Last week I went to the NIH, where I did research for over 40 years, to retrieve a bunch of my books to bring home. I put them in a duffle bag, which turned out to be very heavy, and dragged the bag down from the ninth floor of building 10, the hospital. I put the duffle bag on the curb and started to go for my car, which was about five minutes away. “What am I doing?” I asked myself. I retrieved the bag and dragged it to the car. I was worried that a large, unidentified bag alone on a curb might be threatening, the potential carrier of a bomb, big trouble. I realized I was living in a poisoned environment.

When I first came to the NIH in 1967 it was an open campus – come one, come all. There were lectures, concerts, a hospital and, of course, research laboratories. There was a family atmosphere and it was all about science.

After the infamous 9/11/2001, NIH was enclosed with a chain fence. For security, we needed ID badges to enter. Receiving those ID badges required security checks, fingerprinting, filling out forms and the like. NIH has fingerprinted me four or five times. I thought fingerprints were stable. Anyone who was not an employee needed to go through security, as in an airport, and his or her car was given the once-over as well.

Ok, we don’t like it, but there’s an argument for protection against ghastly, random and organized terrorism.

It’s the downturn in the fabric of our lives that depresses me most, not the overt protections: the insidious decay under the veneer.

Friends tell me they hesitate to surf the net for information that might be construed to link them to terrorism, or perhaps something else that will catch up to their innocent curiosity. And then there are the notorious the emails. No, I have no relationship with Hillary, nor do I know anyone who does, but we all know that no matter what we write, whether we delete it or not, it’s permanent. Be careful! And that’s the message, whether we’re politicians or molecular biologists. It’s that poisoned environment again. We’re guilty until proven innocent. Isn’t the American justice system innocent until proven guilty?

It’s not just NIH. I have received anonymous phone calls threatening that I owe back taxes and the IRS is after me (a hoax). I’m bombarded with requests for money from every conceivable organization – I’m not saying they’re not worthy organizations – but when is it enough? I have work to do, after all. My time is valuable to me. I’ve read that my gaze may be recorded in shops to get information on what I like so advertisers can target me. Do I need to discipline what I look at when strolling through a department store?

It’s 1984 all over again, this time for real. I am an optimist: always was and, hopefully, will continue to be. Call me foolish, but that’s who I am.

So, how can we fix this?