Chapter 8
¶
“Did you figure out the equation?”
“I didn’t,” I replied looking at the floor.
“It was a pretty hard one. Depends on how far you have gone in math, it’s possible either way, but easier if you know.”
“So what’s the answer?”
“I’m half tempted to not spoil it for you, and let you figure it out on your own.”
“Oh please don’t, it already tortured me enough this week.”
“What is enough?”
“I feel like this is a trap… Okay, well I tried enough to really just want to know the answer without having to try anymore.”
“I think that response just made me want to give you the answer.”
“Yes!”
“The formula doesn’t mean much unless you already understand the math behind it, so I’ll write it out. It’s the Number of people divided by 2, subtract from that, the number of people divided by two squared, then add the number of people divided by two cubed, then subtract the number of people divided by two to the fourth power and so on.”
“Yep! I never would have got that one.”
Jack chuckled.
“So which of you neighbors are we going to see first?” I asked changing the topic.
“We can start with Jessica right opposite me.”
“Alright!”
We knocked and no one answered. So we moved to the next door, and the next.
We heard the TV going so we knew Charley was there. After knocking quite a few times he did answer the door. He seemed to be happy to see Jack, but it wasn’t very noticeable, because he was quite drunk.
“Hey Charley,” Jack greeted.
“Hi,” I said as I stuck out my hand and he slowly extended his.
“This is my new good friend Chris; I figured he should meet my great neighbors.”
“Nice to meet you,” he responded.
“How’s your team doing?” Jack asked. I could hear the post-game talk on the TV.
“About as good I’m doing,” he answered with a laugh.
“And how’s that?”
“They’re a mess, but they still make it out on the field on game day.”
“When’s the next game?”
“Sunday.”
“I’ll be there.”
“Alright.”
“Well, we just wanted to stop and say hi, but I’ll see you Sunday, I’ll bring the chips.”
“Good deal, thank you for coming by.”
“Good to see you.”
“Good to see you too, and you, Chris was it?”
“Yes,” I replied.
“Alright then.”
He closed the door and we headed back to Jack’s apartment.
“You like football Jack?”
“I don’t especially care for it, but I do enjoy Charley’s company.”
¶
We got back to Jack’s apartment, and I asked to use his bathroom. I was quite surprised when I saw a picture frame with quotes on the wall across from the toilet.
I asked him when I got out, “How often do you change the quotes in the bathroom?”
“It’s not always a quote, many times its just words. I change it a couple times a week usually.”
“What do you mean words?”
“For languages I’m working on.”
“That’s genius!”
Jack paused and stared at me.
“What?” I asked.
“Genius is logic, something we all have,” he replied.
I knew he had more to say on it so I asked, “Why do you say that?”
I was sure this one was “Pandora’s box”, but the question just came out, and I was very curious.
“Typically one would refer to someone who endures longer in logic as a genius of sorts. I don’t think any one person could be heralded as genius, and ideas or actions should be considered concise or logical.”
“You really think there aren’t any people that are genius?”
“No. A person could endure a certain flavor of logic for quite some time on pure stubbornness, there is nothing genius about that. Well maybe it is out of pride… oh, even more silly. Would it be worse if one endured logic in one aspect of their life for fear? I can’t say I know, but what I do know is that we are all of the same genius.
We all try the long way around, and we all would love something for nothing. Most of who people would consider geniuses, are just lazy people finding easier ways to get by on as little or nothing if possible. Which it’s not possible,” he said shaking his head.
“But there’s not much use working hard and not working smart, right?” I asked.
“Well of course. I’m merely stating that much creativity stems from hard work devoted to laziness, which is not in its self a bad thing. I don’t want to do more than I have to, but I’m not a genius for it.”
“Couldn’t genius then be the perfect blend of concise hard work and creative laziness?”
“Well said.”
“Thanks.”
“I stand by what I said, that we are all of the same genius. We are all confronted with the pursuit of knowledge and understanding. But then what? Do of course! But do what first? The more you pay attention, the more you will see. You will see many things that need to be done, but you will not see all things, so you will never with certainty know which of all things you should do first.”
“Sounds like a paradox. Do you believe there is someone or something who knows all things?”
“If there is, it would have to be a someone, inanimate objects are just that, inanimate. Anyway, I’m sure he, she or it, would want us to figure it out ourselves, like any good teacher should. What I would like, is a detailed map, and not just the vague moral compass I seem to have. That’s neither here nor there.”
“Are you religious?”
“It depends on what you mean by that, but I assume you mean organized religion, and perhaps one day. I want to see how far I can get on my own steam first.”
“How’s that going?” I asked.
“Good I think. I’m as far as I am.”
“Oh yeah, that reminds me; how’s Jacky doing?”
