Long before Darwin, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck proposed another evolutionary idea: the inheritance of acquired characteristics. Giraffes developed their long necks over time, he surmised, by stretching to reach for leaves. Those that could stretch passed on this characteristic to their offspring, and the necks grew longer over time.   

In my youth, Lamarck was discredited and laughed at in science classrooms. The giraffe's neck growing long because it wants to! How ludicrous! Only Darwin, beloved Darwin, got it right! Now we don't scoff so much at Lamarck, because we know more about how DNA can change during a being's life. Some characteristics are acquired during our lives, and by golly, some of them are even inherited. 

Lamarck is more interesting to me in a psycho-social sense as we consider how our genetic natures are shaped by nurture. So I ask myself, as I consider the shadow that my father cast over me (and continues to cast, especially now when I wrestle so diligently with him), the following questions in a Lamarckian spirit: 

1. What characteristics have I acquired from the man?
2. Which of those characteristics are my sons acquiring from me?

I'd like to make a scientific study here, connect every emotion to a gene and track its movement within my family. Might there also be some of his DNA on his fur-lined gloves, or the cufflinks he hardly ever wore? 

No, whatever DNA he left behind in his reliquary has been washed over by mine. I can always exhume him, can't I? This will come in handy for my sons later on, so they can correctly identify what characteristics I've acquired in this life from sources other than my father. That way, they can correctly place the blame if they find themselves plagued by behaviors that Thomas J. Wingate never exhibited, traits he never possessed. 

1. THE SINCEREST FORM
2. THE MACHISMO OF DEFEAT
3. THE WAY OF FEAR
4. ATTEMPTS AT NECROMANCY
5. THE MICROSCOPE FLIPS