The Awakening

A remarkable discovery has unforseen consequences,

Dr. Bolster was nervous, because in a few minutes he would address prominent scientists from all over the world For the past two years Dr. John Bolster and his research team had been conducting experiments using the Superconductor Particle Accelerator, or SPA for short, built in the Arizona desert. They were searching for the ultimate building blocks of matter, but what they found was totally unexpected.

 on his findings. Physicists, mathematicians, astronomers and cosmologists had all come to Arizona, hoping Dr. Bolster's results would shed light on their questions concerning the universe. They were seated in the auditorium, as excited and anxious as children on Christmas Eve.

     Backstage, in a small waiting room, John Bolster was

pacing. He stopped to adjust his tie in a small mirror on the wall, and saw a tired pair of blue eyes staring back at him.

The furrows in his forehead had deepened from the stress of the past few months, and his skin had the pallor typical of artists and musicians who rarely see the sunshine.

     John ran a hand through his thinning brown hair, and was Surprised at the amount of grey, especially at the temples. He suddenly felt older than his forty years, and promised he would take better care of himself when this was all over. Some exercise, some sun and a better diet, partly for himself and partly for his wife Leanne, whom he had neglected terribly over the past two years. His research had become obsessive and he marveled at her patience.

     John felt a sharp pang of guilt as he recalled

the cocktail parties his wife had asked him to attend over the past two years the few times he was home at a decent hour, and how he had balked and argued about going to them.

     Leanne taught American Literature at a local college, but to John nothing was worse than a gathering of English professors, rambling on about the symbolism of Faulkner and this poem versus that poem, as if it really mattered. He would always end up going, but would eventually find a quiet corner and try to look as inconspicuous as possible. Invariably some owl-face would find him and ask what he did.

John would reply, "Oh, I work at the local SPA."

     The intruder would quickly find a way to excuse himself, not quite managing to hide a look of derision. That left John alone with his thoughts, which were infinitely more important to him than Faulkner or Fitzgerald.

     "Leanne," he thought. "I'll definitely spend more time with you in the coming year, a lot more time. After tonight I'll probably be out of a job."

     John stepped away from the mirror and resumed pacing. He reflected on the discoveries that matter was made of molecules, which were made of atoms, which were made of electrons, neutrons and protons, which, excluding electrons, were made of quarks. Boxes within boxes within boxes. A hierarchy of infinite regression.

     Were quarks made of even smaller particles? That was

the question he had been trying to answer using the new SPA. For two years he and his associates had been smashing protons and antiprotons together at enormous energies, trying to find from the spray of particle debris if quarks had a substructure.

     "John, try to relax. Take a deep breath," said Dr. Poonam Singh, who had been sitting quietly in the waiting room, watching John cross and re-cross the room.

     Singh had left the University of Bombay to work with Dr. Bolster. He was ten years older than John, small in stature and very slender. His white hair provided a stark contrast to his brown skin and black, sparkling eyes. He was a brilliant mathematician, which is why Bolster had implored him to join the research team. As time passed and stresses mounted  Singh's soft-spoken manner and sense of humor became as important to John as his mathematical expertise.

     The two men shared a childlike curiosity about the

universe and an insatiable desire to find out how it all

worked. They had become as close as brothers during the two years they worked together.

     "What? Oh, sorry Poon. You're right, I'm too tense. I just don't know how I'm going to tell these people what we found. It's just too...unbelievable. I'm going to feel like a fool," replied Bolster, finally sitting down beside his good friend.

     "Many people didn't believe Copernicus, Kepler or even Einstein," replied Singh is his soft sing-song voice. "Truth is truth, no matter how foolish it appears to be at the time."

     Good old Singh. This wasn't the first time he had calmed and reassured Bolster. John smiled, and put a hand on Singh's shoulder. "Thanks, Poon. What would I do without you?"

     What would John do indeed? It was Poonam Singh who

finally made some sense of their experiments.

     "Dr. Bolster," said a voice from the doorway of their backstage room, "You're almost on. Come this way, please."

     "Good luck, my good friend," said a beaming Singh,

shaking Bolster's hand. "I'll be watching and listening close  by."

