Smarter

by Laurence E. Dahners

  “Ouch! That could be kind of expensive, maybe I could pay for one of those trips for your birthday?”

  “That’d be nice, thanks!”

  “Hey, do you remember Mr. Mandal, your old guidance counselor?”

  “Sure, he was really helpful when I was trying to figure college out.”

  “Well he’s the principal now and asked me if you’d be willing to give the commencement address for the high school graduation?”

  “Accch! I’m still a year younger than a lot of the graduates! They aren’t going to want to hear me talk!”

  “Believe me, no one thinks much about your age. You are much too famous for anyone to focus on whether you are ‘old enough.’ He said it would mean a lot to the school. You’re by far their best known graduate.”

  “I didn’t even graduate! I left after my junior year. Besides, isn’t graduation in just a couple more days?”

  “Saturday. They have another speaker who’s agreed to step aside if you’re willing.”

  “What would I talk about?”

  “Tell them about gymnastics and winning the gold medals, that’s what they’re most interested in.”

  “But you and I know that I’m a freak. I can’t just tell them that gymnastics is easy for me.”

  “Talk to them about physics then.”

  “They’ll die of boredom.” Ell threw her head back on the headrest with a moan. “Let me think about it for a moment.”

  “And…”

  “And what? You’re not going to spring another speech on me are you?”

  “No. But Jake… Well, you know how you and Jake have never gotten along? But he got to be such a big fan of yours when you were in the Olympics. And now he’s just dying to do something to make it up to you for how he behaved in the past. He’s been working hard on something for you all this last week. I don’t know what it is, but I hope you’ll give him a chance with it?”

  “Oh Mom. I don’t know. Just hearing his name brings a picture back to mind of that condescending sneer …”

  “Please, for me?”

  “Well you love him and he is my step-dad, so I’ll cut him some slack. Not very much though. I just can’t picture him giving up his old ways.”

  “Try to be nice. He might even help finance those interview trips you’re worried about.”

  “Well, that actually would be nice.”

  ***

  Ell’s heart started pounding while Mr. Mandal gave her a glowing introduction. To her dismay he focused on her gymnastic gold medals and her subsequent role stopping the terrorist plot to derail the Olympics. Ell had hoped that as an educator he would concentrate on her academic achievements and at least mention her physics paper since that was what she intended to talk about. She stood and, trembling like a leaf inside, slowly walked to the podium. Staring out over the gymnasium full of people she thought wonderingly to herself that neither competing in the Olympics nor facing terrorists had made her this tremulous. There was just something terrifying about public speaking, especially to a group of her peers. She grimaced; they were going to hate her topic.

  Her fear went unrecognized by the audience who only saw a very attractive, slender, strawberry blond young woman in a black pantsuit get up from her seat and walk, apparently confidently, across the stage to the podium.

  She stood silently at the microphone several long moments, wondering if she actually had the courage to give this talk. People shifted in their seats. Finally, she cleared her throat, “I suspect… that you want to hear about winning Olympic gymnastic medals.” she said weakly, then cleared her throat again and with more strength said, “Or that you want to hear about what it was like to be in that room with the terrorists.

  “OK…

  “The first was exhilarating, the second was terrifying…”

  Ell paused. At first scattered chuckles, then a full throated laugh swept the audience. “Now that that’s out of the way, let me tell you about something much more interesting. At least to me.

