Eve Garden
World Lit
Bump
4/14/04
Eve in the Garden
Eve was beginning to get very tired.1 Her textbooks were boring and barely any pictures graced the pages. The few that did exist were mainly diagrams and figures, not real pictures with color and exciting adventures. Eve wished she could go on an exciting adventure one day. She hoped it would be an adventure so fabulous that people would wish to write about if for years to come.
“Oh dear,” she thought, “I mustn’t let my thoughts run away with themselves.” There were tons of quantum homework to finish and she barely understood how an electron could be both a wave and a particle…
* * * * *
…Eve sat up. She rubbed her eyes and looked up at her clock; the digital numbers seemed a bit blurry.2 Rummaging through her drawer she found her pocket watch; upon opening it, she discovered the hands were dead. In exasperation, she drew the curtains and peered out at the tower…. 9:27 am.
Oh no! She was going to be late! Bump would be furious! Eve scrambled to get dressed. Soon enough she was flying across campus in her heels. As she threw open the door of Parlin 104 she saw that the lights were on and no one was there! What could this mean? What kind of strange nightmare was this? A small sigh escaped her lips. Where was her class?
Ah! What if they had taken an excursion outside of the room? The small architecture garden! Oh, but what if she couldn’t get there? Slowly her feet turned towards the garden and she was on her way. Eve had hardly moved her feet when she saw the gates of the garden. Oh they seemed so small! How could she ever get inside? Tears flowed down her cheeks. The beautiful garden! Could her class possibly be in there?
Her tears began to roll down her cheeks in great, fat drops and accumulate at her feet.3 As the tears began to flow like a river around her she noticed that the gates had either grown larger, or she had gotten smaller.4 The world around her began to swirl and the current of water which swelled around her carried her off.5
“Dear me!” Eve thought out loud, “I hope this will end up where my class is. Wherever that might be!” In the flow, she met a turtle.
“Excuse me, Mr. Turtle6, why do have such dark glasses?” Silence.
“Excuse me, but Mr. Turtle, are you going to answer me?”
“P…Please, d..d…don’t t-t-talk s-so f-f-f-ast…” he managed to stammer out before Eve interrupted again.
“Oh! I’m dreadfully sorry. I hope I haven’t offended you much. I get so chatty sometimes. Let’s see, the last time I… Oh, dear me, there I go again.”
“Q-q-quite a-alright, you k-k-know. Life d-d-doesn’t ha-have to g-go s-s-so f-f-f-fast. I l-like h-how sl-slow it is f-f-for me.”
“Mustn’t it be dreadfully boring after a while, always waiting around for something to happen?” Eve inquired.
“Oh. N-no. You s-s-see. I n-n-never g-get-t b-bored-d b-b-because th-things j-just go at my p-pace, in m-my f-frame.”
“Oh. I see” Eve grew silent. She didn’t quite understand. He must wait around for things to happen. The passage of time was constant, or was that the interval? Oh darn physics! She never seemed to get it quite right. Looking up from her puzzlement she realized that her rivers of tears had splashed her into the turtle pond and her shoes were getting very wet, and quickly.7
She jumped up. “Dearie me! Whatever shall I do!?” Quickly, she climbed out of the pond; she had just realized that standing up had only gotten her shoes more soaked.
“However will I dry myself off?” She looked around for the turtle she had met, but realized that he talked too slow. If he did have an idea, she’d already be dry by the time he got around to explaining what it was in the first place. She’d just have to find some sort of hot air. Across the small patch of grass, she saw it, an air vent!
As she started over to the vent, she closed her eyes and began rehearsing her lessons:
“Freedom, which, though belated, cast at length
Her eyes upon the sluggard, when my beard
‘Gan whither fall beneath the barber’s blade-
Cast eyes, I say, and though long tarrying, came,
Now when, from Galatea’s yoke released,
I serve but Amaryllis: for I will own,
While Galatea reigned over me, I had
No hope of freedom, and no thought to save.
Though many victim from my folds went forth,
Or rich cheese pressed for the unthankful town,
Never with laden hands returned I home.”8
She sighed. Eve was debating which would be the next lesson to move on to when she realized that she was now completely dry. “What short time it takes to become dry!” Eve thought to herself. “Now where was I…” Eve carefully pondered….9
* * * * *
Eve didn’t have much time to ponder because as she started down the road, two figures came nearer to her, or was she approaching them? What frame was the initial frame? She never could remember. Suddenly, Eve tripped and tumbled down the hill. Head over heels she rolled and bounced all the way. When she finally stopped, she was lying at the feet of a unicorn and a lion. Brushing the hair out of her eyes, Eve got up enough courage to ask their names.10
“Whoever might you two be?” Eve asked timidly.
“Whatever is this little one saying,” the lion enquired of the unicorn.
“Wherever is this little one is really what we should be asking. Where did she come from? How fast is she currently going? What is her wavelength? What is her momentum?” the unicorn demanded.
“We can clearly see she isn’t oscillating,” retorted the lion. “What is she, a simple harmonic oscillator?” *
The unicorn turned to Eve and asked, “Little one, what is your mass energy?”
Eve was stumped and decided to respond with a girlish comment: “How dare you ask my weight!” The unicorn was taken back.
