Short Story: BALLMER PEAK
The little green cursor on my terminal screen, prompting me to write something -- anything! -- steadily blinked at me. Mocking me, I was sure of it. I slowly lifted my hands to the keyboard, feeling as though I was dragging them through molasses. Sweat beaded on my brow.
I can do this, I lied to myself. I knew I just needed to start, and then the floodgates in my brain would open and my fingers would dance across the keyboard and I'd finish this assignment before the deadline and I wouldn't be fired and blacklisted from any future programming jobs and my wife wouldn't leave me and my children wouldn't hate me and oh god I'm doomed.
With sluggish fingers I typed:
My brain's floodgates remained resolutely closed.
I slumped forward onto my desk, burying my head in my folded arms. I had a month to finish what I was becoming convinced was more than a month's work. I'd been so proud at the beginning, a year ago -- which now felt like a lifetime -- when I was selected to work with the renowned Dr. Sandburg on the task of integrating the nation's nuclear arsenal with the Strategic Defense Initiative network. It had all gone so well in the beginning, until disaster struck...
I missed Sandberg. In the 10 months we worked together, I learned so much from him. He was a brilliant man who never met a problem he couldn't solve. I wished I could talk to him now...
I sighed, slumping back into my chair, looking at the picture that hung on my office wall. Dr. Sandberg, myself, and the rest of the team, all looking so fresh faced and happy, unaware of the tragedy that lurked in our futures.
My gaze wandered around my office. No amount of interior decoration could cover up the suffocating blandness of a government office building, and to be honest I hadn't really tried. Besides the photo of better times that hung on my wall, I only had a few sturdy bookcases, a messy desk currently cluttered with reference books and three-ring binders full of technical specifications, today's newspaper ("NIXON ACQUITTED", blared the headline) and a few other odds and ends.
I had a polaroid photograph of my wife taped to the side of my terminal. I'd taken it last month when we had a picnic. Golden sunlight backlit the hair that framed her face, creating an almost angelic appearance. Her radiant smile, even frozen in time like this, was still infectious enough that I found myself reflexively smiling back. I sure was a lucky guy... well, in that regard, anyway. My smile slipped as I remembered my current predicament.
I heaved a dramatic, self pitying sigh, and stood up and trudged for the door. Perhaps a walk to the water cooler would clear my mind. It hadn't worked the last twelve times I'd tried it in the last hour, but maybe the thirteenth time would be the charm.
As I rounded my desk, my eye was caught by a knick-knack I had sitting on top of one of my bookshelves. It was a length of a miniature white-picket fence, made from toothpicks, mounted on a simple wooden platform. It had been a gift from a senior programmer, Devin Smith. Back when I first arrived at the agency, fresh out of MIT, I had discovered an off-by-one error during a review of Devin's code.
Off-by-one errors, popularly known as the "fencepost problem", result from incorrectly iterating over a collection of elements. It's an abstract problem that can result in very concrete real world problems. A computer-controlled machine at a Ford factory might miss a critical rivet; a fully computerized waste treatment plant might dump raw sewage into rivers when it tries to fill a tank it doesn't have; and in one very real, still-classified example, a seventy million dollar CIA spy satellite had plunged into the atlantic ocean shortly after lunch, when only twenty-eight of the twenty-nine decoupling explosives ignited.
The fencepost problem was one that had plagued programmers since the dawn of the computing age, and wasn't always easy to spot. Devin Smith had been so impressed (and, I suspect, slightly embarrassed) that a rookie had discovered a bug in his code, he made and gifted me the miniature picket fence. As I gazed down at it, I realized that since the deaths of Dr. Sandberg and the rest, I'd been so busy I'd barely talked to anyone else. There may not be anyone left with specific domain knowledge of my current project, but others, surely, had faced similar problems.
Who to talk to... Devin? I chuckled to myself and placed the toothpick fence back on my shelf. I wasn't that desperate.
I knocked on the open office door. "Larry? Do you have a minute?"
Larry Goldsmith looked up from his desk and peered at me over his spectacles. "Ah, Kevin! Come right in!"
In the programming world, older programmers are affectionately known as "grey beards." Larry Goldsmith not only had a literal grey bread -- a great big bushy thing that complimented his Santa Clause-esque physique -- but had also been in the business for most of his sixty years of life. He had worked on the Apollo project, where programming involved hand-weaving wires through magnetic cores. I
I took a seat and quickly explained my problem. The work was 95% done, but this last, critical five percent was proving to be intractable. Anytime I tried to work on it, I felt overcome with anxiety and helplessness, and I couldn't write a single line of code.
When I was finished, Larry leaned back in his chair and tugged his beard thoughtfully. "I see, I see... honestly, I'm surprised you haven't had a mental break yet, with the pressure you must be facing. To lose your team -- your friends, your mentor -- so suddenly and in such a tragic way, and shouldering the weight of the whole project, I can hardly imagine what you must be going through." His face twisted in anger, and pounded a meaty fist on the desk. "Damn communists! Dr. Sandburg was a good friend of mine, and to die in a goddamn Pizza Hut, of all places..."
