses to the brain in order to revolutionize human consciousness. She must face the consequences when she uses her own body and mind as a research tool." Additionally, Andrews presented at Artists in Context's Connected and Consequential conference at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, at the University of New England, and exhibited in the Biddeford, Maine, gallery Engine. She invites those who have experienced ICU PTSD to post their stories on the website Cowbird at cowbird.com/ project/you-are-not-alone/overview. At the XIX International Conference of the Society for Human Ecology, hosted by the Australian National University in Canberra in February, Rich Borden, Rachel Carson Chair in Human Ecology, organized the symposium Nature and Mind — Revisited, presented the paper "Ecology and Experience — Closing the Gap," and chaired the closing plenary session, Individual and Institutional Responsibility for Change. The SHE conference, "Decisions that Work: Linking Sustainability, Environmental Responsibility and Human Wellbeing," was held in partnership with the IV International Conference on Sustainability Science in Asia. In December, Rich was an invited speaker at the Council on Institutes

Barbara J. Brewer September 12, 1922– December 14, 2012 Barbara and Les Brewer shared a lifetime of love and commitment. Barbara led a quiet, reflective life of mutual support with Les, our longest-serving trustee. Our hearts go out to Les, who co-founded COA with Father Jim Gower in 1968, and in the space of three days lost both his wife and longtime friend Father Jim. College of the Atlantic Magazine

of Higher Education session on "The Degree Qualifications Profile: Goals, Practices, Questions" at the annual meeting of the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC) in Boston. Ryan Bouldin, faculty member in green chemistry and physics, working with Nicholas Harris '13 and Matthew McElwee '13, received a highly competitive Environmental Protection Agency P3 grant to further develop the process of converting waste into sugars. Lynn Boulger, former dean of development, is now dean of institutional advancement. Alumna Marni Berger '09 published an interview with Bill Carpenter, faculty member in literature and writing, on the Days of Yore website, thedaysofyore.com/william-carpenter. It begins, "When I was a little kid, I totally lived for the present. I don't remember ever having a desire. Although, as I grew older I began to live in the future — which is like the Fall of Man …" Bill also attended a New England Association of Schools and Colleges conference on current NEASC standards and served on the accreditation team for Burlington College in Vermont. To explore ways that COA can prepare students to work in parks and protected areas, Ken Cline, associate dean for faculty and David Rockefeller Family Chair in Ecosystem Management and Protection, attended the George Wright Society Conference on Parks, Protected Areas, and Cultural Sites in Denver, Colorado. Come summer, the College of the Atlantic Guide to the Lakes & Ponds of Mount Desert, based on COA life trustee William V.P. Newlin's 1989 guide and updated by Ken, Rachel Briggs '13, Addie Namnoum '15, and Brett Ciccotelli '09, will be published by College of the Atlantic Press and North Atlantic Books. For two weeks in February, COA's Ethel H. Blum Gallery took on the

gravitas of a New York City museum, thanks to the exhibit, "Collected Prints: A Selection of Works on Paper from the Collection of Catherine Clinger," the Allan Stone Chair in the Visual Arts. The exhibit included work by sixteenth century artists Jacques Callot and Hans Holbein, several hand-printed books, contemporary work by Sue Coe, Kiki Smith, and John Talleur, even a woodcut by COA's Alice Anderson '12. Among the highlights were five of Catherine's own etchings, including "St. Francis Speaking with the Birds." Darron Collins '92, COA president, gave the opening plenary at the XIX International SHE Conference (see Rich Borden). Emphasizing the experimental at COA, he described human ecology as "a perspective that cultivates self-direction, a method of problem solving that emphasizes transdisciplinarity, a way of knowing that balances hands-on with minds-on learning, and an educational philosophy that inspires purpose and values." Anna Demeo, lecturer in physics and energy, published "A Human Ecological Approach to Energy Literacy through Hands-On Projects: An Essential Component of Effectively Addressing Climate Change" in The Journal of Sustainability Education, drawing from classes she has taught at COA. Co-authors are Dave Feldman, and Michael L. Peterson. She writes, "A human ecological approach to teaching energy literacy is essential to ensure responsible environmental stewardship in the age of climate change. A powerful and effective way to address this is through project-based learning that helps prepare students, across disciplines, by providing them with the knowledge, skills, and habits of mind to be effective advocates 49

