are never here nor there? What is reality if observation creates or changes reality?
Milly and I got the Big Circuits built, because they were not terribly expensive, only terribly cold and precise. Also, they were not supposed to melt or blow up. I had been waiting to test them for months. Milly and everyone else had been afraid to flip the switch, because electric field lines were not supposed to bend as sharply as her geometry required.
Scientific theories and their proofs are hard-won by brilliant people. They are things of immense beauty and personal pride. They are also ideas of difficult scholarly learning by millions of toiling students. Thus, due to effort and pride, scientific theory takes on the rigidity of religious dogma, however temporarily, until experiment casts doubt on the logic. My theory, with only a couple of simple machines as possible proof, remained heresy, and was my own dogma. I no longer tried to explain the theory to justify the circuits' existence. After my escape from The Hole, to breathe some fresh air and to make my wife worry about me, ending in fortunate safety and kind forgiveness, I probably no longer had any intellectual standing among my peers.
Waiting while my youthful impatience simmered, I was at least content with knowing my wife loved me. I literally loved Milly more than I could say, because the eloquence I needed to express the depth of my feelings for her was beyond my verbal abilities. In fact, I'm sure I must have too often transferred the opposite sentiment to her without even knowing. I tried to reciprocate her renewed spirit of fondness and attention. I tried to better demonstrate the affection I felt for Milly, affection I had too well learned to quell over my years with her. But I was not able to continuously hide my scientific disappointment from her. My curiosity about the magic of the new universe we had discovered often stoked the bonfire of my impatience.
There would soon come a time when the Big Circuits would be moth-balled. Personnel were disappearing from the roster of those maintaining the cryogenics of the Big Circuits. Security was tighter on those lower levels in The Hole. We had to test the Big Circuits soon, or inevitable maintenance failure would doom their purpose. There is no greater object of pride than one's intellect, when one thinks he is so intelligent and so imaginative. Why was I never smart enough or sensitive enough or patient enough to never forget how much my wife meant to me, and to never doubt how much I meant to her?
"We'll do it on our own," she said one morning.
"Do what?" I asked, in the middle of reading the only important part of a week-old newspaper: the comics.
"Run the vacuum tests on the Big Circuits."
"How?" I didn't even look up from the comics.
"With these."
I looked up. She held two punch cards over her scrambled eggs and waved them at me.
"What are those?"
"The security keys to the Big Circuits."
"They use old punch cards?" I asked."
"Old is right. And they never changed the passwords."
"How did you copy them?"
"Quickly and sneakily."
"When?"
"Last May."
"All the way back then? I didn't think you were ever in favor of turning on the Big Circuits!"
"Back then I had stupid reasons for wanting to do it. I thought that at worst it would be a painless way to commit suicide. No! I wasn't that far gone! I shouldn't joke about it! I was always as curious as you were about our project."
"I thought you had deserted me!"
"I was just trying to get your attention, Sam!"
"I'm sorry! I know I withdraw a lot. I need to say I love you much more often, just as long as it never seems insincere or habitual."
"Just look at me the way you used to, Sam, and I'll be happy."
"Here's looking at you, kid!"
I did look at Milly, and I saw how beautiful she really was. It was as if she had been fading away from me but was now brightening and blossoming, nourished by what I was now able to give of myself. I wondered how much she had helped me simply because she loved me, rather than because she loved mathematics.
"I love you, Sam," Milly said. "I was always going to help you make this thing work! When we started plumbing the cryogenics I just had a hunch that the Big Circuits were getting a little too scary and we might eventually need to bypass the Advisory Committee. They are so far behind us in the theory that they'll never have the courage to flip the switch."
"Milly," I said, feeling wonderful and humbled, "I knew you were unhappy with me. I assumed you were afraid of the test because of how strongly you argued theory with me. I should have just asked if that was true."
"Yes, I was unhappy with you, Samuel Lee! And you were unhappy with me. But whether you think it's fair or not, you will have to smother me with kisses to keep me happy from now on!"
I thought I could do even better than that.
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Afterword
I hope you enjoyed Part 2: Cryptikon.
If you are ready, Part 3: The Lady is next.
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