When I was in my twenties I was searching for this one complex man with a familiar face I saw in the college library who was shocked by the computer screen before him. I figured he wasn’t shocked by what was on the screen but in awe of the computer itself.
I was intrigued by the incredible noise he was making. It was like a huge rubber band being stretched and released between two massive springs. I found it was not coming from his sunken and split mouth but directly from his mind to my ears.
A coil was sprung between us, like bass guitar reverb, and I wasn’t sure if he was hearing the same thing when he pushed away from the computer, folding his arms for security.
Everybody around us was trying to catch a glimpse of the two of us struggling with our humanity. We were more interested in what was on the computer screen.
When I tried to look at this mental mirror of my own distortion in front of me, it was declared rude by the spectators that I would look at the source of my distraction.
That is when I knew he could also hear the coil being released from tension and that the other students could only see us and couldn’t conceive of the coil but they knew that he did not focus on the movement around us but only on the computer screen.
The awe for me was in our heads and the endless possibilities of what our computers could behold.
At that moment, for the first time it was better to hear than to see. I also decided to not turn on the computer.
Francis Erich McElroy 