Kathryn W. Davis

February 25, 1907–April 23, 2013 The entire COA community mourns the passing of Kathryn W. Davis, philanthropist, peace lover, and inspiration, active into her 106th year. Says William G. Foulke, Jr. former COA board chair and a personal friend, "Kathryn Davis was blessed with high intelligence, boundless energy, and a fortune which she put to the best uses she could devise in the service of world peace, education, and many other humanitarian causes. All of us whom she touched came away impressed with her enormous good will and farsightedness. She had the gift of humor and displayed her love of humankind to all who knew her. I will never forget her, and I'm sure that goes for all of the COA community." Kathryn Davis' belief in global education as an avenue toward peace can be seen at COA in the Kathryn W. Davis Residential Village, the Kathryn W. Davis Center for International & Regional Studies, the Kathryn W. Davis Global Engagement Fund Towards Peace, and the many students who have been able to launch projects around the world as grantees of her Projects for Peace (see page 7). "Kathryn Davis will forever be a cornerstone of COA," says President Darron Collins. "Her life in so many diverse ways is an inspiration for humanity; we will dearly miss her mind, her smile, and her sense of adventure."

for energy choices that reduce environmental harm." It's available online at tinyurl.com/awc9tm9. Dave Feldman, faculty member in physics and mathematics, gave a Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory Science Cafe at McKay's Public House, speaking on "Strange Attractors and the Butterfly Effect: The Mathematics of Chaos," in February. He also was the plenary speaker at the Smith Institute for Applied Research Invitational Symposium held at Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, North Carolina, in late October. Dave spoke on "Chaos and Complex Systems: In the Classroom and Beyond." As part of his sabbatical, Jay Friedlander, the Sharpe-McNally Chair in Green and Socially Responsible Business, worked with World Resources Institute in Washington, DC, researching and writing an article on stranded assets as a potential impact of climate change on companies. In 2013 he gave the presentation "Moving from theory to action: a model for higher education" to the Education for Sustainability 50

session, which he also chaired, at the SHE Conference, and presented to the AshokaU Changemaker Campus conference in San Diego, California. As part of his duties as a board member of Maine Businesses for Sustainability, Jay talked at the University of Maine Orono on the trends leading businesses toward sustainability. Donna Gold, director of public relations and editor of COA was invited on the board of Harborside Shakespeare Company by its founders, Daniel Mahler '10 and Alicia Hynes '11. Serving with her is David Hales, former COA president, and his wife, Barbara McLeod. Sarah Hall, faculty member in geology and earth sciences, spent time over winter break at the American Geophysical Union annual meeting in San Francisco. She co-authored two presentations on Andean mountain building and erosion, and participated in a workshop on teaching undergraduate geology. Ken Hill, academic dean, attended the XIX International SHE Conference (see Rich Borden), and gave the talk

"What Do you Do with a Degree in Human Ecology? Forty years of evidence" in the session Education for Sustainability, chaired by Jay Friedlander. In addition, as executive director of the society, he also gave a brief closing plenary talk. Since leaving COA, former president, founding faculty member, and Allied Whale founder Steven K. Katona has taken his love of marine mammals and his zeal for conservation to the planetary level. Through Conservation International he launched Ocean Health Index, forming a network of scientists who together created a world standard for gauging ocean health. The index offers hard numbers to show how close each country is to a balanced use of the sea. How are we doing? The planet is averaging 60 out of 100, rather a failing grade, meaning we're not maximizing the benefits from the oceans and not accessing those benefits in a sustainable way: oceanhealthindex.org. College of the Atlantic Magazine

Former sustainable business administrator Kate Macko is now executive assistant and advisor to Darron Collins, the job formerly held by Anna Murphy (see below). As part of her sabbatical this winter, Isabel Mancinelli, Charles Eliot Professor of Ecological Planning, Policy and Design, traveled to Colorado to meet with architects at the Rocky Mountain Institute, or RMI about their research on green building techniques and to tour Amory Lovins' net-zero energy house. While there, she spoke to the University of Colorado class on affordable green housing taught by RMI's principal architect, James Scott Brew. Isabel spoke about the design process for COA's Davis Village and explained how the project intentionally fostered development of local expertise in innovative green building techniques that were adapted for local affordable green housing projects at Northeast Creek and Ripple Hill. She presented again at RMI's Snowmass office. "The architects were quite excited and impressed," says Isabel, and

urged that a case study be written and published, as this is the kind of project RMI is hoping to foster.

Collins, (pictured with her son Declan) has moved to the Boston area to be closer to her family.

