Cloud Perforations

It was a state school, not the least prominent but not far up from the one that was. He was a physics prof. He said to his classes first day, "I want you to consider clouds, but not quite clouds yet, but the perforations within them. I want you to think of those openings as pre-existing.

"It is through massive calculation I have determined the chaos theory is correct, in that this is the only means by which I might stand here. However, the incredibly complex labyrinth by which I arrived before you, and you before me, could not have accounted for all the variations in the meagre five billion allotted years. No, we must assign another, darker force. We must determine something is watching."

That grabbed 'em. Then he proceeded throughout the days left in the quarter to demonstrate the arcane ineffable mystery of doubt. And then late in one class a youngster put up her hand.

"Yes, but ... say a Brinks Truck passed by on the interstate outside our window and a bag of cash blew out, or was tossed out, anyway disintegrated and a confetti storm of cash rained down on us here in this class, and only us here.

"Then would we not feel special, as if the product of design, with some force out there selecting us for advancement, whereas all the other classes would be thinking of lunch or the night. Only we would consider ourselves blessed in this universe through the merest chance."

She stopped and she looked at the professor. And he at her. The class ended.

It was the beginning of the Multiverse. All the science journals now are conversant on the multiple universes. And the young student was not even a physics major.

Years later, someone and someone from one of the classes of the physics professor of the almost-lowest-rung state school met somewhere, and one said to the other:

"Say, do you remember that physics professor ...."

"Yes, yes, old Cloud Perforations."

"Yes. I wonder what he meant by that."