Plasmogamy

plaz•mog•amy (noun)
in biology, the process where the cytoplasm of two cells fuse.
Origin: Greek (plasma = liquid, gamy = fusion; plasmogamy = fusion of the cell's liquids)

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So, I'm thinking about this word today for several reasons. Plasmogamy occurs in fungi when two individuals who are sexually compatible meet and undergo plasmogamy, so two organisms are now one, but in many cases, karyogamy does not occur until spore formation, which means each new fungus cell that grows will now have two nuclei; two brains living within the same body, if you will.

The reason that this has been on my mind is because I've been contemplating relationships, specifically when two people become so close that they act like the fungus with two nuclei - they are so in-sync that they act as if one organism, one whole with two brains. How do these sort of relationships arise? How long do they take to form? If a relationship reaches this point, is it guaranteed to last forever? Is this something that is possible between any two people, or do they have to have some degree of compatibility in the first place? Does it matter with whom such a relationship is formed, or does the fact that such a relationship exists between two people outweigh everything else?

Naturally, you may be thinking that this is a relationship that a marriage should have, but could it happen outside of marriage? Is it possible to have more than one sort of this relationship, and if yes, is it RIGHT to have more than one?

These thought have sort of been floating around in my mind for a while now, and its something that is important to me.

Going back to UBC, I was expecting it to be lonely, but even still, it's difficult, and so I've had plenty of time to think, and because my life is deficient of meaningful human interaction, that's one of the reasons why its been the thing I've been thinking about it the most.

There's no doubt that one's relationship with others will impact their lives, be it positive or negative, but when something does happen, to what degree are you responsible for the outcome? To what degree are you responsible for the person they have become? To what degree are you responsible for how their life is unfolding? These are very difficult questions that I've been struggling with a lot for a while, especially for the past three weeks. When something terrible happens between two people, it is undeniable that it will drastically change their lives, but to what extent are they responsible for the misfortunes that occur in the others' life? When can you say "I'm no longer responsible for what's happening to you"?

I remember that someone once told me that it is useless to attempt to address "what if"s because it is not humanly possible to imagine all of the outcomes. To me, this makes sense: there are infinitely many factors in life and a greater order of infinitely many more outcomes. I believe that part of the human condition is being able to only consider one angle, one factor of a situation at a time, whereas it is divine to be able to consider all of them at once.

However, its easy for me to forget this, and I still ask myself: Would it have been any different? Would the future have been better, or worse? What kind of people would we be had this not occurred?

Moorhead once told me that someone can never be the same person twice; people are always changing: they read books, they interact with other people, they hear things, see things, and experience things that change them, whether the change is minuscule or humongous it matters not, only that there has been a change, and that therefore signifies that they are not the same. Change can be good, or it can be bad, but it happens. There's no guaranty that a certain change would not have happened, but there's also no guaranty that a certain change would have happened regardless of what/who/how it was triggered.

Admittedly, it's difficult to come up with subjects to discuss with you here because so many of the things I'm thinking about right now are themes that are presented in the book that I mentioned last week, and I don't want to spoil it by talking about them before you get a chance to read it, Clay. I don't mean to bog you down with my teen angst; I know its depressing; I promise to talk about something less morbid next week =P

I really liked the word you chose last week; epiphanies have an especially important role in my life, I completely believe that they can happen, whether it be small or life changing. I love your personal definition of an epiphany; it is a good description of the experience.

I'm glad that you're enjoying your classes! I wish I could take history and literature courses with having the stress of needing to keep up my average; I love learning things like that! LOL your dorm sounds like a really great place to be.

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SO YESTURDAY I GOT MY MATH MIDTERM BACK! This is what my prof said to the class: "So, the midterm's average was 55%, a little bit lower than I like it; I usually write my midterms so that the class average is about 60%, which means your average on the final will be about 65%."

LOL. UBC MATH LOGIC = WIN /not/

BUT GUESS WHAT.

I GOT 88%. WIN.

Oh yea, and your blog posts are so much more colourful than mine! I must retaliate by adding photos as well!

Asci and Ascospores of reproducing fungi

Here is a photo I took in my NVP Bio Lab! I've mastered the art of taking photos of slides under a microscope, and I've got tonnes of cool science-y pics now =D

Here's another cool photo of a sporangiophore under a compound microscope using phase contrast light microscopy that I took just this morning!

Anyways, I hope you are doing well and that you are having fun! You'll be in my prayers =)

Chat soon,
~Tim~

PS - You have been violating one of the cardinal rules of the Vonerculary! YOU MUST USE THE PREVIOUS VENERDWORD IN YOUR CURRENT BLOGS.