In a letter dated shortly before he retired, Werner wrote of turning his attention to what lay ahead.....I have become somewhat preoccupied, perhaps not unnaturally, with the next passage, retirement and beyond, and I am developing some very definite opinions. What these opinions were or by what path he was arriving at them, Werner (uncharacteristically) did not, in this letter at least, say. Staying with the vulnerability and uncertainty of the moment, he offered the following reflection instead:
So much of my life-- almost my entire life-- has been wrapped up with Pitzer, and I am not yet sure how I am going to take the change that will come with retirement and death (not so soon I trust). Plenty of projects ahead, but it is all terra incognita and I am not so sure.
What I can say about this moment of change is that I am happy and at peace; hardly a day passes when I do not experience and express how rare and fragile such a state of being is. It is of course the way life is supposed to be, but it hardly ever is. Instead I experience it as a state of grace that may not last but is still to be cherished.
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