     John Bolster followed a man along a dim corridor to the side entrance leading onto the auditorium stage. He stopped and waited as he heard himself being introduced. He realized he was shaking, and his mouth felt so dry.

     "...  and now, the head of the research team, Dr. John

Bolster."

     Applause rolled up onto the stage.

     John swallowed, inhaled and exhaled deeply, and walked towards the podium.

     "Ladies and gentlemen, fellow scientists. I know many of you have come a long way to hear the results of our research at the SPA. In a nutshell, we have determined that quarks do indeed have a substructure."

     The audience erupted with applause, cheering and excited conversation. "Yes, yes! I knew it!" stood out above the din.

     The joyful outburst came from Radoslav Jankowski, the theoretical physicist who had predicted quarks were made of even smaller particles. There were smiles and chuckles at his enthusiastic response.

     Now came the hard part. Bolster began perspiring, and not just because of the lights. He knew his reputation and credibility as a scientist were on the line.

     He began, somewhat hesitantly. "At first, we didn't know what we had, so we redid the experiment. Several times, in fact. We kept getting the same results. Quarks didn't seem to be made of smaller particles, but rather some sort of massless....energy."

     Then came the anticipated question, the same one he had asked in the lab.

     "If the substructure is massless, then what gives quarks their mass?" inquired someone in the audience.

     John replied, "I know, it seems senseless. But it's an energy unlike anything we've ever seen. In fact, maybe energy isn't quite the right term.

     We were as stumped as you are right now, until my

associate Dr. Poonam Singh offered some insight. He is not only a renowned mathematician, he is a master of Yoga and Buddhism. He said our results make sense if you picture the quark substructure not as particles or energy, but as a sort of consciousness or...thought. In short, quarks seem to be made of ...ideas."

     Stunned silence slowly gave way to murmuring. Finally, the head of the physics department at Stanford blurted out, "Whose ideas, Bolster. Yours? This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. We're scientists, not some goddamn mystics."

     John could feel his shoulders and stomach tighten. He knew they would react this way. He himself had reacted with anger and frustration while he was trying to come to grips with such a radical theory.

     "Please, I know. I'm going to give you a printed report of all our data. I'm hoping you will find an alternative explanation, but in the meantime, I'm begging you to maintain an open mind."

     Someone near the back shouted, "You mean quarks can

think? They have a... consciousness?"

     "No, we don't mean that. What we are saying is that

quarks are made of thought. This is the only model that fits the data at the present time, but if..."

     The Stanford professor interrupted. "Bolster, if you are telling us that quarks are thoughts, then protons and

neutrons and atoms and the whole bloody universe are one

giant idea. I ask you again, whose idea? Yours? God's,

maybe?"

     The mood of the audience was definitely turning ugly. They sure weren't going to like the statement John knew he now had to make.

     "After much discussion with our capable staff at the

SPA, this is our conclusion. We think quarks, and yes, the whole bloody universe, are a dream."

     "What rubbish!"

     "Utter nonsense!"

     Six months ago those were John's sentiments exactly. He flashed back to that night in the lab when he and his staff were discussing Singh's hypothesis that quarks were made of consciousness. Singh arrived late, and said he had spent several hours that day meditating. He explained that one of the most important ideas of Mahayana Buddhism is that form is emptiness, emptiness is form. The reason they had such difficulty interpreting the results of their particle collisions was that they were looking for "real" particles to comprise quarks, while his Buddhist philosophy regards "real" objects as illusions resulting from our limited mode of awareness. He said that enlightenment is the realization that all things are transient, virtual states and are part of an unbroken wholeness.

     During his meditation, he said he experienced enlightenment, and the results of their research became clear to him. Quarks were being dreamed.

     John argued with him until the small hours, long after the others had gone. In the end, as much as he hated it, John began to succumb to Singh's hypothesis, for he could find no flaw in Singh's arguments and had to agree it fitted their data. It still took several days of soul searching before he felt in his heart Poonam was right, because emptiness (the dream) having form (the universe) contradicted everything science had taught him. After sleepless nights and an entire spectrum of emotions, John finally conceded to this astounding revelation.

