Re'Marian'ces

I have known or, rather, I knew Marian Tolpin for a long, long time. Beginning during our earliest years as candidates at the Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis, it became clear that obviously she was a most unusual colleague, so outstanding in her intellect, in her empathy for the experiences of others, in her ability to conceptualize her insights without losing either her reason-framed basic theories nor her awareness of both fleeting and of intense feelings. Add to this her skills in communicating her experiences both verbally and through the subtle motions of posture and facial lines and you are beginning to sense that you are in the presence of a uniquely gifted person who is for the moment totally interested in YOU.

Yes, but you know all this already from the numerous testimonials, letters, conversations, and especially from your own memories. I would like to add a more personal note. It is not easy for me to do this because I still feel her loss very painfully. I am not eager to display a relationship that was more than friendship, more intimate, more joyful yet none-erotic. The English language does not have a proper word to label such mutual understanding and congruence of feeling. Some of you may think that the word “love” is a fitting term, but I think that would cheapen real love and also cheapen the specialness of what Marian and I had together. There was this aura about her that would lighten up the room whenever she entered with her radiant smile. In more than half a century, I have met only one other person who can also immediately cheer up all those around her with her mere presence. I married her.

However, let me elaborate a little on how Marian approached her patients. She did not get on top of a mountain, looking down on other mere mortals and start to lecture them, nor did she philosophize to herself about the great intellectual insights that psychoanalysis brought to the undeserving world. Indeed, when Marian talked about the le