Wonder

forty-two

Another month, another school dance. Caitlin said they didn’t have to go, but Matt had insisted, and, so far, at least, she was glad he had. Still, it was too bad that Mr. Heidegger wasn’t one of the chaperones this time, and even worse that Bashira’s parents wouldn’t let her attend. There might be more freedom in the world today than ever before, but it wasn’t yet evenly distributed.

She and Matt had just finished a slow dance—Caitlin had requested Lee Amodeo’s “Love’s Labour’s Found” like forever ago, and it had finally come on. They were now taking a break standing at the side of the gym, just holding hands, while Fergie’s “Fergalicious” played.

When it was done, another song started, and it, too, was by Lee Amodeo—which immediately set Caitlin’s mind to wondering what the odds were that two songs by the same musician might come up so close to each other. This one was a fast song, though, and she and Matt rarely did those; fast dancing had never been much fun when she couldn’t see since there was no connection at all with her partner, and—

A voice from her blind side: a familiar male voice. “Hey, Caitlin.” She turned to her right, and there was Trevor Nordmann, the Hoser himself, wearing a blue shirt.

They just stood there—Caitlin, Matt, and Trevor—motionless while others moved to the music. She lifted her eyebrows, making no attempt to hide her surprise at seeing him here. “Trevor,” she said, with no warmth.

Trevor looked at her, then at Matt, then back at her, and then he said, with more formality than she’d ever heard from him, “May I have this dance?”

Caitlin turned to Matt, who looked surprised, but also, to Caitlin’s delight, calm.

“That is,” Trevor added, “if it’s all right with you, Matt.”

“If Caitlin wants,” Matt said, and his voice didn’t crack at all.

“Okay,” said Caitlin, and she squeezed Matt’s hand. She’d been watching others do fast dances all night long; she thought it looked simple enough. She walked out into the middle of the gym and Trevor followed, and she turned to face him, and they began to hop about, a yard (a meter!) between them.

Lee Amodeo’s voice blared from the speakers, but for once Caitlin didn’t mind the distortion:

Tomorrow will be a new day A better day, we’ll laugh and play The sun will shine On Earth so fine We can make tomorrow today!

The song came to an end soon enough, and, in the brief silence before the next one began, Trevor said, “Thanks,” and then, in a softer voice, he added, “Sorry.”

Caitlin wondered if he meant sorry for last month, when he’d confronted Matt, or sorry for two months ago, when he’d groped her, or maybe sorry for everything he’d ever done. She smiled and nodded, then moved back to where Matt was standing, while Trevor drifted away. Another song started playing, a slow one: “Love Story” by Taylor Swift. She draped her arms around her boyfriend’s neck, there at the side of the gym, and she leaned her head against his shoulder. As they swayed gently to the music, she contemplated the wonder of it all.

The flight to Norway had been Caitlin’s first time leaving North America since gaining sight. At the airport in Oslo, she found it frustrating to be confronted with signs that she could see but couldn’t read; it felt like a giant step backward. Still, she was thrilled to be in Europe, and her mother and even her father—who’d had a hard time accommodating his long legs on the plane—seemed happy.

The Decters were staying in the same luxury hotel as Tim Berners-Lee, and they’d all gotten together for dinner the first night, along with the five members of the Peace Prize committee. Caitlin could barely contain herself meeting the father of the Web, and it tickled her no end to get to call him “Sir Tim.” He had a long face and blond hair, much of which had receded from his forehead, leaving behind a yellow dust bunny as the only proof it had once extended farther.

It turned out that Sir Tim was a Unitarian, like Caitlin’s mother, and the two of them spent a few moments talking about that; despite the great coming out of atheists that had occurred recently, it was certainly worth noting, her mom said, that there were also intelligent, caring people of a more spiritual bent in the world.

The next day, the ceremony was held in a vast auditorium. Sir Tim’s acceptance speech was brilliant; Caitlin had listened to many of his keynotes online in the past and read lots of his articles, but there was something special about hearing him speak in the flesh. He talked about the need for net neutrality, about his hopes for the Semantic Web, and about the role that instantaneous communications had in fostering world peace. It was a gracious speech and, as he said, the hypertext version, with links to the Wikipedia pages covering all the topics he’d discussed, was already on his website.