     Through the auditorium lights John saw several people, including a disappointed Radoslav Jankowski, stand and make for the exits. He was sweating profusely now. Those remaining were chattering and gesturing. Dr. Fred Johnson, John's longtime friend from Princeton, stood up and implored the crowd to quieten down. Then he turned towards the stage and said, "Carry on, John. I for one would like to hear more about your dream hypothesis."

     Several pairs of eyes turned downwards in the dark. It became very, very quiet.

     John, feeling a little better, began speaking.

     "Look, I know it sounds crazy, but our research points to a dream as the ultimate building block of matter. A lot of events in our lives make sense in that context.

     For example, you've all had dreams in which the most ridiculous and implausible events are happening, but while you're dreaming they seem to be perfectly natural. It's not till you wake up that the events in the dream seem funny.

     In our society someone walks into a restaurant or a university and shoots several people, or people fight and kill each other over some petty disagreement, or a brick is thrown off a building and hits an innocent passerby, or people willingly inject harmful drugs that disrupt their central nervous systems. Rape, incest, torture...I could go on and on, but do these events sound rational? I mean, if we are a smart and reasoning species, would we knowingly do these bizarre things?

     In a dream, these are perfectly normal events. We all accept them as part of living in this society."

     Dr. Johnson spoke again. "I see what you're saying. Aberrations in our society can be thought of as arising from the dream state. Yes, that would explain a lot. Ghosts, UFO's, ESP, the Bermuda Triangle..."

     John smiled, for he knew Fred was teasing him and providing some comic relief to relax him and his audience.

     "Excuse me, Dr. Bolster. My name is Kenichi Takahara from Tokyo. This just occurred to me. If what you say is true, then who is doing the dreaming?  Is it you...or me...or some alien on another planet?"

     John recognized the question. Poonam Singh brought up that very point five months ago. Between them they arrived at this conclusion.

     "No, we don't think any one of us is doing the dreaming, nor is an alien somewhere. Dr. Singh pointed out to me that the characters in a dream disappear when the dreamer wakes up. Therefore, if any one of us was dreaming it, the world would disappear when we awoke. If the universe is a dream, and we obviously are a part of the universe, then we ourselves are just characters in the dream. The same applies to aliens. Anyone or anything that exists is part of the dream, and cannot be the dreamer."

     Dr. Krutov from the Soviet Union posed the next question.

 "Dr. Bolster, who then is the dreamer? Where is he...or it?"

     "It must be someone...or some...thing that lies outside of the universe. Is it God? Some creature in a parallel universe? I don't think we'll ever know."

     A tall gentleman near the front stood up. John couldn't make out who it was. His deep voice resounded through the auditorium.

     "Dr. Bolster! Your speculations are getting more

outlandish by the minute. I don't believe a bit of what

you've said here tonight, but I stayed out of curiosity. I've got only one question. Do you agree our universe is immense, with a diameter of several billion light years?"

     "Yes, I agree with that statement," replied John, not sure where this was leading.

     "Well, then, what size would your dreamer have to be to fit all this in his damn head?"

     The questioner made a sweeping gesture to accompany his question, and was smirking triumphantly in the darkness of the auditorium.

     John replied calmly, "Sir, do you agree it's possible to dream of a large meadow, or an ocean stretching from horizon to horizon?"

     "Yeah, I guess so," came the cautious reply.

     John continued. "But when you wake up, this vast

landscape vanishes. An immense world created in your mind, but it fitted within your head. A dream can be of infinite size, but it still fits."

     "D****t, we're talking about reality here. This universe has real size."

     "But a dream has it's own reality. Dreams seem real,

don't they? Settings in a dream have real size also, at least while you're still dreaming."

     The questioner, with obvious hostility in his voice, shouted back, "But the universe is thirteen billion years old. Who the hell can sleep that long?"

     John had a reply. These were all questions he and Poonam had asked a thousand times.

     "Sometimes a dream seems to last for hours, or longer. Really it takes only a very few minutes. Time is distorted in a dream state, so what seems to us to be a very long time, like the age of the universe, may only be a few minutes in the mind of the dreamer."

