Monday, April 2, 2007

Professor Emeritus Martin Fuller

Those who knew, worked with, and learned from Martin Fuller feel a loss at news of his death. Through this blog, perhaps alumni, faculty, and friends can share their thoughts and remembrances. It is fitting to begin with words from Martin himself. Several years ago Martin Fuller gave a presentation in a program Austin College had called the Last Lecture Series, what perhaps the individual might say in a final lecture, though the presentation might have come in the midst of the professor’s career. In that lecture, he read something he had written in his journal: “It is so important really to be aware of places, people, animals, plants, rocks, each detail of our surroundings at each moment. Yet how often and how much we take it all for granted. We will never see all of the world, never experience all its wonders. Therefore how very necessary to see and to experience the wonders into whose presence we are fortunate enough to come.” He went on to say, “If we do, if we cultivate that intimacy with the natural order of things, we may come to look upon death not as an enemy to be feared or conquered, but as part of the natural order of our lives, as the natural end to a natural being. Death is but the final affirmation of life.”

A life well lived … A being of nature that shall be missed.

— Vickie Kirby, Austin College Sr. Director of Editorial Communication