WHIM LOGIC

Mr. West, my San Jose City College instructor for Symbolic Logic, would love this.

Anyone in a timeless moment, even before morning's dreams have vanished, will remember the original face. Though details slip away.

Symbolic ? Coming up in a moment.

Those who have paid something may reasonably expect a plot, characters, entertainment and perhaps a puzzlement that resolves itself. Like getting to work somehow, or being a good boss, or not, or some similar struggle. The caveat: It's like getting nothing for something.

This endless story without beginning or end, some ineffable stone faced god that remains unmoved. And yet wind still blows through the trees. Fortunately, it has no price.

Each lecture began the same way. The textbook plopped on the lectern like a dead cat. The cover, having given up the ghost god knows how many years ago, it's frayed binding regressed to the original cotton, dangling a loose string: “Turn to page fifty seven,” as he gazed upon nothing in particular, and began reciting the contents of page fifty seven, word for word.

My major had recently become English, a fallback position. Math classes for an engineering career had been rolling along straight-A. Next one in line was an accelerated Algebra-Trig-Calculus course, two semesters in one, that would have been OK until I got there and sat for a period. This instructor avoided eye contact, soulless, desiccated, dedicated to what?

I left his chamber of horrors, spun around on what was going not to be an engineering heel, and headed for the Student Union. Over a cup of coffee, the Symbolic Logic course somehow stood out amongst the elective offerings.

It was a whimsical decision.

And why not? Philosophy was already fun, and English, and instructors who hadn't fizzled out. I would play with all the good stuff. Maybe I would invent Differential Philosophy, Integral English.

And indeed as it turned out, belying his thin gray hair and text book, Mr. West was very much alive inside. His eyes twinkled as he jostled our sleepy minds.

I appeared at the State Department of Employment, AA in hand, no plan in mind. With the AA, and four years of USAF microwave experience, immediately I was sent out for an interview. Three days later, arranging my desk at a start up company making integrated circuits, I became: the Technical Writer.

Things went well until they noticed my TR3. My wife, a talented commercial artist, had painted a lovely flower garden of on the side of it. And then there were the warnings. I wrote relevant details about dangerous chemicals into the manufacturing procedures .

WARNING – Hydrofluoric acid is quickly absorbed through skin and under finger nails, causing initially painless burns while damaging cells. If exposed, immediately remove clothing, rapidly wash entire body in the emergency shower. Get medical attention.

I was “promoted” to solitary confinement with an office on manager's row, given trivial tasks, until finally the strategy worked. I quit the job out of sheer boredom. And disgust. My boss, the Vice President of Marketing, a graduate of Santa Clara University, had said: “You are defined by your relations with others.”

At the next job interview, arranged by insider friends, I was given a test, a schematic of an RS flip-flop: “How does this operate. Draw a truth table.”

The whim kicked in. I had learned the symbols, and truth tables, so I figured it out and drew up a truth table. . .

Where or when it came to my attention I don't remember, but this resonates. Charles Fort said: “We are lived.”

Stone faced, laughing god whim!