     "Yeah, right! Pure speculation, with no proof..."

     John was getting exasperated. "But the proof is in our data! Once you examine it you'll see that..."

     The questioner wasn't listening. He was walking up the aisle, and others were following his lead. Only a handful of scientists remained.

     John felt dazed. It had gone terribly. His reputation as a meticulous, conservative researcher was shot. He felt so tired, so...alone. Did Copernicus, or the scores of others throughout history who dared upset the scientific beliefs of their time feel like this? Poor wretches! He just wanted to get out of there.

     "Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming...and staying. We'll be sending you copies of our data, and hopefully...uh...you'll see...that..."

     His voice trailed off. John turned and walked off the stage. A polite smattering of applause followed him.

     He straggled into the waiting room backstage, sat down heavily, leaned back and closed his eyes. He felt exhausted and depressed. He heard the door open and someone enter.

     "John, my good friend. How are you feeling?"

     John opened his eyes and saw Singh smiling sympathetically.

     "Hi, Poon. I knew it would be rough, but not this bad. I feel lousy. Maybe we made a mistake somewhere. Maybe we should recheck all our observations."

     "John," said Singh in his quiet lilting voice, "You know we are right. It's just going to take them some time to get used to our ideas."

     "Maybe I'm the one who's dreaming, Poon. Maybe I'll wake up and find this whole mess is just a bad nightmare. I mean, these are scientists, right? They're supposed to have open minds. I can see them being skeptical at first, but they were completely closed. Any new idea that shakes up their cozy, conservative view of things they reject right away. I'm afraid even when they see our data they're still going to reject it as nonsense because of their own stupid, blind prejudices."

     John pounded a fist against his knee. It was all so

frustrating, so futile.

     There was a knock on the door. Singh put his hand on

John's shoulder and gave a reassuring squeeze. He felt so

badly for his friend. Then he walked over to the door and

opened it.

     A young man in his mid-twenties stood there, and behind him, in the dim corridor, Singh could see a figure hunched in a wheelchair.

     "Uh...excuse me, sir. My name is Jerry Profit. I'm a graduate student of Dr. Hawking at Cambridge. Dr. Hawking would like to talk to Dr. Bolster. I'm here to act as interpreter."

     John sat upright in his chair. Dr. Hawking? Dr. Stephen Hawking? Here? He couldn't believe it!

     "Come in, please," said Singh, as he moved aside and opened the door wider.

     Jerry wheeled Stephen Hawking into the room, and positioned him across from John. John was in awe of this man. Hawking's frail body was withered by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease, but he had one of the greatest minds on the planet.

     After the two men had been introduced, Hawking apologized for the behavior of their peers. Through Jerry, who could understand his speech slurred by his disease, he said he found Bolster's findings most helpful.

     Hawking said his latest work seemed to indicate the universe could not and should not exist. He needed John's results to help confirm his equations, and he thanked John for his courage in facing the scientific community even though he knew his results would cause such controversy and scorn.

     John was delighted and relieved to find someone who believed him, especially it being Stephen Hawking! He was about to ask Hawking about his work when Jerry Profit coughed and raised his hand, like a shy schoolboy.

     "Uh...excuse me, Dr. Bolster," Jerry said apologetically. "Could I ask a question?"

     "Go ahead," replied John.

     "Have you ever been dreaming, and the character in your dream...say it's yourself...is suddenly aware that it's only a dream?"

     "Well, yes... I would say everyone's experienced that at some time."

     "Then what usually happens once you realize you're dreaming? You soon wake up, right?"

     Bolster and Singh looked at one another, then at Hawking. This was a question none of them had considered before.

     Jerry carried on. "Well, if your dream theory is correct, and it supports Dr. Hawking's idea that the universe is an illusion and shouldn't exist, and we as characters in the dream are now aware it is only a dream, what happens now?"

     "May I answer him, John?" inquired Singh. "My boy, the Universe has been here a very long time. There is no reason to think..."

     The Dreamer stirred.

     "...that it won't last another..."

     The Dreamer now realized it was all a dream, only a dream.

