What a sad news… but of course this is only the conclusion of the previous
ones. For me, the sad news about Marian Pettibone began when she left the
Smithsonian, because it was for health reasons, this incredibly strong and
independent woman was not feeling well... and then, when she was taken to that
last retirement place, in the State of Washington, I knew that we, or at least
I, would not hear again from her directly.
I met her very long ago, in my first visit to Smithsonian, early eighties...
and from the beginning she was an incredible personnality to meet, with all
the qualities the other colleagues have underlined, and many more. I was very
impressed, because her reputation preceded her, but was not prepared to the
fact that such an impressive person, so intelligent and acute, one of the four
best known living polychaetologists of the world then, was also so gentle and
nice. She was always so friendly with me, always smiling...she helped when an
obscure article or an academic advice was needed and then with all she had to
do, she also had time to take me out, to a movie at the Smithsonian or to an
exposition. In the years following my sabbatical at Smithsonian with Kristian,
every time I went to Washington, she would treat me to a lunch in “The Cast
le”; I always felt very honored, and came to expect it as one of the
highlights of my visits there, for we would then chat mainly about polychaetes
and polycheatologists in informal ways but also about other matters.
Once, during my sabbatical, Kristian and I saw her, one afternoon, from the
lab window, walking down the street: she was going to Jury duty, Kristian
informed me. Then she told me about it, and if proof need be of her character,
she said that she did not even considered leaving the jury room until she
convinced all the others of what the veredict should be, and she had her way,
of course! Another time, when I announced that we would dedicate a genus of
orbinid to her, her comment was that she wanted to be certain we did things
correctly, because she would not want to be synonimised later! There are
thousands of anecdotes that could be told about Marian, for she interacted
with so many of us in so many ways, I only chose two, but now that she is
definitely gone, the memories of all she was, of all the time spent together,
of the inspiration she gave, of all that world that the Smithsonian represents
to those of us that have had the good fortune to be there, begin to flow back
to me... they were very good years indeed when she was around and fortunately
for her, she lived a long and productive life... more importantly, she gave
us the disctincive impression that she lived it as she wanted to live it, and
that is perhaps her best achievement.
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