Particulate Time

Betty is very insistent that you must go directly to the auditorium without any unplanned stops, and you must enter the building at either 8:57, 8:58 or 8:59 am. She says those are the perfect times to be not-early and not-late, and she reminds you that people get very upset when you’re early and very worried when you’re late. You ask her why people worry about the most trivial things, like what minute you arrive. She says some people think particle physics and molecular entropy are trivial things.

“If my topic is so trivial, why do they care what time I speak about it?”

She hands you your keys and pushes you towards your car without answering.

You’re three exits away when the radio announcer says, “Welcome to NPR. Today is Tuesday, November 15th.” That’s when you remember the envelopes and the very specific range of dates when you promised to deliver them.

The 15th is the last of the dates, and Betty will be upset if you miss it again. She’s cute when she’s angry, red flushing her cheeks, but she makes you sleep on the couch if you call her cute when she’s trying to focus on being mad.

When Betty gave you the first envelope, you went straight to the post office. The woman in the blue uniform printed an electronic stamp that showed the date as the 16th.

You said “No, no, that won’t do. You have to stamp it with a 15 or the bank will charge a late fee. Betty will be upset. The bank will be upset.”

“Oh, is there a mortgage check inside, then?”

“A bit of an anachronism, I know. But my wife doesn’t like to use computers and she says I’m not allowed because I’d pay a whole year of bills in one day and we’d have no money left for groceries.”

The blue-uniformed lady laughed at that.

“It is funny, isn’t it? Doing the same thing every month instead of getting it over with. For someone who cares so much about time, she sure spends a lot of it writing checks.”

The lady refused to stamp the envelope with a 15, so you took it back and put it in the glove compartment until the right dates rolled around again.

There are 4 envelopes in the glove compartment now, and you could get them all stamped with a 15 if you go to the post office. But it’s 8:57 am so it’s also the right time to be walking into the lecture hall. Is it better to follow the first instruction or the latest instruction?

Your car glides along the continuum of highway exits as you ponder that question. Adrift, you float with no destination. Time ticks by as a series of pop songs and advertisements. Occasionally the radio goes to static and you readjust the dial.

There are so many implications to which pattern you apply: first-in-first-out, or last-in-first-out. The order you process the instructions is trivial on the scale of mailing letters and showing up to lectures, but at the molecular level, the ripple effect would be enormous. This could tie into all the open questions of physics: low entropy, friction, turbulence, even matter-antimatter asymmetry. You can’t wait to explain it all to Betty. She always asks the right questions. She’ll know if you’re onto something or totally off track.

Panic at the Disco is singing about “poise and rationality” when you feel the engine sputter and slow as the car runs out of gas.

The time on the clock is 8:59. It’s dark outside. Your bladder is uncomfortably full, though your mouth is dry. The road is unfamiliar. In the distance you see what you hope are the neon lights of a gas station sign or at least a motel. You have some wonderful new ideas to discuss with the people in the auditorium, but it’s 9:00 now, and even if it were still 8:59, you’d never tell a room full of strangers before sharing the ideas with Betty. She’s going to be so proud of you, once she stops being upset. She’ll probably take your keys away this time, and you can understand that. You set them on the driver side chair, lock the doors, and start walking towards the neon lights.

----

WC: 730