     "...thirteen billion years or so."

     Jer

ry didn't look convinced. He felt a sudden dread sweep over him. They all felt it.

     The Dreamer began the ascent from subconscious to conscious mind, from dream state to waking state, like a diver rising from the darkened depths to the green light above.

     Stephen Hawking's eyes widened beneath his spectacles. John opened his mouth to speak, or to scream.

     The Dreamer's eyes opened, and the universe winked out of existence.                                   

Reviews

[JayG]

You didn’t request comment, but I thought you would want to know, so…

In this, your profession is betraying you. During your basic education your training in writing was reports and essays, with a tiny fraction of it, fiction. Through college you wrote research papers and such, with perhaps a creative writing course that spent a week or two on fiction. And since that time, on the job it’s reports and other nonfiction applications.

But. In all that time, did anyone spend significant time explaining the difference in structure between a scene on the page and one on screen/stage? Did they define the elements of a scene, and why they end in disaster for the protagonist? If not, how can you write on that the reader will recognize as being one? Reading didn’t give yus the skills of writing fiction, any more than eating makes chefs of us.

The result? As you were trained and practiced, the writing of the story is fact-based and author-centric—the definition of nonfiction methodology. You, the narrator, in a voice devoid of any emotion not suggested by punctuation and a given word, explain and report. It works for you, of course, but you cheat. You know the characters, the location, the situation, the backstory, and the goal of the scene. So as you read, each line calls up images, backstory, and everything needed to make the scene live—all stored in your mind. For the reader, though, , each line calls up images, backstory, and everything needed to make the scene live—all stored in *YOUR* mind.

For example: First, you tell the reader that someone they know nothing about—not even gender, age, or what his PHD is in—is nervous for no reason the reader knows of. That’s a factoid, devoid of context (but not as you read). What can a reader do but say, “Uhh…okay.”?

Then, you tell them his gender, and that for two undefined years that could as easily be 1932 or 2361, he, and an undefined number of others, in some undefined specialty, have been performing undefined experiments in an undefined area of science. We have context for none of that, but we learn that it happened in an undefined area of Arizona? Would the story change had the research taken place in Chicago? If not, why mention that but not things of far more importance to THIS SCENE.

My point? Story happens, and does so in real-time. It’s not explained or talked about, if for no reason other then that the reader hasn't been made to want the data you’re giving them. You’re also placing effect before cause. First they HAVE DONE the research. Then we learn the scientific area of the research, and that they found something unknown. And then, after announcing all that, you leave the poor doctor tapping his toe in impatience backstage, while you ramble on with things irrelevant to the scene, like his relationship with his wife.

In fact, a full 848 words, or three and a half standard manuscript pages, pass before the poor b*****d gets to step on stage and the story actually begins.

The really short version: You’re trying to write fiction using nonfiction writing techniques. It can’t be done.

It’s not your fault, of course. We all leave school believing that the word “writing” that’s part of the profession we call, Fiction-Writing, refers to the skill we were given in school, and use daily. It doesn’t.

Why? Because different goals require different methodology. The goal of nonfiction is to inform, clearly and concisely. The narrator dispassionately explains and reports. History books use nonfiction skills. And who buys history books to read for fun?

Think of yourself reading a horror story. At some point the protagonist is poised to enter a darkened, and spooky, basement. As a reader, do you want the author to tell you that the protagonist feels a shiver of fear? Or do you want that author to make a shiver run down YOUR back? Learn, or feel? The answer is obvious, which is why the techniques of fiction are emotion-based and character centric—a methodology you weren't told exists as your teachers prepared you for the needs of employment.

You’ve heard, I’m sure, the old saying that in a lover’s quarrel there are three versions of the truth: Hers, his, and what really happened. So given those three truths, does it make sense that we, as writers, tell what really happened, in an entertaining and interesting way?

I’ve posed that to groups of hopeful writers, and they invariably agree, as a group that, we need to focus on what actually happened. And that belief explains why the rejection rate in the publisher’s office is 99.9% or worse, because nothing could be further than the truth. We choose our protagonist and present their viewpoint. Why? Because every decision they make, and every word they speak is the result of how THEY view the situation. How can we empathize with, or understand someone who is acting on deductions, beliefs, and imperatives we’re unaware of?