  “Young’s double slit experiment is one of the most elegant and exciting phenomena in all of physics and something that I lay awake at night thinking about. I think you should all be puzzled by it too, so I’m going to briefly explain it to you. If you send light, say a laser beam, at a narrow slit you will find that the beam spreads out on the other side of the slit, just like the waves in water do when they come through a narrow opening in a breakwater.” Ell was proud to have recognized that this analogy would be readily understood by people in this coastal town. “If you send that beam so that it hits two neighboring slits it will spread out from each slit and create an ‘interference’ pattern where the waves double up in some areas and block each other out in others. So light must consist of waves right? Well yes light does act like a wave. However, light also acts like a particle. You can slow down your light emitting device until it is only emitting one ‘quanta’ of these particles or “photons” at a time. Then they show up at the detector as a single spot, kind of like a bullet hitting a target, and just like a particle would, they leave a mark at that one spot. And you can send those particles through the two slits one at a time and see each one appear on the other side of the slits one at a time, each arriving as a single little spot on your detector. Just like a particle should arrive. That’s not very wavelike! But after thousands of your photon particles have gone through the two slits, one at a time, you will find that they have arrived at the target, distributed in that same wave interference pattern! It’s as if the particles act like waves even when they are traveling all by themselves, one at a time! It’s freaking bizarre, but true.

  “This phenomenon has given physicists headaches for decades and has led to weird terms like ‘wavicles’ to try to describe this tendency to act like both a wave and a particle at the same time. So I present this to you as a challenge. Figure this out! Or at least ponder it. You probably thought I would give a long winded speech or try to inspire you with stories of how hard I worked to achieve what I’ve done in gymnastics. Instead I’m telling you what I want to do. I want to figure this ‘wavicle’ thing out.

  “The way I see it, there are two possibilities. First, light is neither a wave, nor a particle, nor a wavicle, but instead something completely different from either one and we need to come up with a different descriptive model than either a particle or a wave for what light really is. Or, my current pet theory, which is that light is made of single photon particles that can actually spread out like a bunch of particles. In other words, each particle can spread out like a ‘wave’ of particles and that all these spread out ‘subphotons’ are actually connected to one another through a 5th dimension that we can’t see, feel, or touch. Then when the photon arrives at its destination, having traveled like a wave of subphotons, it coalesces through that 5th dimension to become a single complete photon at the one point where we detect it at our receptor apparatus.

  “I’m particularly excited to have invented a math that seems to fit known experimental data correctly for such subphotons and a 5th dimension, at least so far. I could be proved wrong any moment now! I want to go to grad school to work on experiments suggested by that math, to see if my math continues to agree with even newer experimental results. But, it’s important that you realize that it is very likely that I will turn out to be wrong! And so there is room for millions of bright young minds like yours to contemplate other ways that light could travel, neither as a wave, nor as a particle and yet behave like it does in the double slit experiment.

  “Or, if you don’t want to work on that, there are thousands of other problems out there, from physics to fisheries, from photons to farms, that all need solutions. So I urge you to go forth and seek not just work, but seek to find solutions to problems!

  “Finally, I know that one or maybe two of you are disappointed to have heard a talk about physics, so this is for you.”

  Ell turned and strode to one end of the stage, pivoted and did handsprings toward the other end of the stage,
finishing with a double and then a triple to land thunderously on the wooden stage. The audience reacted with laughter and a standing ovation as she walked back to her seat.

  ***

  On Monday Ell got in Jake’s car with him to go down to his office for his “surprise.” She continued to be wary about what the surprise might be, but tried to relax. He’d been very upbeat since she came home and they had mended fences to the point that Ell was even staying at Jake and Kristen’s house rather than at her grandmother’s like usual. His attitude certainly had changed in that he no longer implied that she was ignorant, stupid, incapable or weak like he had so often intimated back in high school. He was upbeat on the trip to downtown Morehead City where his law practice dealt with real estate, fishery negotiations and other small commercial business enterprises. As they neared his office he turned to her and said, “You are really going to love the deal I have set up for you, Ell. I have worked out something better than you could ever have dreamed of!”

  Ell’s blood ran cold. That had sounded too much like the Jake of old, the man who always knew what was best for Ell, no matter what Ell herself wanted. “Deal?” Her voice was low and toneless and she felt bad for sounding angry before she’d even heard what was involved.

  Jake, as she might have expected, didn’t even notice her tone. “Oh yeah! I’m not gonna say anything more. Except that you are going to be blown away!”

