[Previously: Part 1.]
Deborah arrived two minutes before the scheduled meeting.
Morrow's office door contained a small window and she could see him at his desk, peering at his computer monitor, obviously absorbed by a profound scientific question.
She stepped back from the office door and moved a few steps down the corridor to avoid interrupting the busy lecturer before their scheduled meeting time. She waited until precisely 11am, then stepped forward again, careful to not look through the small window, and knocked on the door.
There was an instant cry from inside. It could have been a yelp. It was hard to say exactly what it was, once you discounted what it most sounded like, which was extreme profanity.
Deborah involuntarily jumped back from the door.
Now what should she do? Should she open the door? Should she wait for Morrow to come and open if for her? Was it presumptuous of her to expect him to get up and walk over to his office door? Or would it be presumptuous of her to barge in?
If he wanted her to come in she assumed he would say something. He certainly had no trouble being audible.
He said nothing. This could only mean that he expected her to come in. Or, given the large number of seconds that had now passed, that he hoped she would go away.
She knocked again.
“Come in!” he yelled, meaning, “What the hell have you been waiting for?”
Deborah, zapped by the force of his voice, opened the door and propelled herself into the office in one flustered burst of motion, then stood frozen on the other side.
“Sit down! Sit down!” Morrow waved at a small table with two chairs in the centre of the room. He had got up from his desk and was already moving to sit on one of the chairs.
Deborah carefully sat on the other.
Morrow stared at her. He looked more confused about how any of this worked than she was.
She thought it would help if he knew who she was, so she said, “I'm Deborah.” It might also help to tell him who he was. “You're my tutor.”
It was unclear whether he was offended that she had assumed he did not know these two things that he certainly should have known, or whether he was thankful for being given, at this bewildering moment in the long and rambling stage play of his life, a helpful prompt. Maybe the second, since, after a few more moments of blank staring, he seemed to remember his next line.
“I'm Dr. Morrow. Nice to meet you! So, uh, tell me, what are you studying?”
Now it was her turn to try out the blank stare. “Physics,” she said. She hoped her stare remained merely blank while she wrestled down and suppressed the words, “Just like all your other tutorial students.”
He recovered well. He gave a good imitation of a light laugh, and said, “Well then. You're in the right place.”
She returned the light laugh. “That's good to know.”
He smiled, slightly, but said nothing more. He appeared to be struggling again with his script.
She had read an account once of two extremely famous physicists, who had each admired the other's work for many years, but were both so painfully shy that when they finally met all they did was sit across a desk and stare at each other for over an hour. So she decided to just concentrate on sitting quietly, and wait him out.
Eventually he came up with something to say. “What made you decide on physics? Are you more interested in research or industry?”
“Oh, research, definitely.”
“What area of research?”
Ok, this was going great now, wasn't it? Deborah ran with it.
“I don't know! There are so many interesting and important questions, aren't there? Is there still a chance to find a grand unified theory with string theory? Or is there some other way to reconcile quantum mechanics and general relativity? What are dark matter and dark energy? Or, more practically, the problem of room-temperature superconductivity. Or viable nuclear fusion. I would love to solve any of those problems.”
Morrow raised an eyebrow. “And you think you could solve one of those problems?”
“Why not? Isn't that what a physicist does?”
Morrow sat up straighter. This attitude did not seem to have ever occurred to him. “And how will you do that?”
“I don't know yet. That's what I'm going to learn here, isn't it?”
Morrow's eyes bulged. “You think so?” His voice transmitted cynicism and bitterness with such direct intensity that it was as if his brain had been connected to hers' with jumper cables. With each word the intensity jolted up a level. “Here? At this university? From these academics?”
Deborah clung desperately to what she thought were facts. “This is one of the top ten physics programmes in the country.”
That only turned Morrow even more sour. His face twisted into a nasty sneer. “Yes. Yes it is. The academics here are well above average. They write lots of papers and win lots of grants and regularly delight the university by concocting hit press releases. But how much truly impressive work do you think they have done?”
Deborah did not know. She braced herself for a disappointingly low estimate.
“I'll tell you how much truly impressive work. None. Not a single calculation or observation or measurement or result worthy of any of our favourite buzzwords. Not innovative. Not transformative. Not paradigm-shifting or seminal or direction-changing. No-one can even honestly claim to have done just one of the things they bragged they would do when they convinced the department to hire them. They say they have – they honk on about their achievements all the time – but they haven't. All they do is waste their meagre talents on meetings and committees and bureaucracy, and classes and exams and marking, and being stressed and over-worked and bitter and miserable, and the only good thing about all the pointless work and stress is that it stops anyone from having any time to face up to the fact that their lives have been a complete waste. So, no, I don't think these clowns are going to teach you how to make a breakthrough discovery.”
At the conclusion of this outburst Morrow fell back in his chair. He looked surprised at what he had just done, as if he had been possessed by an evil demon, and wasn't entirely aware of what the malicious spirit had compelled him to say.
Deborah was in shock. It could only have been worse if she had walked in on him in the throes of snorting cocaine, or performing intercourse with a farm animal. But not much worse.
Now he just looked sheepish and uncomfortable. Or maybe that was how she hoped he looked.
The only thing she could think to do was leave. She somehow managed to stand up. “Should we try this another time?”
“Yes, I think that would be a good idea.”
“Send me an email?”
“Ok.”
Then she left.
Do you dare to find out what happens next? Here’s Part 3…
I'm glad not to have Morrow as my tutor, poor
Deborah !