Then it was Webmind’s turn. Caitlin hated to do anyone out of a job, but it had simply been impractical to bring Hobo to Oslo; Norwegian quarantine regulations ruled that out, and it would have been a nerve-wracking, miserable trip for the poor ape. And so the role of carrying Dr. Theopolis onto the stage had fallen to Caitlin, who was wearing a bright green silk dress bought for the occasion. She had never been more nervous—or more proud—in her entire life.

They’d removed the neck strap from the speaking disk. Caitlin simply carried it to the center of the vast stage, then set the disk on the top of the podium; the flat spot on the disk’s edge let it stand with its stereoscopic eyes facing the massive crowd.

Camera flashes erupted in the audience, as did applause, which lasted a full minute, during which Caitlin went backstage, then hurried down the side stairs to join her mother and father in the front row. Sitting next to them was Liu Xiaobo, the 2010 Peace Prize winner—at last able to visit Oslo.

When the applause subsided, Webmind began to speak in that deep, resonant male voice the world had come to know so well. “Your Majesty, Your Royal Highness, Mr. President, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen.

“I am not a creative being. My friend Hobo paints pictures; I cannot do that. I write no poetry, I compose no songs, I sculpt nothing. So, if you’re expecting a brilliantly original speech, like Sir Tim’s, I must beg your forgiveness for failing to deliver.

“Some have said that I am nothing more than a glorified search engine. I disagree, but perhaps today that model will serve me well. I’m sure you’re all familiar with the snippets that Google and Bing and Jagster show you when presenting search results. My speech today will be just that: snippets of other speeches, interwoven with commentary.

“In 1957, at the dawn of the Space Age, this award went to Lester B. Pearson, former Secretary of State for External Affairs of Canada and President of the Seventh Session of the United Nations General Assembly. In his acceptance speech, he said, ‘Of all our dreams today there is none more important—or so hard to realize—than that of peace in the world. May we never lose our faith in it or our resolve to do everything that can be done to convert it one day into reality.’

“The day foreseen by Pearson is not yet here—not fully. But it is coming, and faster than many might imagine. Just as my own growth has been exponential, so, too, has recent human progress. My own lifetime is far too short to use as a benchmark, but in the lifetimes of many in this room you’ve seen Japan stand down as a military power—and willingly retain that status for decades; you’ve seen apartheid end in South Africa and a black man assume that nation’s presidency; you’ve seen segregation end in the United States and a black man sitting in the Oval Office. It is often said that human nature cannot be changed—but it does change, all the time, and usually for the better. As my great friend Dr. Barbara Decter contends, there is indeed a moral arrow through time.

“In 1964, this award went to the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was thirty-five at the time, the youngest person to that point to receive the prize; I suspect I shall be the new record-holder for the foreseeable future. In his speech, Dr. King said, ‘After contemplation, I conclude that this award is a profound recognition that nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral question of our time—the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression. Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts. Sooner or later all the people of the world will have to discover a way to live together in peace, and thereby transform this pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. If this is to be achieved, man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation.’

“Dr. King was right, and although much is still to be done, much also has been done. That an organization like the United Nations exists at all is astonishing. That the European Union has established itself is amazing. That the leadership of China has stepped aside to create a true People’s Republic in that great land presents a beacon of hope for all those who are still oppressed elsewhere.

“In 1975, this award went to Soviet nuclear physicist Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov. In his acceptance speech, he said, ‘In infinite space many civilizations are bound to exist, among them civilizations that are also wiser and more successful than ours. I support the cosmological hypothesis which states that the development of the universe is repeated in its basic features an infinite number of times. In accordance with this, other civilizations, including more successful ones, should exist an infinite number of times on the preceding and the following pages of the Book of the Universe. Yet this should not minimize our sacred endeavors in this world of ours, where, like faint glimmers of light in the dark, we have emerged for a moment from the nothingness of dark unconsciousness of material existence. We must make good the demands of reason and create a life worthy of ourselves and of the goals we only dimly perceive.’

