Warning Signs

My sister Em had a long walk uphill from high school to home. One hot day she bought a cold soda near school for the trek. When she got home, a little was left, so she put it in the fridge with a note: I spit in this. Em.  Knowing anything in the fridge was fair game for each of us seven kids, she thought the note would deter us from helping ourselves to some of her drink. Later, I was in the kitchen when she went to retrieve her stash. She smiled with satisfaction as she reached for the bottle, but stopping to look at the note, frowned. She slammed the fridge door shut, poured the drink into the kitchen sink, put the empty bottle and note in the trash and stormed off to her room. I retrieved the note and found that a brother had struck; an addendum to her note said: So did I. Ben.

Under the Boardwalk

    When it’s summer we go to the beach. We always get a bungalow right on the boardwalk. You know what I used to do? I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you what I used to do. When it was morning? I’d get up early, really early. Everybody would still be in bed. They’d all still be asleep. I wouldn’t make a sound. I’d go outside, and go under the boardwalk. It’s kind of cold and damp there, but I’d just walk right under. I wouldn’t stop ’cause there’s bugs there so I’d just keep going. Big kids have to crawl under, but I don’t have to crawl ’cause I’m only four and a half, so I can stand up straight and walk right under, and I don’t hit my head.

    When I get to the other side? Guess what. There’s no one there. I’m the only one there. So I’d go to the ocean, but I wouldn’t go all the way. I’d stop, like where the beach starts to go downhill to the water. And I’d stop right there. I’d just sit down and wait for the sun to come up. I could see lifeguards way far away at the end of the beach where they have rocks. The lifeguards all have rakes, and they rake the beach every morning. Every morning I’d see them there raking the beach.

    If you watch the waves, you will see every one is different. And they just keep coming. They never stop. Pretty soon the sun would start to come up. You can’t look at it ’cause it hurts your eyes, and Dad says you will ruin your eyes if you look at it. You know how just before the sun comes up it’s sort of cool? Soon as the sun came up, it’d be warm. That sun is really warm.

    Then I’d get up and go back to the bungalow before anybody got up. Nobody knew I was gone. Not Mom, not Dad, not my brothers, not my sisters. I have two brothers and four sisters. Two of my sisters are just babies though.

    Only one day Mom caught me. She said, “Where have you been?” I told her. She said, “Don’t ever do that again.” Mom doesn’t want me to go to the beach by myself. So I can’t do that anymore. But guess what I found out. I can see the sun come up, and I don’t even have to go outside. Know how I do it? I just stand up on pillows on the sofa and look out the window. But I don’t do that any more. It’s not the same, like on the beach.

    When Mom’s cooking breakfast that’s when the iceman comes. He has this big block of ice for the icebox. He carries it with tongs, kind of like curvy scissors. It has two handles, but he only holds one handle. How come the ice doesn’t just fall right out? I don’t know. I don’t know how that works. Anyway, the iceman just puts the ice in the top of the icebox.

    Then after that we eat breakfast. The bungalow is so small we have to eat breakfast on the deck in the back, but that’s really good ’cause when you spill something, it’s ok; we just wipe it up and wash it off with the hose. After that we help Mom pack a bunch of sandwiches and lemonade with lots of ice. She chops it off the big hunk the iceman gave us. She won’t let any of us kids chop the ice; she’s afraid we might get hurt. Then we all go to the beach. Dad carries the umbrella. When we get to the beach he sticks it up. Then Dad has to read the paper; but Mom gets to watch us play.

    Now is August, and next comes September. That’s when I start school. I have to go to Kindergarten. I don’t know about Kindergarten, we’ll see. (That’s what Mom and Dad say when we ask for something, “We’ll see.”) My sister Margie says I will like it. She’s starting second grade. She said you just play with toys and draw and paint and stuff with a whole bunch of other kids. And she said you take naps. And you learn to read. But I already know how to read. Know who taught me? Guess who taught me. Me! I taught myself! When Mom read books to me, I just looked at the words by her finger, and pretty soon I figured out how to read. I just figured it out all by myself. They all thought I learned the words by memory, but then one time I read a new book, and boy were they surprised.

    There is no Kindergarten at the beach. First we have to leave the bungalow and go back to our big house where we live most of the time. Then I get to go to Kindergarten.

© Richard Gilbert   September 2011

  Ace Relations

    Bob Wilson’s first job as an engineer was at Thomas Electronics in West Orange, New Jersey, just 13 miles west of New York City.  Having just completed the circuit design of a new product, he was working with George Adams, the draftsman assigned to do the mechanical design.  Adams was a tall, slim, handsome man in his mid-twenties. Wilson, on his way in one morning, was confronted by a colleague who whispered, “Hey Bob, I notice you call George Adams, ‘Ace’.”

