Stefan Lochner (c. 1410-1451)
"Organ-playing Angel" detail from
Maria in der Rosenlaube (1448)
Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, Köln, Germany
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When I learned that Sterling McNees had died from Sally's June 19th email, I noted that she sent it at 5:55 pm. Since 55 is the number of the soul of the universe according to Plato's Timaeus (poem: "Speculations on the Soul"), I was struck by the coincidence. Also a colorful butterfly had flown over me at 1 pm that afternoon. Since the Greek word psyche for butterfly also means soul, it was doubly meaningful. I met Sterling McNees only on one occasion, on October 27, 2005 at Stanford's Einstein Workshop. Sally had told me about her Dad's earlier research in physics and vacuum tubes. So I mentioned the upcoming Einstein Workshop, which Sally brought him along. We sat together listening to Dr. Tilman Sauer from Caltech speaking on "Einstein's Unified Field Theory" and Dr. Dean Rickles from University of Calgary speaking on "What Price Determinism". While the talks were fascinating, some of the technical presentations were much too advanced for both of us. I had to rush to another talk by Dr. Tsondue Gyatso on "Tibetan Medicine" at Stanford's Medical School, so didn't have time to chat more with Sterling after the Physics Workshop. When Sally invited me to her Potluck party on Saturday, April 29 at her home in Los Altos Hills, a friend drove me there. We were both eager to meet Sterling, but couldn't find him when we arrived. We were told that he had slipped while sweeping the floors before the guests had arrived. Sally called 911 and brought him to El Camino Hospital. We learned later that Sterling had a stroke and he was recuperating from it when he had died on June 13, 2006. James Clerk Maxwell, who discovered the link between electricity and magnetism in his famous Maxwell Equations, was born on June 13, 1831. He wrote a mystical poem about the expanding universe in his youth that preceded Hubble by over 50 years. Another experimental physicist, Luis Alvarez was born on June 13, 1911. He won the Physics Nobel Prize in 1968 for his studies in elementary particle physics and development of the hydrogen bubble chamber. Sterling passed from this earth on the birthday of two great physicists— Maxwell and Alvarez. May they welcome him in Physics Heaven. After selecting three Angel Cards from my Random Generator web page, I composed the poem "Peace... Openness... Understanding..." for Sterling along with Notes for the sources. Then I selected poems which were written for my Dad when he passed on Dec. 13, 2000. I've also included five poems on peace from poets and sages, some illuminating quotes on death from my favorite writers. Because I attended the Einstein workshop with Sterling, I've typed one of my favorite quotes from Einstein. This quote appeared in the March 29, 1972 issue of The New York Times. It was given to me by my friend Jon Kabat-Zinn after we attending a morning 6 am talk on the Kena Upanishad by Swami Chinmayananda at MIT. Jon was a Professor in Biology at Brandeis while I was a Biochemistry Postdoc Fellow with Gerald Fasman at Brandeis at the time. I hope this insightful quote from Einstein will help us aspire to the cosmic consciousness kind of mind that will reduce one's sense of pain when a loved one leaves us as well as opening ourselves to the infinite joy and blessings that surround us in everyday life.
— Peter Y. Chou |