  Ell took a deep breath and forced herself to relax as they pulled into his parking space and walked into the building. She noticed that it had been remodeled since she left so he must be doing pretty well. Jake’s long time receptionist, Susan, leapt out of her chair and came around to give Ell a big hug, patting her on the shoulders and welcoming her back to town. “Mr. Radford, the gentlemen are in the conference room.”

  Ell looked questioningly at Jake and he motioned to the little hall where his conference room was located. When Ell entered she found two Asian men, one apparently in his 60s and the other in his 20s seated at the table already. Jake thumped down into the seat across from them and said, “Sit, Ell, sit.” Ell slowly slid into the seat two down from Jake and looked back and forth between Jake and the men. Jake said, “I suppose you’re all wondering why I’ve brought you here?” then chuckled at his own joke.

  The men looked puzzled and Ell just stared at him. “So.” Jake said, “Ell your worries are over. These men have come down here from Lenovo, in the Research Triangle Park, to offer you a job. They are very interested in that paper you published in Nature. They don’t feel that it is at all necessary for you to go to grad school. They want you to start work now and I’ve negotiated you a starting salary of, get this, $200,000 a year!”

  Ell stared at Jake, then at the two Asian men who had focused all their attention on her. She turned back to Jake and said in a flat tone, “Not interested.” She started to stand.

  Jake flushed. “What!” he said in a dangerous tone.

  “I’m not interested in a job now. I fully intend to go to grad school, no matter how good a job is offered to me at present. If you had bothered to ask me, I could have told you this at any time and saved you the trouble of setting this meeting up.”

  The elder of the Asian men turned to Jake and, in a heavy accent icily said, “I thought you said your daughter was respectful and obedient?”

  Ell snorted on hearing that.

  Jake’s face was red and he looked like he was about to explode, but he kept his temper and ground out, “Ell, think of your mother. If you took this job you’d be able to help her out financially.”

  “In the first place, you’re her husband. You and my mother are the ones who should depend on one another financially, not she and I. In the second, even if I were to forego grad school, I would still owe two and a half years active duty to the Air Force before I took a job.”

  The Asian man turned back to Jake. “Your promises were of no substance! We expect our money back.”

  Ell turned her icy gaze back to Jake. “How much money did you take on the promise that I would take this job?”

  Jake opened his mouth and waved his hands defensively but had said nothing before the Asian man said, “Two hundred thousand dollars.”

  Ell’s ice green eyes bored into Jake again, “You owe the man his money back.” She stood and opened the door.

  Jake rose, “Now look here young lady!” Ell didn’t hear whatever else he had to say. She had closed the door by then.

  She walked out front and turned brightly to Jake’s receptionist. “Hey Susan, could you give me a ride home? Jake’s going to be meeting with those guys for a while longer.”

  “Sure Honey, just let me get my purse.”

  Ell stopped at home just long enough to pack her duffle again, slung it over her shoulder and walked to her grandmother’s house. It was quite a walk, but the weather was nice. “Gram!” she said when the door opened.

  Her grandmother narrowed her eyes and looked at her a moment, then opened the door wide. “That S.O.B. Jake causing more trouble?”

  Ell shrugged, “Yep.” She said brightly. “Jake being Jake. He knows what’s best for everyone.”

  “Damn that man. I don’t know why Kristen stays with him! She constantly lets him bully her. I would have thought my daughter would have the spine to stand up to that jackass.” Gram shrugged, “Let’s get you back into your old room.”

  Ell unpacked pensively, “Gram? I’ve heard of ‘controlling husbands’ but never thought about it as regards Mom and Jake. I think I was oblivious to any of the signs when I lived at home. I just worried about my relationship with him. Do you think they’ve got that kind of problem?”

  “Oh yeah, they’ve got most of the signs. I’ve talked to your Mom about it but she either doesn’t recognize the problem or is too afraid to deal with it.”

  Ell and her grandmother talked about Kristen and Jake while they prepared and ate dinner. They had some ideas but, of course, none of their ideas would bear fruit without Kristen’s initiative. Then the door creaked open and Kristen stepped in. “Ell? I thought you must be here! Why were you so rude to Jake? He said that you just walked out in the middle of the proposal he’d worked so hard to arrange for you!”