Your reader doesn’t want to learn what happened. That’s history, immutable and boring. Your reader wants to literally become the protagonist, and live the scene as that character, so realistically that if someone tosses a rock at the protagonist the reader ducks. And in your school years you literally spent zero time on how to do that.

To see how viewpoint can dramatically change the feel of a given situation, try this article:
https://jaygreenstein.wordpress.com/2011/09/22/the-grumpy-writing-coach-8/

And for why it’s necessary, this one:
https://jaygreenstein.wordpress.com/2015/05/13/inside-out-the-grumpy-writing-coach/

So, I know this is nothing like what you wanted to hear in response to posting the story, but because it is what you need to know… The thing to remember is that since the day you began reading you’ve selected only fiction that’s been created with the professional skills of the fiction-writing profession. You don’t see the skills in action, because, as they say, art conceals art. But you do see, and enjoy, the result of the use of those skills, and expect it—as your reader expects it of you. And that's the best argument I know of for acquiring the skills the pros take for granted.

You can find what you need in the library’s fiction-writing section, but for unknown reasons, the best book on the nuts-and-bolts issues of writing scenes that will sing to your reader is free on the site I link to below this paragraph. It won’t make a pro of you. That’s your job. But it will give the knowledge and tools to do it with, if it’s in you. And it’s the book that resulted in my first sale, after having written six many-times submitted novels. So give it a try. Use the leftmost button to download.
https://ru.b-ok2.org/book/2640776/e749ea

For an overview of some of the issues within that book, you might look at some of the other articles in my WordPress Writing blog.

So jump in. And while you do, hang in there, and keep on writing.

Jay Greenstein
https://jaygreenstein.wordpress.com/category/the-craft-of-writing/the-grumpy-old-writing-coach/

[Greg Gorman]

Hi, Barry. Your story took me back to my science classes in junior high and high school. I wasn't much of a student, but there were some things I was able to retain. If I heard the story right, Galileo recanted his heliocentric theory under the threat of execution for heresy. Here is John Bolster trying to present his findings and he is being mocked and grilled. How did the scientists before him do it. Where did their fortitude come from? Where would Doctor Bolster be without Poonam Singh?
Getting it from people in his own field must have been terrible. In the beginning of the story, he's getting it from literaries. He was trying to be a good husband and escort his wife to a party. A bunch of people who live in fictional worlds all day everyday and they are putting his science down? I'm wondering how much this guy drank at the parties.
In the beginning of the story, you mention the SPA is used. Later, when you talk about the party, he says he works at the SPA. Is the SPA a machine or a place? I was confused about that. I was also confused about the applause and the voice that said, "I knew it!" I thought you were giving a voice to the applause. Maybe mention specifically that he heard a voice. Then again, this could be the way I was reading it.
I was feeling a little embarrassed for Doctor. People are walking out in the middle of his presentation. He is referring to the quarks as dreams? Preposterous! An atom is made of quarks and quarks are made of dreams? I was wondering about our own universe as I was reading. Could this universe, ours or the one you created, be just a dream. I read somewhere our universe could be nothing more than an atom in a giants fingernail. Maybe you or I have a universe in one of our fingernails. Whose? God's? Dr. Bolster is mixing science and religion? Is he going to be run out on a rail? Mentioning God or religion in a scientific theory. Can you get a doctorate revoked?
I remember reading something else about time and how it seems slow to humans but fast to God or gods. What I read dealt with the Creationist Theory. The universe was created in six days. It wasn't done in six days, but in 6,000 years. Time moves so fast for the Creator that it seemed like six days to him.
Speaking of divine intervention, Stephen Hawking comes in and gives legitimacy to this theory. Talk about reviving a defeated scientist. The man may have been considering the theory he had been working on and all of the data and studying to support it. Dr. Hawking came at the right time for Dr. Bolster.
I was wondering as I read this if this was just a dream, but whose? Dr. Bolsters? A giant? Another scientist? Or was it the end of the world?