Suzanne Morse, Elizabeth Battles Newlin Chair in Botany, spent the fall teaching agroecology at the Life Sciences University in Aas, Norway. While in Europe she ran workshops on the role of visioning in transforming food systems at the Beyond Our Backyards conference in Cerbere, France, and participated in community meetings helping to shape a Sustainable Food initiative in Oslo, Norway. Additionally, Suzanne was awarded a northeast SARE grant, "Potential of coppiced alder as an onfarm source of fertility for vegetable production," to begin at COA's farms in April. Funding will go toward research, providing a stipend to a student assistant and participating farmers, and to conducting analyses of soils and plant tissues.

Chris Petersen, faculty member in biology, was elected vice president of the Frenchman Bay Partners. Chris co-authored a paper presented at the Society for Integrative Biology meeting in January with Brad Erisman and Phil Hastings from Scripps Institute of Oceanography and Bob Warner from the University of California Santa Barbara. He also coauthored a paper presented by Alex Brett '11 at the Northeast ARC users group: "The Frenchman Bay Atlas — a Collaborative Mapping Project," and a poster on collaborative conservation action planning in Frenchman Bay at the Maine Water Conference in March. Lead author was Bridie McGreavy of the University of Maine Orono.

Anna Murphy, former assistant to presidents Steve Katona, David Hales, Andy Griffiths, and Darron

In The Plant Family Brassicaceae, part of the series Contribution Towards Phytoremediation in Environmental Pollution, Vol. 21, published by Springer in 2012, Nishanta Rajakaruna '94, faculty member in botany, contributed "Roles of Rhizospheric Processes and Plant Physiology in Applied

Bon Voyage Sarah Baker

"Sarah Baker is warm, and funny — so witty, I always feel as if I'm two beats behind her," says Sarah Gribbin '12, who has been working under Sarah, our Dean of Admission, for four years, the first three as her work-study job, and now as an admission counselor. College of the Atlantic Magazine

"But must important, she's really good at creating an environment that makes people feel comfortable, whether it's the most nervous fifteen-yearold, a cocky seventeen-year-old — or that boy's grandparents. You leave a conversation with Sarah feeling good about yourself — she's such a beautiful person."

and harness the strengths of her staff; and the entire community will miss the insights and creativity she brought to the recruitment process. But we'll have her success to build on. Applications more than doubled since Sarah arrived at COA in 2000, with 2013 seeing the largest incoming class ever.

Sarah is leaving at the end of June to discover the next step on her personal journey, and to spend some more time with her young boys, Finn, 9, and Corin, 6, and managing the studio of her husband, artist David Graeme Baker. COA will miss her smile and wicked humor; the admission staff will miss her warmth and inspiring leadership, her ability to understand

"I think the best way to sum up Sarah" muses Danielle Meier '09, assistant director of admission for recruitment, design, and communication, "and this is something that a lot of us who have worked in the admissions office over the years find ourselves saying to each other, is, 'Don't you wish Sarah was your mom?'" 51

Phytoremediation of Contaminated Soils Using Brassica Oilseeds" with Sarah Neilson '09. In The Journal of the Torrey Botanical Society, published in 2012, Nishi wrote "Stressors and threats to the flora of Acadia National Park, Maine: Current knowledge, information gaps, and future directions," along with first author Tanner Harris '06, Sarah Nelson, and Peter Vaux.

Winter Ecology students. Photo, first row, left to right: Kate Shlepr '13, Anna Stunkel '13, Chris Phillips '15, Randy Miles '14, Bethany Anderson '13, Abbe Urban '14, Steve. Second row: Sarah Duff '14, Carly Segal '13, Tallulah Orcel '15, Chloe Dodge '15, Tari Pisano '14, Anne Hurley '15, Emily Zine '15, Laurie Costa '13, Erica Georgaklis '14. Alisha Strater, former manager of Beech Hill Farm, has moved on to other fields. Taking her place is Tess Faller '09 (see alumni notes).