    “Yeah?”

    “I don’t think that’s such a good idea.”

    “Why not?”

    “The guy’s black.”

    “So?”

    “ Well, ‘Ace’ sort of suggests ace of spades and they sure don’t like to be called a ‘spade’.”

    “I see. Well, I don’t think there’s a problem there. If there were, he would let me know right off the bat. Oh, he wouldn’t hesitate, believe me.”

    “Well, your call. I just thought I should say something.”

    “OK, thanks, Jack.”

    Wilson thought about it. Could Adams have asked Jack to intervene? No, he and Adams had an open rapport. Most of the people in the office were engineers like Wilson himself, but Adams was different. He was an engineering draftsman, yet artistic, imaginative, even theatrical, as if a bit of Broadway had hopped the Hudson River. Wilson really enjoyed collaborating with him.

*****

    Adams once borrowed a dollar from Wilson, claiming he didn’t have any ones for the Coke machine. Each time Wilson reminded him of the debt, Adams claimed he didn’t have a dollar to spare, but would pay him back some time later, “Maybe next week.” After a month of this routine, Adams offered to pay him back in installments, thoroughly enjoying the tease: “How about a dime a week?” Wilson stopped bringing it up.

    Months later, Wilson walked up to him holding up a dollar in his left hand. “Hey, Ace, got change for a dollar?”

    “Sure thing.” Adams fished the coins out of his pocket and dropped them into Wilson’s outstretched right hand.
    Wilson put the change in his pocket, took out his wallet, and placed the dollar in it. “Thank you so very much.”  He set the wallet back in his pocket, looked at Adams and smiled patiently. Adams looked puzzled for a moment, then groaned as he lowered his head in his hands. Wilson walked off, happily leaving his colleague in his misery.

*****

    When the Engineering offices were to be moved, Adams was selected to do the layouts. He had gone through several iterations; the latest showed 12 cubicles in a long line ending at the offices of the Chief Engineer, Hans Kort, and Assistant Chief Engineer, Frederick Eagleton. Kort was tall and silver-haired, Eagleton short and balding with just a tuft of hair over each ear. Adams referred to them as “Mutt and Jeff.”

    The openings of the cubicles looked across a wide aisle to a line of windows to the outdoors. The eight-foot wide cubicles formed a string 96 feet long. One morning Eagleton and Kort came to Adams to look at the layout. “Every man has his own office,” explained Eagleton; the arrangement was his idea. “The senior engineers would be up near us and the more junior at the far end.”

    “What happens when someone leaves?” asked Kort. “Wouldn’t we have to move a lot of furniture?”

    “No,” said Eagleton, “all cubicles have the same furniture. It doesn’t move. They just move their paraphernalia. Gives them a chance to update their bulletin boards.”

    “Looks good,” said Kort. He put his hand on Adams’s shoulder. “What do you think, George?”

    Adams knew full well his opinion meant nothing, but that did not deter him. “Twelve cubicles in a line is OK. Every morning a guy can come up the aisle with a wagon and pitch a forkful of hay into each one.”

    Silence ensued. Eagleton glared at Adams. Kort slumped into a sad smile; finally he said, “Hmm, let’s see that last layout again.”

© Richard R. Gilbert    September 2011

A Logical Theological Theory

At first,

Sun revolving about earth

was sensible and

seemed right.

It was simple.

Comfortable with that,

we believed

and called it True.

Then along comes

merciless Math.

With earth revolving about sun

not needing Math so complex,

we choose the new simpler.

Now more comfortable with this,

we believe

and call it True.

Survival instinct,

so powerful

it breaks

the bounds of Reason,

proclaims Eternal Life.

More comfortable with this,

most believe

and call it True.

Will we witness

an Afterlife?

If yes, we will find joy in Heaven.

(Hell is for enemies.)

If no afterlife, we will be released.

In either case,

we will not be

disappointed.

© Richard Gilbert 2011

Seeing and Believing

A young woman stands

on a balcony

to watch her husband

sail far off to sea.

The two-masted ship

let's two pennants waft,

white atop foremast,

red, the same height aft.

They wave last goodbyes,

her husband and she,

as the ship sets sail

on a glassy sea.

It will take some time

from balcony's height

for the large vessel

to sail out of sight.

So the wife sits down

in a rocking chair,

yet makes no motion,

just watches with care.

As the ship grows small,

the wife sees ahead

the white pennant fall

well below the red.

Now she isn't sure

she sees all the fuss

about theories

of Copernicus.

And she does attend

the great Mother Church

and does honor Her

in her life's truth search.

And she knows full well

the Church is quite clear:

the good earth is flat

and can't be a sphere.

So quietly keeps

what she clearly saw

to her self alone,

yet does feel in awe.

