It begins.

After a six year career in education, I switched gears. Not so much driven off by the nature of teaching as by the nature of Flint, MI, I relocated to Houghton, MI in the summer of 2007. I had missed the lab and the surroundings. To be perfectly honest, I would have moved to Houghton and earned my living in a number of capacities had I been denied the chance to return to grad school. I was fortunate to get my first choice, but would have taught, substitute taught or even poured beer to enable the move.

Of course, the inevitable question one is faced with by family, friends and colleagues is, "So, what are you going to do with your Ph.D.?" That's a good question. As I think more about my options, it's crystallized that what I want out of a career, ideally, is something that combines some interrelated interests, namely science, photography, writing and education.

To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure what that looks like, or what kind of job title to put on that. There are options, of course. Professors do all of those things. As do journalists. I suppose it comes down to a matter of audience. I've worked with a captive audience (high school students), but there is a desire to publish, beyond the world of scholarly, peer-reviewed journals. I believe a key to humanity's survival is a scientifically literate global citizenry. As such, much work has yet to be done to bring knowledge at the frontiers of discovery to the nonspecialist.

A shining example of a scientific publication that is accessible to the non scientist is Seed magazine. Sporting the subtitle Science is Culture, Seed delivers more than the facts and embeds current discovery within its political and cultural implications. There is context. Furthermore, there is beauty. What strikes me most is the aesthetic of the work, complete with full-page photoessays and tear-out cribsheets in the print version (downloadable PDF's in the online version).

All of that said, this blog will serve as a foray into the world of scientific journalism, occasionally veering into the political, artistic, cultural and spiritual realms.