Biology Faculty member Steve Ressel visited alumni Garrett Conover '78 (front center) at his North Woods Ways in Willimantic, and also Hannah Plekon '12 in Greenville with his

This winter Sean Todd, Steven K. Katona Chair in Marine Sciences, again conducted research cruises to the Southern Ocean and Antarctic Peninsula aboard two ecotourism vessels, photo-documenting humpback and killer whales. The second journey was on a vessel chartered by the Hotchkiss School in Connecticut, for which Sean

served as a professional guide. In March, Sean visited Prescott College's Kino Marine Field Station on the east coast of the Sea of Cortez in Mexico as a new member of its board of scientific advisors. Karen Waldron, Lisa Stewart Chair in Literature and Women's Studies, chaired the panel on Constructions of Landscape in American Literature II at the annual Northeast Modern Language Association Conference in March, and delivered the paper "Contemporary Humans and Nature: Barry Lopez' Winter Count and Remembering Places through Cognitive Dissonance" to the panel Constructions of Landscape in American Literature I. Karen also spoke about the early Quaker proto-feminist Sarah GrimkĂŠ, offering the paper, "The Limits of Biblical Self-Authorization" to the roundtable session: Her Word as Witness: 19th Century Narratives of Self-Preservation and Identity.

Why I am a Northern Lights Society Member Elena Tuhy-Walters '90 I have not revised my last will and testament since before my daughter Evelyn was born three years ago, and I know I need bring it up to date. As it is currently written, College of the Atlantic gets all of my children's books and a small monetary bequest.

Photo by Carl L. Walters II.

When I update my will, the books will obviously go to Evelyn, but I will still give money to COA. I give to the college every year, but the idea of having a legacy gift is really important to me because it lets me give back one last time to the magical place that helped shape me more than any other situation outside of my family. My gift will be a thank-you for the ideas I was exposed to: the mainstays, such as recycling and gestalt theory, and those that have only finally hit home, especially veganism, from the days when Take-A-Break did not serve animal meat. It will be a thank-you, for the friendships: Jason, Val, Missy, Josie, Heather, and more. It will be a thank-you for helping me understand and love the law: constitutional theory with Don Meiklejohn, my internship with Michael Ross in his law office, and legal writing and legislative process with Ken Cline. I am so grateful for the tiny college on an island in Maine, and my executor will get to deliver my final thank-you. To learn more about how you too can become a Northern Lights Member, call 207-801-5625 or visit coa.edu/planned-giving.

… (but Embarrassing) Though we strive for perfection, we make mistakes sometimes. The 2012 COA Annual Report is missing a number of donor names. Here we are giving credit where credit is due! Thank you — and sorry! — to the following friends of COA who gave in the 2012 fiscal year (7/1/11–6/30/12), but were not recorded in the annual report booklet distributed in January.

Champlain Society The following are names left off the Champlain Society list in the annual report. Created in 1988, the society recognizes those special friends who contribute $1,500 or more to COA's annual fund. Anonymous Dr. and Mrs. John Buell The Combs Family Dianna and Ben Emory Mr. and Mrs. Nat Fenton

Mr. and Mrs. Paul J. Growald Mr. and Mrs. Robert Hoguet Mr. Peter Hunt Mr. and Mrs. Jan F. Karst Mr. and Mrs. Peter Loring

Mr. and Mrs. C. W. Eliot Paine Mr. and Mrs. Charles E. Pierce, Jr. Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Pierce Mr. and Mrs. Harold White III

Friends of COA The following are names left off the Friends of COA list in the annual report. Thank you to all our non-alumni friends who gave up to $1,499 to support COA's Annual Fund in FY12. Mr. and Mrs. Ordway P. Burden Mr. and Mrs. Sean Cosgrove Mrs. Gordon I. Erikson Mr. and Mrs. David Fitz

Mr. and Mrs. H. Lee Judd Mr. and Mrs. Robert A. Nathane, Jr. Ms. Sandra G. Nowicki Dr. and Mrs. Richard N. Pierson

Mr. and Mrs. Owen W. Roberts Dr. Richard G. Rockefeller Mr. and Mrs. Patrick R. Wilmerding

Year After Year These names reflect longtime donors who have given consistently year after year for more than ten years. We are glad for the opportunity to include the full list of our constant donors.

Over 25 Years Mrs. Diane Anderson Bar Harbor Bank & Trust The Estate of Edward McC. Blair Hon. & Mrs. Robert Blake Peter & Sofia Blanchard Mr. Jerry Bley ('78) Mr. Leslie C. Brewer Charles & Barbara Burton II Roc & Helen Caivano '80 Estate of Alida D. M. Camp Gerald & Suzanne Colson Dick Atlee & Sarah Corson Norah D. Davis Mrs. Charles Dickey, Jr. Arthur Dole Estate of Amos & Alice Eno Carol & Jackson Eno College of the Atlantic Magazine