For she did witness

in the time she sat,

the earth, plain to see,

is really not flat.

Mr. President, It's Not Your Fault

In the climactic scene of the movie, “Good Will Hunting,” the psychiatrist talks to his patient about what happened to him in his childhood. Ten times he says, “It’s not your fault,” before the patient tearfully accepts absolution.

Regarding the economy, Mr. President, listen to me, sir. Listen. It’s not your fault… it’s not your fault. The state of the economy is due to four factors, only loosely related causally: one, globalization; two, oil prices; three, an unrestrained Wall Street; and four, speculative housing.

1. Globalization began decades before you took office with GATT starting in 1947 and WTO in 1995. It has resulted in high unemployment in the US and Europe. Actually, more people are employed now than in 1995, but they are in China and India. The employment picture in the West will improve when the average worker in China is making wages acceptable to the American worker. This may take a while, certainly more than two years, probably more than six. There’s little you can do about it, and in any case, Mr. President, it’s not your fault.

2. When oil prices go up, gasoline prices go up and people have less money to spend on other goods and services. Buying goes down, so production goes down, making employment go down, which reduces spending money, thus further lowering buying, and the vicious cycle is underway. And, of course, with lower employment comes a reduction in tax revenues. High oil prices by themselves are enough to cause and sustain a recession. By the way, where does the extra money we pay for gasoline go? Is it becoming more expensive to drill for oil or is someone getting richer while we get poorer? Check out Dubai. So far, Mr. President, no one has blamed you for high oil prices. Mr. President, it’s not your fault.

3. The problems with Wall Street began under the reign of George I and the lack of necessary restraints went unaddressed by both Mr. Clinton and George II. You did what you could about it; you continued TARP and the bailouts initiated by George II and instituted new regulations. Mr. President, it’s not your fault.

4. The housing situation is little more than a new version of “tulipomania” exacerbated by Wall Street selling packaged mortgages. With obstructionist elements in Congress, you have done as much as could be done. Again, Mr. President, it’s not your fault.

The mid-term elections are, of course, disappointing for you and some have said the results are an indictment of your policies. No, there is nothing in what you did that inhibited a recovery from this recession. Your opposition has complained about the high rate of deficit spending, but the overwhelming consensus of economists is that this spending is exactly the correct course in a recession. The fact is, people vote with their wallets and when the economy is in poor shape, they vote the incumbents out, no matter who they might be. Ask Britons to name the greatest Briton of all time, and most answer “Winston Churchill.” He is regarded as their savior. Yet right after WWII, economies everywhere tanked, as they invariably do after war, and the Brits actually voted him out of office. Our 2010 election results are no more than the same kind of unavoidable, knee-jerk reaction by a disgruntled public, and there is nothing you could have done about it. You may feel you’ve taken, as you say, a shellacking; but Mr. President, it’s not your fault. It’s not your fault.

Remembering Professor Stuart

Milton Caleb Stuart was Chairman Emeritus of Lehigh University’s Mechanical Engineering Department and a recognized authority in his field, having authored textbooks on thermodynamics and steam power plants. Silver-haired, he always wore a suit and tie in class. He seemed to like his students, and the feeling was pretty much mutual. I liked his class and certainly didn’t need a reminder to do the homework, or so I thought.

When one of us raised a question, his answer was often unpredictable but salient. On the last day before graduation, someone asked, “Professor Stuart, how do you think we should go about getting our first job as a graduate engineer.”

“Decide where you want to live, go there and look for work.” At the time, that seemed like useless advice. Years later we would realize the man had a point.

Professor Stuart was opposed to our memorizing material. Rather, he wanted us to learn the fundamentals and work from that knowledge. One day, to illustrate this, he drew a large “X” on the blackboard. “Name a cycle.” We all knew what was coming; he would draw a cycle diagram in an unusual way to illustrate that we didn’t need to memorize thermodynamic cycles if we could just think our way through them.

“Stirling,” someone said. Quiet chuckling followed; the Stirling cycle, not in general use, was the most obscure one we knew. The quiet laughter spread as one by one, we realized the game was on. We would make this as difficult as we could.

“Give me a property.”

“Entropy,” came a quick reply. The laughter grew; entropy was a bit of a nebulous concept to us.

“Now another.”

After a moment of silence, someone said, “Specific volume.” Gleeful guffaws broke out. It was a silly idea; a useless graph would result, and it wouldn’t be easy to think it through.

“What polarity would you like for the axes?”

“Both positive down,” one of us said. There was more laughter. No mercy. Now our professor would have to create an unprecedented diagram, and draw it upside down. To our amazement, he did so without hesitation. As he went through the various parts of the cycle, he explained why lines went in the direction they did and why they were curved the way they were. By the time he had finished, our laughter had given way to sober awe. He certainly did make a convincing demonstration.