“Dear child, do you mean to inform me that you don’t know of Einstein’s great equation of mass energy? What are they teaching in schools these days?”11
“Am I supposed to?” Eve questioned.
“How are you to pass quantum physics without it?” the unicorn responded questioningly.
“I’m uncertain!” Eve hoped that this would appease the unicorn. Although they are supposed to be imaginary animals, you never can tell what one will do.
“My dear young lass, we all have uncertainties about ourselves,” the unicorn responded gently.
“I have no uncertainty!” boasted the lion. “Classically is the way to go.”
“NO, NEVER! ‘God does play dice with the universe. All the evidence points to him being an inveterate gambler, who throws the dice on every possible occasion,’”12 the unicorn growled back.
As these two began to debate the finer points of the situation, Eve attempted to rise to her feet. In the process, she tripped over a small container and spilled its contents. Fog lifted off the ground and everything under Eve’s feet became crunchy.
“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!” the lion roared. “My precious liquid nitrogen! My superconductors!”
“YOUR superconductors? I think not,” whinnied the unicorn.
Everything faded in Eve’s ears, the mist continued to rise…
* * * * *
…Suddenly before her, Eve saw a large stream. The water was lazily wandering around a large mushroom. On top of the mushroom was a snake smoking from a large hookah. “So that is where all this smoke came from!” Eve thought.
“Excuse me, dear Snake, sir?”
The snake took another smoke from the hookah and slowly stretched his neck out.
“Who are you?” 13 slipped out of the snake’s mouth before Eve could go on.
“My name is Eve, sir,” she responded quickly. But before she could go on, the snake interrupted her again.
“Yes-s-s-s-s. Little girl?”
“If you wouldn’t mind, could you tell me where my class might be?”
“Your classssss?”
“Yes sir. It’s a small group of thirteen people. They would be talking about grandiose things such as architecture or Alice in Wonderland.”
“Can’t sssay I’ve sssseeen any one matching that dessscription”
“No, sir snake, I said a group of people”
“Yesssss. But can’t a group be one as well?”
Eve pondered this for a bit. “Well, if an electron can be both a wave and a particle, I guess my class could be several individuals as well as just one. But, then does that mean the entire class is me?” Eve wondered, and as she wondered, she paced…
* * * * *
“Oh! I’ve got it! I’ve got it!” Eve exclaimed as she looked up.
“Where am I? Sir snake? Sir Snake?! Oh Dearie me where have I gotten to?” Her quest for her class had taken her far, far from the center of campus. She wasn’t so sure she was in Texas anymore.
“I’m
late! I’m late!” Whipping around the corner, a small, white squirrel in a top
hat and coat scurried by. “Mary Ann, I think I’ve told you a thousand times,
never leave home. Now please, get me a pair of white gloves and a fan.”
“Squirrel, Sir Squirrel, I don’t think we’ve met before, and my name isn’t Mary Ann!” Eve shouted out as the squirrel ran out of sight. Well, I guess I have no choice but to follow him, she thought….14
* * * * *
Insert Lost Episode
* * * * *
…As she followed the squirrel, she came upon a large building. Looks pretty modern to me, Eve thought. I’ll just go up and open the door. Maybe see what is inside.
As she touched the handle, she looked up through the door…
* * * * *
Travis had one hand on her shoulder and was shaking her. 15
“Eve! Wake up! You’ll never pass your quantum test if you can’t even stay awake!”
Eve sleepily rubbed her eyes and looked up. She was sitting on her bed and Travis had come into her room to check on her studying efforts.
“OH! WAIT! I’m late for class!” Eve jumped off her bed, hitting her head on the top bunk in the process and nearly tipping over Travis. Travis caught her.
“Calm down, calm down, its only 11:45 pm. It’s Wednesday evening, You’re studying for quantum physics….Remember?”
“Oh, so was it all a dream?”
“No, you still have a physics test tomorrow, “ Travis said with a chuckle.
“Oh, never mind, just got a bit distracted,” Eve half-smiled. Maybe its best to keep one’s dream to one’s self.
Word Count: 1896 + 514 = 2410
Annotated Eve:
- Annotated Alice: Alice in Wonderland, 11
- Reference to Waking Life. This is a movie which deals with the difference between waking life and dream life. It is said that while one is dreaming, you cannot read small print and digital clocks become unreadable. My quote is just a reference, not an actual quote. It implies that everything that is happening to Eve is just a dream.
- Annotated Alice: Alice in Wonderland, 21
- Annotated Alice: Alice in Wonderland, 24
- Annotated Alice: Alice in Wonderland, 25
- Annotated Alice: Alice in Wonderland, 26
- Spacetime Physics, Taylor and Wheeler, 10
- Bump - XA 244A
- Annotated Alice: Alice in Wonderland, 30
- Annotated Alice: Through the Looking Glass, 228
- C. S. Lewis, Chronicles of Narnia, the old professor says this in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
- Stephen Hawking, I copied it from the powerpoint presentation of my physics professor one day in class
- Annotated Alice: Alice in Wonderland, 47
- Annotated Alice: Alice in Wonderland, 37
- Annotated Alice: Through the Looking Glass, 267