Mrs. Gordon I. Erikson The First Mrs. Ruth Fraley Mr. & Mrs. W. West Frazier IV Dr. & Mrs. Donald Glotzer Mr. & Mrs. John M. Good Bruce Mazlish & Neva Goodwin Nina '78 & Jonathan '78 Gormley Fr. James Gower Julie MacLeod Hayes '78 Ms. Katherine Hazard '76 Kate & Eric Henry ('74) Mr. & Mrs. Melville Hodder Kass Hogan '81 Ms. Betsey Holtzmann Mrs. Michael Huber Charles & Louise Huntington

Catherine B. Johnson '74 Ann Sewall & Edward Kaelber Laura & Michael Kaiser '85 Mr. John M. Kauffmann Mr. & Mrs. John N. Kelly Diana & Neil King Mr. & Mrs. Robert P. Kogod Mr. & Mrs. S. Lee Kohrman Margaret & Philip Kunhardt III '77 Mrs. Marcia MacKinnon Mrs. Louis Madeira Mr. & Mrs. Gerrish Milliken Mr. & Mrs. G. Marshall Moriarty Mrs. Lorraine Morong Mr. & Mrs. Benjamin Neilson Mr. John H. Newhall Mr. & Mrs. William V. P. Newlin 53

Mrs. A. Corkran Nimick Ms. Sandra G. Nowicki Mrs. Elizabeth Higgins Null Mr. & Mrs. C. W. Eliot Paine Bruce Phillips '78 Nancy Gray Pyne Ms. Cathy Ramsdell '78 Mr. & Mrs. John P. Reeves Mr. David Rockefeller Peter H. & Lucy Bell N. Sellers Mr. & Mrs. Clyde E. Shorey, Jr. Ms. Joan H. Swann Mr. John Thorndike Mr. John Viele ('81) Stacy Hankin & Ben Walters '81 Alice & Bradford Wellman Mr. Douglas Williams Sue Woehrlin '80 Jane S. Zirnkilton

Over 20 Years Anonymous (2) Professor (Emeritus) J. K. Anderson Atwater Kent Foundation, Incorporated Bar Harbor Savings & Loan Mr. & Mrs. Robert M. Bass Mr. John Biderman '77 Mr. Francis I. Blair Ms. Edith Blomberg Dennis Bracale '88 & Hana Bracale Ms. Rebecca Buyers '81 Bill Carpenter & Donna Gold Mr. & Mrs. Elliot Cohen Dr. Melville & Polly Cote Ms. Sally Crock Mr. & Mrs. Roderick Cushman Ms. Lisa Damtoft '79 Mary Drury Mrs. Bertha Erb Ms. Cynthia Jordan Fisher '80 Mr. & Mrs. William G. Foulke, Jr. Dr. & Mrs. Richard Fox Ms. Susan Freed '80 Mr. Edwin Geissler ('76) Jackson Gillman '78 Mr. & Mrs. Paul Growald Mr. & Mrs. George B. E. Hambleton Ms. Lois Hayes '79 Ms. Sherry Huber Susan B. Inches '79 Bob & Ellie Kates Susan Lerner & Steven Katona Mr. & Mrs. James M. Kellogg Craig Kesselheim '76 Carl & Lorraine Ketchum Ms. Anne Kozak Ms. Alice Leeds '76 Ms. Andrea Lepcio '79 54

Dr. & Mrs. Ralph Longsworth Robert May, ND '81 Mrs. Anne Mazlish Mr. & Mrs. William McDowell '80 Mr. J.R. McGregor Suzanne Durrell & Ian Scott McIsaac ('76) Jennifer & Jay McNally '84 Mr. Peter Moon '90 Janneke Seton Neilson Virginia Nyhart Jennifer Waldron & Benoni Outerbridge '84 Dr. & Mrs. Lewis Patrie Mr. & Mrs. Daniel Pierce Mr. & Mrs. George Putnam Mr. & Mrs. Owen Roberts Mr. & Mrs. David Rockefeller, Jr. Hilda K. & Thomas H. Roderick Mr. & Mrs. Ronald Rogers Mr. W. David Rosenmiller '84 Drs. Stephen & Pamela Ross Mr. & Mrs. Max Rothal Mr. Daniel Sangeap '90 Ms. Barbara Sassaman '78 Ms. Margaret Scheid '85 Mr. Winthrop Short Ms. Dorie Stolley '88 Mrs. Allan Stone Mrs. Kathryn Suminsby Elena Tuhy-Walters '90 & Carl Walters Mr. John Van Dewater Mrs. Jeptha Wade Mr. John Wilmerding Janey Winchell '82 Betsy Wisch '83 Mr. & Mrs. William Wister, Jr. Mr. David Witham

