Early on, living in Houston developed an interesting syndrome in [Dominique de Menil], which I might compare to that which an explorer can experience far from home. It would be appropriate to call it, for the sake of argument, the Lamberéne syndrome, after the site of Albert Schweizer's hospital in Gabon. Isolated and away from the metropolitan centers of culture, Dominique developed an unexpected sense of insecurity, which sometimes made her overvalue the opinions and advice of guests passing through town. This sense of insecurity made her feel that she was missing something--removed, as she sometimes felt, from where the action was.