Professor Stuart conducted class much as a showman. He would ask a question and then call a student, by his last name, to answer. If the good professor didn't like the answer, he would simply say, "No, no," and call another name. When getting a good answer, he would say, "Stand up." When the student rose, Professor Stuart would go to him and shake his hand. He would then make his way back to the head of the class and discuss the question. Such was the routine. He was always down to earth. In one case, while discussing boilers, he asked, “Mr. Abbott, how big is a boiler?”

“It depends…” began Abbott.

“No, no,” said Professor Stuart. “Mr. Jamison, how big is a boiler?”

“Well it does depend …” Jamison protested.

“No, no, it doesn’t ‘depend,’ it doesn’t ‘depend,’ ” growled the professor, treating the word “depend” contemptuously. Well, of course the size of a boiler does depend; it depends on the rate at which it raises water to steam and to what temperature, but our instructor obviously wasn't satisfied with that. He then called on John Redmond, who looked too big and muscular to be very bright, but probably was as smart as most of us. "Mr. Redmond, how big is a boiler?"

Redmond knew full well the size of a boiler depended on it's rating, but with that answer having just been twice rejected, he raised his voice in desperation and simply said, "Pretty damn big."

"Of course," said Professor Stuart, "stand up." The handshake ensued. "You people have been on field trips to three different power plants. You didn't notice that? Boilers are pretty damn big." None of us would ever forget how big a boiler is.

My roommate and I shared a small room in a private house that also housed eight other students. He and I were compatible. In fact, for most evenings for three years, we sat facing each other across a small worktable doing our homework and never had a significant disagreement. We pretty much thought alike. Both car guys, we preferred sports cars to Detroit iron. He was more aggressive; I more laid back. He had a 600cc Triumph motorcycle; I made it through college without wheels. Had we been old enough for the Air Corp in WWII, he might have made a great P-51 pilot. I would have wanted that, but more likely would have been stuck as a navigator in a B-17. He was raised Catholic and I Methodist, but neither of us was superstitious. He had a crewcut, so we called him "Curly." I went with conventional combed hair. Most of us in the house had gotten in the habit of calling one another by our last name spelled backwards, so I was "Treblig." We sat side by side near the front of Professor Stuart's basic thermodynamics class.

Now we are approaching “thermo” with a mutual friend, Dan, who asks, "So you guys know all there is to know about enthalpy?"

"What is it?" I ask.

"Enthalpy."

"Enthalpy? What's that?"

"Apparently you have not done your homework," drawls Dan.

"Oh my god, I completely forgot." It’s not like me to forget an assignment. I might gloss over one or simply decide not to do it, but forget to do it? No. And I would never give short shrift to an assignment from Professor Stuart. "What page is it on?"

Dan turns to his bookmark. "Fifty seven."

In desperation, I quickly turn to the page in my book and scan the few pages in the section. It's all text except for a single equation: h = e + pv. I know what e, p and v are and so h must be enthalpy. Now time has run out, we are entering the classroom, so I quickly close the book. I had spent no more than five seconds preparing for class.

Professor Stuart starts the class by asking, "What is enthalpy?"

Don't call on me; all I know is that one equation. Well, the odds are in my favor; I'm just one of about twenty in the class.

"Mr. Zimmerman."

C’mon Big Z, you know it.

"Enthalpy is a measure of the total energy in a gas."

"No, no." Then after a pause, " Mr. Ellison."

OK, Ellison, give him what he’s looking for.

" It's the amount of useable energy in a gas."

"No, no". He looks over in my direction. "Mr. Gilbert."

Damn, so much for the favorable odds. Maybe he saw me trying to look invisible. All I can do is recite the equation. Well, here goes, "Enthalpy is the sum of internal energy and the product of pressure and specific volume."

"Of course. Exactly right. Stand up." Professor Stuart comes over to me and we shake hands. He turns and goes back to the front of the class and I sit down. "Didn't you people read the assignment?"

I sneak a look at Curly, expecting something like a sad smile and a slow shake of the head. Instead he gives me a theatrical icy stare, heavy eyelids, the whole bit: pure, cold hatred. Curly could have made it big in Hollywood. I'm so surprised by that face that I almost burst out laughing.

After class, Curly and Dan walk away. I catch up with them. They're quiet. I'm feeling good. I break the silence with "Enthalpy… no big deal."

"Shut up," says Curly.

"Shut up," echoes Dan. It's their way of congratulating me. Then I remember the look on Curly’s face and start laughing.

Back at the house, I make a homework schedule and tape it to the wall next to my side of our worktable. I rarely need it, which is to say, of course, I do need it.

Richard R. Gilbert © 2010