Over 15 Years Anonymous (3) Dr. & Mrs. Raymond Alie John & Karen Anderson Mr. Peter Anderson '81 Mary Dohna '80 & Wells Bacon '80 Mr. Jeffrey Baker '77 Bar Harbor Lobster Bakes Mr. Bruce Becque '81 Mr. Bruce Bender '76 Mr. & Mrs. Harold G. Brack Suzanne Taylor & Don Cass Estate of Robert Cawley Ms. Tammis Coffin '87 Ms. Diana Cohn '85 Ruth M. & Tristram C. Colket Jr. Mr. & Mrs. S. Whitney Dickey Mr. Lawrence Duffy Mrs. Marcia Dworak Ms. Carol Emmons Dianna & Ben Emory

Julie A. Erb '83 Thos & Carroll Fernald Mr. & Mrs. William M.G. Fletcher Mr. James Frick '78 Gary & Glenon Friedmann '86 Galyn's Galley Ms. Laurie Geiger Stephen & Kathleen George June LaCombe ('75) & William Ginn '74 Ms. Megan Godfrey '77 Robert & Sonia Goodman Mr. Walter Goodnow John Allgood & Abigail Goodyear '81 Mr. & Mrs. Michael Gumpert Mr. Samuel Hamill, Jr. Mr. Matthew Hare '84 Barbara J. Hazard Mary J. Heffernon Dr. Josephine Todrank Heth '76 Mr. & Mrs. Robert Hinckley Carolyn & Dave Hollenbeck Bill & Cookie Horner Ms. Evelyn Mae Hurwich '80 Ms. Anna Hurwitz '84 Mr. & Mrs. Orton P. Jackson, Jr. Alison & Joplin James '84 Jordan-Fernald Esther Karkal '83 Dr. James Kellam '96 Steven King '80 Aleda J. Koehn Roz Rolland & Scott Kraus '77 David Lebwohl MD The Agnes M. Lindsay Trust Peg Beaulac & Carl Little Mr. James MacLeod Meg & Miles Maiden '86 Maine Coast Sea Vegetables Maine Community Foundation Ms. Casey Mallinckrodt Carol Manahan '77 Rob Marshall '87 Sarah A. McDaniel '93 Ms. Donna McFarland Mr. & Mrs. Clement McGillicuddy Clifton McPherson '84 Robert J. & Jane H. Meade Mr. Jeffrey Miller '92 Peter Milliken ('76) Mr. Frank Mocejunas Lois & John Moyer Mr. & Mrs. Olin Eugene Myers, Jr. ('80) National Park Tours & Transport, Inc. Ms. Hope Olmstead Robert & Susan Pennington Ms. Judith Perkins Dr. & Mrs. Richard Pierson The Honorable Chellie Pingree '79 & College of the Atlantic Magazine

Donald Sussman Ms. Frances Pollitt '77 Ms. Sydney Roberts Rockefeller Dr. Richard Rockefeller Dr. & Mrs. Dennis Shubert Wickham Skinner Harriet Hailparn Soares Lynne & Mike Staggs '96 Carol & Sid Strickland Mr. & Mrs. Richard Sullivan Stuart Dickey Summer '82 Dr. Davis Taylor Ms. Katrin Hyman Tchana '83 Nick & Joan Thorndike Ms. Wendy Van Dyke ('80) Richard Hilliard & Karen Waldron Ms. Jean Weiss '81 Mr. & Mrs. Joseph Wishcamper Tom & Loretta Witt Ms. Jingran Xiao ('89)

Over 10 Years Anonymous (2) Acadia Senior College Heather Albert-Knopp '99 & Erich Reed Ms. M. Bernadette Alie '84 Ms. Judith Allen Ms. Evelyn Ashford ('83) Estate of Brooke Russell Astor Dr. David Avery '84 Lelania Prior Avila '92 & Family Elizabeth Rousek Ayers '95 Sarah & David Baker Barbara Tennent & Steven Barkan Sandi Read & Ron Beard Paul '79 & Robin '80 Beltramini Mr. Glen Berkowitz '82 Joan Stroud Blaine Deirdre Swords & Michael Boland '94 Rev. Paul Boothby '88 Shan Burson '83 Mr. Charles Butt Cadillac Mountain Sports Ms. Liza Carter ('76) Michele & Agnese Cestone Foundation Erin Chalmers '00 Mrs. Sally Chetwynd '76 Ms. Taj Chibnik '95 Tim & Hannah Clark Ms. Katherine Clark '91 Mr. Kenneth Cline Jan Coates Pancho Cole '81 Mr. & Mrs. Douglas Coleman Karen & Darron Collins '92 Mr. Douglas Coots '83 Mrs. Bernard K. Cough Jennifer '93 & Kevin '93 Crandall College of the Atlantic Magazine