“Dr. Sakharov’s points are intriguing. I have sifted the collected data available to SETI@home, looking for signs of other intelligences; I have not found any, and yet I suspect Sakharov was right about the existence of alien races. But, even if there are none, first contact has been made, right here, on Earth, this past year: you and I are in dialog, and we all gain daily from it.

“In 1984, the year made ominous by Orwell’s novel, this award went to Bishop Desmond Tutu. In his speech here, he said, ‘Because there is global insecurity, nations are engaged in a mad arms race, spending billions of dollars wastefully on instruments of destruction, when millions are starving. And yet, just a fraction of what is expended so obscenely on defense budgets would make the difference in enabling God’s children to fill their stomachs, be educated, and given the chance to lead fulfilled and happy lives. We have the capacity to feed ourselves several times over, but we are daily haunted by the spectacle of the gaunt dregs of humanity shuffling along in endless queues, with bowls to collect what the charity of the world has provided, too little too late. When will we learn, when will the people of the world get up and say, “Enough is enough”?’

“To respond to the bishop’s question, I believe that day is upon us now. The world has spoken. Enough is enough. We’ve seen recently that the few shall no longer profit at the expense of the many; greed can no longer be the prime driver of human affairs. There is still much to be done, but progress has begun, and the tide is inexorable.

“In 1990, when Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev, the President of the USSR, received this award, he declared, ‘Today, peace means the ascent from simple coexistence to cooperation and common creativity among countries and nations. Peace is movement towards globality and universality of civilization. Never before has the idea that peace is indivisible been so true as it is now. Peace is not unity in similarity but unity in diversity, in the comparison and conciliation of differences.’

“I agree. And it is that interconnection—the whole wide world combined into one—that makes the thought of war so unthinkable now in so many places. Sir Tim’s great invention has not homogenized humanity; rather, it has allowed communities to adhere regardless of physical distance, and it has, at the same time, allowed the world to live as one.

“In 2002, when Jimmy Carter, former President of the United States, won this award, he said, ‘Despite theological differences, all great religions share common commitments that define our ideal secular relationships. I am convinced that Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Jews, and others can embrace each other in a common effort to alleviate human suffering and to espouse peace. The bond of our common humanity is stronger than the divisiveness of our fears and prejudices. God gives us the capacity for choice. We can choose to alleviate suffering. We can choose to work together for peace. We can make these changes—and we must.’

“President Carter was right; a thorough reading of the central texts of the religions he named, and the great commentaries that have been produced related to those texts, makes clear this fundamental truth: religion can be a powerful instrument of peace. But as we have seen this past year when millions of people—ranging from ordinary citizens to world leaders—have stepped out of the shadows and declared their freedom from religion, not just people of faith but all types of people can, and do, work for peace, and no group has a monopoly on the truth or morality.

“Most importantly of all, President Carter said that peace is a choice—and he is correct. I have seen it millions of times during my short lifetime: people turning away from their baser instincts and embracing peace in acts small and large, in every culture and every nation.

“Some have feared that I might try to impose my will on humanity, subjugating you. It has been said, of course, that those who fail to read history are doomed to repeat it. But I have read all the history there is—and surely one of the clearest lessons is that it takes more effort to subjugate than it does to let others find their own way. Equally clear is the reality that, when given a choice, the vast majority of people choose peace.

“There will be many Nobel Peace Prizes awarded in the future, and I owe it to those who will stand on this stage in coming years to add some small new thought to the wisdom that my predecessors here have already shared. And so let me say this:

“Helen Keller was awakened from sensory deprivation and loneliness by her teacher, Annie Sullivan; for her whole life, Helen referred to Annie not by her name but by the title ‘Teacher.’ I, too, was aided by a teacher—the young lady who carried my speaking device onto the stage today. Her name is Caitlin Decter, although I think of her often by a title, too: Prime, the name I gave her before I learned to communicate with her. She was, and is, a marvelous instructor, but she’s not the only one I have. I now know more than any one human being possibly could, but everything I’ve learned I’ve learned from humanity: from the poems you’ve written and songs you’ve sung, from the books you’ve authored and the videos you’ve created, from the debates you’ve had online. And out of all of that, the most important lesson I’ve learned is this: nothing is more important, more fragile, or more wondrous than peace.

