Curiosity (XII).

Whitfill, Patrick

    So much of what we refer to as progress
   depends on the continual efficacy of Moore's
   Law. My mother once slept with a Moore.
   The equation which determines the likelihood
   of one's birth mother's desire to have sex
   with a college friend of her youngest child is
   written on public restroom walls, coded in
   the etchings for cock
 and balls.
 According to
   science, Moore's Law will fade out; progress
   will peak, then slow, then require a massive
   revision. So often, what we consider stopped
   has so much inertia that, from our vantage, its
   progress appears stagnant. Movement occurs
   via variety. It takes a certain degree of
   arrogance to determine the actions of others,
   as such: one child cannot predict the sexual
   needs of his mother. I make rules because I
   believe in the significance of appearances. I
   refuse to believe otherwise. When I visit my
   mother, I never let myself see her as a lady
   who fucked a friend of mine from college.
   This has all taken too long to happen. By
   now, the Mars Rover has bumped into
   enough rocks to recognize the limits of itself.
   In forty minutes, a radio signal can reach
   the surface of Mars. In forty minutes,
   a network drama detective can solve a rape.
   Or start to solve a rape, drinking coffee. In
   forty minutes, I can forget the names of every
   kid I went to kindergarten with. In forty
   minutes, a war can go untelevised. I consider
   this a testament to Moore's Law. I consider
   Moore's Law a testament to my mother. I
   consider my mother a testament to whatever
   indomitable nobility there is between need
 and
   sex. Hello
 translates in more than one language
   as Peace.
 When I first met the man who later
   seduced my mother, I said Hello, and what I
   meant was, Please don't hurt me. I can be your
     friend. I pose no threat. I do not mean you harm.
 I
   consider this a weakness nearly enviable, like
   having thumbs for every finger. On my first
   day back home, my father told me about
   the eleven possible dimensions, how gravity,
   as one, proves how osmotic existence is. Look,
   he said, and lifted his arms above his head. I
     just defeated gravity.
 In some ways, we become
   gods before we become men. In some ways,
   we lose one dimension to help prove
   the other ten exist. How do I see my father in
   relation to the dimensions which proves he is
   my father? Like this,
 I say, and I lift my head
   above my arms, and I lift my arms above my
   father, and I drag my father into the air. When
   no one is looking, I lift us both into that blue,
   unfragmented, undestroyable progress of sky.