Mr. & Mrs. Shelby M.C. Davis Steve '80 & Rose ('88) Demers Philip & Tina DeNormandie Holly Devaul '84 Janet Redfield & Scott Dickerson '95 George & Kelly Dickson, MPhil '97 Angela DiPerri '01 Mr. Millard Dority Amb. & Mrs. William Eacho III Mr. & Mrs. Alden Eaton Mr. Joseph Edes '83 Samuel & Elise Felton David & Judith Fischer Tom Fisher '77 Beth & Will Gardiner Mr. Matthew Gerald '83 Nadine Gerdts ('76) & Steve Lacker Ms. Anne Giardina Ms. Lauren Gilson '88 John P. Gower Mrs. Bo Greene Ms. Linda Gregory '89 Mary Nelson Griffin '97 Chris Hamilton '85 Atsuko Watabe '93 & Bruce Hazam '92 Katie Hester '98, ND, ARNP Dr. & Mrs. John Hoche Margaret Hoffman '97 Homewood Benefits Ms. Sarah F. Hudson Ms. Jen Hughes Ms. Jane Hultberg Mr. Peter Hunt Dania Iams Charitable Remainder Trust John Jacob '81 Ms. Jamien Jacobs '86 Mr. William Janes Margaret & Peter Jeffery '84 Mr. & Mrs. Edward C. Johnson III Ms. Laura Johnson Ms. Leslie Jones '91 Mr. & Mrs. H. Lee Judd Mr. Michael Kattner '95 Jill & Bobby Kelley Kent-Lucas Foundation, Incorporated Steven & Barbara Kiel Bethany & Zack Klyver ('94) Dawn ('92) & Josh '91 Lamendola-Winer Burks B. Lapham Dr. & Mrs. Leung Lee Ms. Rosalind Lewis Jessica Greenbaum '89 & Philip Lichtenstein '92 Mr. & Mrs. Edward Lipkin Gordon Longsworth '91 Mr. & Mrs. Peter Loring Machias Savings Bank Maine Space Grant Consortium

David Malakoff '86 & Amy Young Mr. & Mrs. Francis McAdoo Ms. Leslie McConnell '81 Mr. & Mrs. Grant G. McCullagh Ms. Carol Mead '85 Laura Ellis & David Milliken Rebecca & Steve Milliken Mr. & Mrs. Sung Moon Frank Moya MD Mr. Stephen Mullane '81 Susan & Bob Nathane Carol '93 & Jacob '93 Null Willy Osborn Cara Guerrieri '83 & Francis Owen '83 Jim & Suzanne Owen Mr. & Mrs. Kenneth Paul Mr. & Mrs. Malcolm Peabody Ann & Arden Peach Ms. Margaret Pennock '84 Kim & Keating Pepper Mr. & Mrs. Ferguson E. Peters Helen Hess & Christopher Petersen Ms. Susan Priest Pierce '77 Thomas & Patricia Pinkham Ms. Carole Plenty James Dyke & Helen Porter Dr. Nishanta Rajakaruna '94 Mr. & Mrs. John Rivers Mr. & Mrs. Hamilton Robinson, Jr. Mr. & Mrs. John Robinson Dr. Walter Robinson Edith & William Rudolf Ms. CedarBough Saeji '93 Mr. Steve Savage '77 David & Mary Savidge Cynthia Livingston & Henry L. P. Schmelzer Mr. Samuel Shaw Sherman's Book & Stationery Store, Inc. Richard '88 & Lilea '90 Simis Rich MacDonald & Natalie Springuel '91 State Street Corporation Bruce & Susan Stedman Mr. John Steele William P. Stewart The Swan Agency â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Insurance Mr. Gilbert Sward Dan Thomassen & Bonnie Tai Mr. & Mrs. William Thorndike, Jr. Ellen Thurman Louise Tremblay '91 Mr. Frank Twohill '79 University of Maine Sea Grant Program US Department of Commerce Ms. Katrina Van Dusen Cody & Christiaan van Heerden '09 Peter Wayne '83 Mr. & Mrs. Harold White III Bryan Wyatt '80 55

