A Conversation with Francois
Today I had my interview with François, my PI. He is from Quebec (and yes, he has a French accent), so I was actually very interested to learn about how he came to be studying lichens at Duke. I “interviewed” him over lunch, but it was really more of a casual conversation. I was munching on pizza, and different people from the third floor hummed in and out (we were eating lunch in the third floor lunch room), occasionally chiming in on the conversation. It was actually quite pleasant.
François' story was actually surprisingly straightforward. Well, straightforward isn't exactly the word, since he didn't do the tradition high school-college track. That part was actually quite unorthodox. The straightforward part, and the surprising one, was that François never wanted to be anything but “someone who worked with nature.” When asked about other hobbies as a kid, such as sports of the like, he answered that he played hockey, of course, he was Canadian after all, but he played goalie, which is the most antisocial position in the game (besides, of course, reff). I was surprised to learn that in Québec (although not in Western Canada, where my dad grew up), high school went until tenth grade, at which point the students filled out lengthy questionnaires to find out what to do with their next two years of high school, or the rest of their lives. François recalled that after filling out his questionnaire, he advice counselor said, “Oh, this is easy!” because it was evident that he wanted to nothing but a naturalist. The counselor then advised him to become a field technician, which required only a few years of college. Not the average story for a perspective PhD, eh? François jumped on the idea of becoming a field technician.
It was while working at a university in Québec that François met Irwin Brodo, a man who was to irrevocably change his life. Irwin Brodo is extremely well known in lichenologist circles, not only for being a phenomenal lichenologist himself, but especially for being an all around genuinely nice guy. Brodo has co-authored the extensive and excellent “Lichens of North America,” which is more often referred to as “Brodo's Book,” or, in my case “The Lichen Bible.” This book is an absolute must have for the budding lichenologist (I got it for Christmas several years ago, and have studied and revered it religiously ever since).
Anyway, to get back to François! He was working as a technician at the same time that Irwin Brodo was setting up a lichen-intensive workshop at the university. François helped out in setting up the workshop, and ended up persuading the university to let him enroll in the class, even though he was not a student of the university. After taking the class, François found himself doing all the identifications for grad student, all of whom wanted to deal in flashy vascular plants but did not deign to touch lowly lichens. It was then that François discovered his love for the little guys. He became incredibly animated when talking about how to him, lichens represented an unknown, untouched field, with so much still to discover. Kind of like that emptiness of knowledge touched upon by that article we read (“The Importance of Stupidity in Science”). Anyway, it was this interest in lichens that persuaded François to go back to college, first to get his bachelors degree, then his master's, and finally his PhD. He said that it was in his fifth year of college that he finally quit his job as a technician, when, I suppose, he realized that he was never going back. Eventually, François ended up as a grad student under Rytas Vilgalys, a professor here at Duke. After a year as a post-doc, François got a job at the University of Chicago, but eventually came back 'round to Duke, where he promptly had the entire third floor remodeled in order to utilize all the extra space. And he has been here ever since.
One thing that I am always interested in when I meet people that have devoted large amounts of time and energy to a single, concentrated area is if they every though about simply quitting, and moving on to do something else. Does their work ever seem futile, or confining? Apparently, not François'! When I asked him if he ever felt like quitting, he immediately responded “No!” Simply and without hesitation. It seems that he never really wanted to be anything but a lichenologist, and that desire has kept him happy. “I'm sorry there's not more to tell,” he said apologetically “but maybe you can make it into something more interesting.” Personally, I don't think it is a tale that needs any embellishing.
As our interview drew to a close, several other people were eating lunch around the table. Those present who had gone through grad school began talking about how they got into their specific fields. It really seemed more a matter of chance than anything else. Blanka Shaw, originally from the Czech Republic, said that she knew she was interested in botany, but only ended up specializing in mosses because the algae professor was a curmudgeon, and mosses were the next greenest things. John Shaw, Blanka's husband, entered into mosses because of a really great professor, much like François and lichens. Sandy Boles, a marine botanist, only came into her field after disliking another. She said that rather than having a specific organism to be passionate about, she wanted to ask specific questions, and than use whatever necessary to answer them. All present agreed with these two things: it is really important to have a good teacher, because they shape and inspire you in ways you cannot imagine, but only begin to understand later in life, and also, it is important to ask the right questions. And I think both of those are definitely worth thinking about. Over and out.