  Gram pursed her lips and Ell stared at her mother a moment. “Mom… Why do you think I walked out on Jake?”

  Kristen looked startled, then a considering look crossed her face and she slowly sat down while looking Ell in the eye. Her face crumpled and tears ran down her cheeks, “His proposal was something he worked out completely on his own without taking your feelings into consideration at all?”

  Ell slowly nodded.

  “Then he told you that you should be grateful?” she sniffed.

  Ell nodded again.

  “And there was something in it for him too?”

  Ell leaned forward and took her hands, “Something big. You do know he’s a controlling bully?”

  Kristen looked at the floor, wiped her nose on the back of her hand and nodded fractionally.

  “Do you want our help?”

  Long sobs wracked her then she nodded. Ell and Gram both put their arms around her and rocked her. “Do you want out? Or do you want to try to repair what you’ve got?”

  “Out,” she whispered.

  Chapter Two

  Randy idly watched the people riding down the escalator, waiting for Ell Donsaii to arrive. His eye caught on a gorgeous young woman riding the escalator and tracked her downward. Suddenly he realized that the beautiful young lady was actually the person he had come to pick up.

  Ell rode down the escalator to the baggage area at Boston’s Logan Airport and was startled when a young man standing near the bottom approached her. At first she thought he wanted an autograph but he excitedly said, “Ms. Donsaii, I’m from MIT. Professor Golroy sent me ‘round to pick you up. It’s right this way to get your luggage and then we can be on our way.”

  Ell broke into her trademark crooked smile and held out her hand, “Ell Donsaii.”r />
  The young man seemed practically ecstatic to be shaking her hand, though he looked about twenty four and would therefore be six or seven years older than Ell. “I’m Randy Dunsbaugh, one of Professor Golroy’s grad students.”

  Randy led her to the baggage slide where she picked up her duffel herself despite the young man’s attempt to get it for her. He kept up a line of chatter. “The professor is determined to have you on his theoretical team and sent me to make sure no one else horned in — He has you set up to give a talk tomorrow at three, most of the department will be there — I’m to warn you about Professor Smythe, one of the experimentalists. Smythe apparently thinks that you want to join an experimental team!” This last about Smythe was uttered with a tone of utter incredulity. Apparently Randy had no idea that Ell had in fact requested to work in experimental physics. She was full of theories; she wanted to learn how to test them.

  Randy took Ell to a nice hotel and when she protested that she couldn’t afford it, assured her that the Department had covered the cost! Ell was greatly relieved but could hardly believe that they were going to this extent to woo a grad student, no matter what paper she had written. She had been pleased enough that they waived their requirements that she take the GRE exam and that her application be submitted back last December. And giving a talk! “Randy, I can’t give a talk! I don’t have anything prepared. I’ve never even heard a talk at a physics department. I don’t know what they would expect.”

  “Oh, believe me, you don’t have to have anything prepared. All you have to do is walk into the room and let them blast you with questions!”

  “My God Randy! That’s hardly reassuring!”

  “Come on! You wrote the paper. Surely you can answer questions about it. No one could know more about your new math than you do!”

  ***

  The next day passed in a whirlwind. Randy picked her up at the hotel and took her to breakfast with Professor Golroy who was disappointed to learn of her desire for an experimental track in physics. However he helped arrange appointments with Smythe and Olson, two of the faculty who did do experimental work with quantum phenomena. At three they indeed had a conference where, in fact, Ell didn’t have to give a talk as threatened, but sat with several of the professors at the front of the room. The professors on the panel asked her a series of perceptive questions first, then opened it to the room. At first Ell felt good responding to the questions, even though some were quite pointed. After all she’d worked with her math endlessly over the past couple years. She whispered to her AI, Allan, and he interfaced with computational power on the University’s servers to demonstrate on the big screen at the front of the room how her 5th dimensional solution fit with known experimental data.