Japanese Beetles Anneke Hart '16 In an old peanut butter jar filled with water and hand soap, I must drown them in masses. My fascinated eyes squish to the glass watching them fall onto the foamy top layer temporarily calmed — their wings splayed out and frozen by the feeling of resting on air. Then, they sink below, their short legs struggle, beetles upon beetles pile on stilled bodies. They cluster together, crawl on top of each other, their last moments in panic. Then they go still, their lungs finally starved by the lavender perfume. Sometimes, as I grab each bug off hole-riddled bean leaves or pluck a mating pair from the paradise of my potato plants, I sing to them, usually folk songs in a soft voice full of vibrato. I think that beetles might like folk songs. Everything loves to be loved, doesn't it?

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Deep Things out of Darkness: A History of Natural History By John G.T. Anderson, faculty member in biology University of California Press, 2013

Whenever we examine the natural world, we inevitably divide it into categories. We watch the blueberries and raspberries for signs of ripeness in summer; but not juniper berries. And we have no fear of the squirrels — but should a coyote scurry through our yard, we might lock up the cat. How do we know this? How do we know that a juniper berry is quite different from a blueberry? The trial and error, the search and research, the recording and telling of natural history has gone on for eons. Many of these stories are lost to obscurity, but John Anderson's Deep Things out of Darkness recovers quite a few enchanting ones. To complete the wellness theme of this issue, we are excerpting a section from John's book about one of Europe's first herbals. But first, a few lines from the introduction. – DG Adam's Task, Job's Challenge … This book is neither by nor intended for a professional historian, I am advancing no overarching thesis about the development of science or culture. Instead I aim to resurrect the people and the stories that set the stage for modern ecological understanding. … I am writing [in part] for the serious amateur naturalist — the sort of person who has played such an important part in the development and recognition of natural history across time, and

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who may feel a little shut out of the rise of increasingly theoretical and technologically driven brands of science. Chapter Five: "New Worlds" Here John writes about one of the first popular herbals, created by "the Dutch botanist and physician Rembertus Dodoneaeus (1517–85), who served as the court physician to the emperor of Austria," translated into English in 1597 by John Gerarde as The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes. The Herball is important in a number of ways. First, it was widely published, edited, republished, excerpted from, and used as a model. Second, it provides clear evidence of both the decline of superstition and the rise of a truly global perspective in botany. Examples of both abound throughout the book, which is organized so that each species gets a basic description (illustrated in later editions), a rough range estimate, a synonymy, and its "Temperature and Vertues," which consist of possible medical applications and preparations, often with reference to earlier authors. Gerard includes the mandrake (Mandragora) in his catalogue, but he is downright dismissive of what he refers to as the "old wives' tales" surrounding this plant. Contrary to earlier opinion,

he rejects the notion that the plant can be harvested only by attaching it to a dog, which will be killed by the mandrake's screams as the plant is uprooted. He also rejects "many fables of loving matters, too full of scurrility to set forth in print, which I forbear to speak of." The gossip in some of us might have enjoyed such "loving matters," but "all which dreams and old wives' tales you shall from henceforth cast out of your books and memory knowing this: that they are all and every part of them false and most untrue." Gerard is also very firm that he has himself safely "digged up, planted, and replanted very many" mandrakes and assures us that the plant does not look like a human. Gerard's medical applications run the full gamut, from an enormous variety of "purges" to the treatment of what we might now regard as psychological ailments. He cautions that drinking a concoction of the "Prickly Indian Fig" may result in red urine to the degree that a patient may fear for his life, but he assures us that the color is simply from the plant itself. Quite charmingly, he speaks of the seed of basil, which "cures the infirmities of the heart, takes away sorrowfulness that comes of melancholy, and makes a man merry and glad." Would that it were so.

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Wintergreen (Gaultheria procumbens) by Lilliana Demers '13, from her senior project "A Study of the Local Healing Plants: Form, Color, and Spirit" Also known as teaberry, wintergreen is a small, creeping evergreen native to northern North America. The leaves and oil of wintergreen are used medicinally as a tonic, stimulant, astringent, and aromatic. It is anti-inflammatory and antiseptic, and is useful as a diuretic and to stimulate menstruation. External applications of the diluted oil from the leaves and twigs are used as a remedy for muscle pains and swollen joints. It's also used for headaches, as a digestive aid, and to eliminate flatulence.