I turned to find a strikingly exotic man standing beside me. He was thin and of middle height and middle age, shirtless and shoeless, with smooth, titian skin and dark, black eyes; he wore a rainbow-colored dhoti wrapped around his waist and legs in the style of a Hindu ascetic, and on his head a skullcap made of small gold beads. His face was peaceful, unfathomable, like that of a Buddhist monk during meditation. He was beautiful in the way a gazelle or an antelope is beautiful.
“Oh, hello,” I said, trying to recover from the shock of his appearance while blushing and coughing on a cracker at the same time. “I didn’t see you standing there…” I coughed again and cleared my throat. “Wow, pardon me,” I said.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“Yes, I’m fine, thanks. Quite an interesting sculpture, isn’t it? But to me, it seems to be saying that a traveler can’t maintain a single direction. Choices are constantly being made, changing her path.”
The sphere rotated, and my three virtual representatives disappeared around the far side.
“But time leads in only one direction from which there can be no deviation,” the man said. “If your point is that there can be many possible present moments, then I would agree. One may choose between them.”
“I’m not sure that’s what I meant,” I said. “How can there be many present moments?”
“I believe the sculptor intended for the forward rotation of the sphere to represent the unchanging direction of time. This means that any point on the surface where the figurine happens to stand represents the present moment as experienced by her at any particular instant of rotation. If so, then stretching behind her from that point on the sphere is the past, and out in front of her lies the future. Yet, it is a sphere, so what is behind her must eventually rotate around and appear again in front of her, illustrating that the past inevitably becomes the future. From the traveler’s perspective, she will be seeing it again, as if for the first time.”
“You seem to know a lot about this sculpture,” I said.
“I’ve studied it a great deal,” the man replied. “Now, suppose you were to draw a longitudinal line halfway around the sphere from the present moment where she stands-a prime meridian. You would see that this line represents all possible places on the surface of the sphere where the traveler can stand and still be within the present moment. The doors represent the decisions she must make on where to stand along that line.”
“If that’s what the sculptor was trying to say, I missed it.”
“I don’t think that’s all he was trying to say,” the man said. “We’ve accounted for only two dimensions of the sphere so far-time, represented by the rotation of the sphere, and place, represented by the surface of the sphere. We’ve described only a flat disk, I’m afraid-half a pancake.”
“I didn’t do well in geometry.”
The man smiled.
“There must be a third dimension giving volume to the sphere and meaning to the dimensions of time and place. The meridian line I mentioned, representing the present moment, doesn’t just float upon the surface; it also extends beneath the surface, through to the core of the sphere, giving the sphere its depth and shape. This dimension of depth represents the possible levels of understanding of the traveler at any given present moment-the levels of meaning of place and time. Her perception might be very basic and primitive, in which case her understanding of her time and place would be near the surface; or she might possess a more complete understanding of her time and place and all its nuances, in which case her understanding would be very deep and near the core. Meaning is also a matter of choice, is it not? We may experience the same present reality in many different ways. Thus, although our traveler has no ability to choose her particular time-although she may indeed fantasize about the past and the future-she has complete freedom to choose both her place in the present moment, and its meaning and significance to her-her level of perception. In this way, she experiences reality in three dimensions from a potentially infinite number of locations along the line of the present moment, assigning to her reality a potentially infinite number of meanings corresponding to the depth of her perception.”
He was talking way over my head. I was there to celebrate becoming a presenter, not engage in a philosophical exegesis of time, space, and perception. I scanned the crowd for Luas and Nana and a polite way out of the conversation.
“My name is Gautama,” the man said, perceptively extending his left hand.
“Brek Cuttler,” I said, smiling sheepishly, embarrassed at having been caught looking for an exit.
One of the faceless attendants arrived to retrieve my empty glass and plate.
“Yes, I know who you are,” Gautama said. “I hope I haven’t bored you. I myself am far more interested in the smaller steps along the journey, but standing back on occasion to glimpse the whole can be useful. For instance, it explains the presence of the postulants here among us right now, and our mutual inability to see each other because of our chosen levels of perception.”
“Does it explain why every presentation in the Urartu Chamber is terminated before a defense can be presented? I assume this has been your experience as well?”
“I’m not a presenter,” Gautama said. “I’m a sculptor…among other things.”
“You sculpted this?” I asked, even more embarrassed.
“Yes, do you like it?”
“Yes, of course,” I said. “It’s fascinating…but a bit intimidating.”
“We’re not comfortable making choices; we prefer others to make them for us. But choice is what makes everything run, you know; it’s the energy that powers the universe. To create is simply to choose, to decide. Even the Ten Commandments are choices-ten choices each person must make at any instant in time that create who they are and who they will become, although they can be reduced to three, which is what I’ve tried to do here with my sphere.”
“Three?”
“Yes. The first four Commandments are simply choices about the Holy One, are they not? Will we acknowledge God-or Spirit, or Truth, whatever language you wish to use-or will we worship material things and settle for the impermanent world? Will we invoke the power of God, the creative force, to harm or destroy others, or will we love them as ourselves? Will we set aside time to appreciate Creation and Truth, or will we consume all our time in pursuit of finite ends? The remaining six Commandments concern choices about others and self. Murder, theft, adultery, the way one relates to one’s parents, family, and community-these reflect how one chooses to regard others. Whether one is envious, and whether one conceals the truth, are ultimately decisions about one’s self.”
“Interesting way of looking at it,” I said.
Gautama turned toward the crowd.
“Your understanding of this, my daughter, is essential, for these are the choices that must be presented in the Urartu Chamber. From these choices alone is the Final Judgment rendered and eternity decided. The Judge is demanding and thorough. Some might even say the Judge is unforgiving.”
“The presentations are never completed,” I said. “Some might say the Judge is unjust.”
“Ours is not to question such wisdom; but you might ask yourself how many times the same choices must be presented before the story is accurately told.”
“Since I arrived in Shemaya, I don’t think I’ve met anybody, except my great-grandmother, who wasn’t a presenter. You said you are a sculptor, among other things. What things are those?”
“I help postulants recognize themselves and their choices. That is why my sphere is located here in the train station. ”
We turned back to the sphere. “I still don’t understand the reflections on the door,” I said. “I saw two different versions of myself.”
“Are not all choices based in personal desires? And are not all desires reflections of who we are or wish to become? We could distill the three choices presented here by the three pairs of doors into one, and conclude that all things in life turn upon choices concerning Creation itself. We could distill this even further and conclude that all things turn upon Creation’s choices about Creation itself. In other words, Brek, we are co-creators with God. At the highest level of reality on the sphere, at the pole from which we start, and to which we will inevitably return, there is but one possible here and now. All the rest flows from it, and returns to it, in the course of Creation-in the course of making choices. We choose who we are or wish to become, but in the end we are only one thing, permanent and unchanging, no matter what choices we make. The journey around the sphere is, in essence, an illusion.”