Jack chuckled, “I was wondering how long it would take you to get back to her.”
“I have to know how she is.”
¶
“Alright, let’s see.
It was a bleak unforgiving, but twistedly restful night. Much different than yesterday, which was a lot of pacing, fretting and circling; oh the restless sorrow of a wasted day.
The very first rain started to splash and run down the window panes. The rain comes as a flood of relief, from the terrible pressure changes that wreak havoc on the built up scar tissue and pounded joints in my back.
I was so happy I could sleep that I couldn’t. If it’s not my back it’s my brain; one of the two is always conspiring against my sleep. I tried to picture blackness, but it kept changing, it was coal, or tar, oozing and forming shapes, a black wolf, and a shadowy hawk on the night’s sky.
‘Maybe sheep would do the trick’ I thought to myself. The first sheep approached and jumped over the bed with the fence over me. Then the bed and the fence started zooming toward the oncoming sheep. They hustled to jump over it.
The bed started to increase in size, and then the room disappeared; I was suddenly in space. Only one sheep had made it on the bed, which was now a spaceship; a spaceship hurdling through space like a comet.
The fence was on a belt that wrapped the ship all the way around, and spun like the track of a tank. The fence was attached, and the sheep, who had barely made it on the ship, had to jump the fence as is spun faster and faster around the ship. Running as fast as it could on the track, and then jumping the fence each time it came around.
Was it all relative? Was it even possible to stay on? It looked as if it was possible.
A
few good jumps, followed by a few sprinted steps, and the sheep was more fully on the ship.
But then in a pass of the fence, the sheep was brushed of the ship into the emptiness of space.
“Wait, wait, wait, “I interrupted.
“What?”
“That doesn’t sound like Jacky”
“Well, physics was her favorite class her senior year in high school. For as much drama as there was, life was still a lot simpler then. Especially after the second accident, everything got a lot more complicated.
She wished she could be in school, but seizures don't wait for anyone, or any particularly convenient time or place. The scare over her cheek bone was evidence of that. Driving was all but impossible and most everything else was similarly difficult if not impossible as well.”
“Wait,” I interrupted again.
“What is it now?” Jack asked.
"It still doesn't sound like Jacky. I didn't have her like that in my mind."
"That’s funny, because she is coming from my mind right now… But you're probably right. That's what I get for just trying to make things up on the spot. Also that is exactly what happened to me last night… counting how many times a sheep could jump over a revolving fence on a spaceship approaching speeds where relativity would start interfering."
"I definitely believe you would have those dreams, just not Jacky.”
“That’s the problem - it wasn’t a dream, because I wasn’t asleep,” he said as he rolled his eyes and then forced a laugh.
“Okay, so Jacky isn't a physics person, and she didn't have that dream.”
“Alright, but she does have a mild epilepsy. She did take a physics class in high school… but it didn't play such a big role in her life. But then again, I don't think any one thing in a person’s life can really play a very big role. Who we are, is not so much what we do, but why we do it, and how we see it in our lives. The same is true for...
"Jacky?" I filled in. I could tell he really didn’t want to call her that.
"Yes... She took physics. She excelled. She excelled in most everything where the rules were set. Seizures happened maybe a few times a year, homework always waited; as tedious as it could be at times, it was never inpatient with her.
People however are different; it was as if everyone around her was more burdened by the seizures than she was. Even something as scary or terrible as uncontrollable convulsions, can be in a way novel at first, but there is something exhausting and resenting in a problem that can’t be fixed. More so, something you can’t control inside of you, which you can’t run away from.
No one would ever say anything about it, but an almost silent sigh would say more than she ever wanted to hear.
She would do all she could not to be a burden to others. There were places she didn’t go and things she didn’t do, that might frighten someone she didn’t know. She always felt close to embracing the thought, that everyone deep down loved her, and helping her during a seizure, would be the farthest thing from a burden; however so many times, that thought just felt stripped from her hands.
Jack stopped, he looked a little uneasy.
I asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Being that you are recording this story, I don’t know if I’m quite in the right mood for this story.”
“That’s fine.”
“When I talk, I think about the validity or importance of what I say, and maybe what I was expressing is my difficulty in dealing with things I can’t change, or prevent in my life or in the hospital.”
“It’s fine.”
“I’ll be in a more productive mood next visit. I just suddenly have quite the headache. I don’t mean to rush you out, but I think I’m going to lie down. I will give you a puzzle first if you would like?”
“Thanks, yeah.”
“Here’s a riddle from a man named Lewis Carroll
A Russian had three sons. The first named Rab, became a lawyer; the second named Ymra became a soldier. The third son became a sailor, what was his name?”
“Alright, I’ll try to figure it out, and I’ll see you next week.”
“See you then.”