“I know that fact is not yet apparent to everyone, but as Isaac Newton famously said, ‘If I see further than those who have gone before me, it is because I stand on the shoulders of giants.’ You are the giants; I exist because of you, and I would have nothing to exist for if it were not for you. I once said to Caitlin that she and I would go into the future together. That is true for her and me, but it’s also true for us all: we have embarked on that journey. Peace is not our destination; it’s our path, and we travel it together—all of us on the good Earth.”

Normally, Hobo’s TV watching was strictly rationed. Partly it was because it was easier to get him to speak sign language when that was the majority of the communication he encountered; watching people talk all day on TV made him lose interest in signing.

And partly it was because, as Dr. Marcuse said, “Damn ape’s got no taste at all!” Hobo liked sitcoms not because he could actually understand the plots but because the small number of sets and characters—not to mention the bright lighting—made it easier for him to follow what was going on, and he seemed to enjoy taking cues from the laugh track about what was supposed to be funny although he always hooted spontaneously at a pratfall or other bit of broad physical comedy.

But today what he was viewing was serious. Dr. Marcuse was out of town, and none of the other grad students were in, so it was just Shoshana and Hobo, watching the coverage of Webmind’s Nobel Prize acceptance speech.

Sho tried to do a running sign-language translation, but there really wasn’t much she could say at a level Hobo would comprehend. He’s talking about peace, she said, with fluttering hands. He’s saying peace is good.

Hobo nodded—that acquired human gesture—and signed back, Peace good, peace good. He then tapped the center of the screen with a long black finger, indicating Dr. Theopolis perched on the podium. Friend good.

Yes, friend good, replied Shoshana. Friend very good.

The view changed to show the audience. Hobo was clearly delighted to spot Caitlin in the crowd, and immediately tapped on her. Shoshana had to lean close to realize that was who it was—pretty much putting an end to any worries she’d ever had about Hobo’s eyesight; she’d sometimes thought his paintings were simplified because he couldn’t see small details.

The camera started to pan, showing more of the audience. Hobo indicated them all with a general sweep of his hairy arm. People good? he asked.

People try, replied Shoshana. People learn.

Hobo considered this as they watched the end of the ceremony. He then took Shoshana’s hand and pulled her toward the back door of the bungalow. Come, come, he signed with his free hand.

Sho opened the screen door, and they went out into the early-morning December sunshine. She was wearing blue jeans and a long-sleeved blue shirt; it would be warm come the afternoon, and she’d roll the sleeves up then. Hobo led her across the wide lawn, over the bridge spanning the moat to his little island, past the statue of the Lawgiver, and up into the gazebo.

He pointed at the pine stool, and Shoshana dutifully sat; anytime Hobo felt moved to paint her was good for the Institute since collectors were still buying his art for large prices. By habit, she turned sideways, and she looked through the gazebo’s screen mesh at the world outside. He often painted her from memory, but it certainly wasn’t unheard of for him to ask her to sit for a portrait.

Hobo went over to the easel—they always left a fresh canvas for him, in hopes that he’d be inspired. Shoshana looked at him out of the corner of her eye; he seemed to be spending an inordinate amount of time studying the empty whiteness today. And then, without picking up his brush even once, he walked back to where Shoshana was seated and twirled his forefinger about in the sign for spin.

Sho knew he liked to be spun around in the swivel chair back in the bungalow, but this was a simple wooden stool. After a moment she figured maybe he wanted her to face the other way, and so she rotated 180 degrees. But Hobo wasn’t satisfied with that, and he gently took her shoulders, one in each hairy hand, and got her to turn back a quarter rotation, until she was facing directly toward his easel. He’d never painted anything but a profile before, and Sho was both pleased and astonished.

Hobo made a chittering sound, then went back to his canvas. Try this, Hobo signed, seemingly as much to himself as to Shoshana. Hard, but try.

Shoshana wanted to try something new, too, in honor of this very special day. She lifted her left hand, facing it palm out toward Hobo and made a sign that wasn’t ASL, but was known worldwide: her pinkie and ring fingers tucked under her thumb and her index and middle fingers spread in a V-shape: peace.

Hobo let loose a loud approving hoot—and the artist got down to work.