"Well, we never proved it was the Russians --"
"Bah," Larry replied dismissively, "I don't believe in coincidences. A gas line explodes and wipes out almost an entire team working on nuclear response technology, and I'm supposed to believe it was just chance? Nonsense."
"Well, I'm only here because of chance. The only reason I wasn't there is because I came down with the flu the day before." I smiled bitterly. "You know, the only reason we were celebrating was because we'd just hit the final milestone before delivery. The last component needed -- the part I'm now stuck on -- was the integration with the Minuteman silos. Dr. Sandburg was going to write that part himself, because he had the most knowledge of the interface."
I fell silent, slipping back into depression. Larry studied my morose posture with a critical eye. After a moment, he broke the silence with an unexpected revelation. "I'm sure I don't look like the type, but I am a strong believer in the benefits of meditation, of becoming a more, ah, spiritually connected man."
I cocked a dubious eyebrow. "Really?"
Larry chuckled. "Really! In fact, I've gone overseas and spent time with holy men of various religions and practices. In fact, I even visited the bhudist monks in the Vietnam territories, after we won. And I have to tell you, getting in touch with your inner self can help in so many ways. I think your problem is that you're too stressed out to concentrate -- you need to cleanse yourself of your worries and doubts before you can move forward. Here, I'll lend you a book about itā¦"
Larry rummaged in his desk drawers for a moment. "I know it was here somewhere... ah! Found it!"
I took the proffered paperback. The cover featured the silhouette of a man in a lotus pose, and the title "Becoming the Better You," by someone by the name of "ThĆch Quįŗ£ng Äį»©c". The book was somewhat worse for wear; clearly Larry had gotten his money's worth out of it. I was doubtful, but... well, if it worked for Larry, maybe it'd work for me. I thanked him, exchanged a few more pleasantries, and returned to my office. I cracked open the book to page one and started my spiritual journey.
The deadline was in a week. I'd read the book, cover to back, and then back to cover, and tried everything it suggested. All I had to show for it was a few hundred lines of mediocre code, and an even worse case of depression. Okay, I thought with all the determination I could muster, one more time. I closed my eyes, then took a breath, counted to three, exhaled, and repeated. I cleared my mind the way the book had taught me, pushing my worries to the side, one by one. I felt myself becoming more relaxed. Maybe this time it was actually working. Maybe this time I would have a breakthrough. Breath in, breath out. Breath in, breath out. Breath in...
I opened my eyes. My terminal was still blank. I looked at the clock, and realized I'd just slept for four hours. I swore loudly and threw the book across the room. It missed the trash can, but I didn't care. Okay, I thought. Meditation isn't more me. I stood and headed for the door. If the world of spirits lacked the answers I sought, perhaps the world of science would have them.
I found Harvey Ketiel in his cubicle, sorting through a stack of paperwork. Harvey was a psychologist, and although we never saw each other on an average workday, I'd become friends with him through the company bowling league. Ah, bowling... one of a hundred fun things I hadn't done in months.
Harvey glanced up when he heard me approaching, then did a double take. "Kevin? You're the last person I expected to see today, but I'm glad I did!" I grinned and took a seat, and we chatted for a few minutes, catching up on what we'd been up to. The conversation soon moved to my purpose of being there, and Harvey listened intently as I described my problem.
"I think," he said, after I'd finished, "I know exactly how to help you."
"Well, that's a relief! Hopefully it doesn't involve shock therapy or anything similar?"
Harvey laughed. "Nah, man, just an egg timer. I just read about it, it's in one of these..." He shuffled through a stack of scientific journals, pulled on out, and flipped through it. "Ah, here it is. It's a focusing technique called the Pomodoro Method, and this study showed that subjects in the experiment that used the method became 83 to 240 percent more efficient at the tasks they were assigned."
"And all I need is a timer?"
"Yup! You simply set a timer for thirty minutes, do your work, then set a timer for five minutes and do anything other than work. The theory is that it's easy to concentrate and get past things like writers block when you set a time limit. Basically, your brain is terrified of working for an indeterminate amount of time, but you can easily convince yourself to work for a measly half-hour, and then another half-hour, and then another until all your work is done! It's like magic, except it's science."
"Well, it certainly sounds easy. I'll give it a shot!"
I took my leave and headed back to my office with a feeling of renewed optimism. I only had a week left, sure, but looking at it another way, I had a whole week! I could do this, I knew I could.
The deadline was tomorrow. It was 3:35 PM. I was not finished, not by a long shot.
The Pomodoro method had helped, for sure, but the core problem of self doubt remained. I found myself spending whole days writing and rewriting the same functions, unsatisfied with the quality of work and knowing I could do better.
Perhaps it was time to admit defeat. Grovel at the feet of upper management and hope I wasn't fired. I looked bleakly around my office. It wasn't a great office, but at least it was mine. I didn't want to start over in a cubicle somewhere else... my eyes alighted, as they had a month prior, on the model picket fence. Desperate times call for desperate measures, I thought. Time to talk to Devin Smith.
The elevator ride down to the basement was a quiet one, giving me plenty of time to think about Devin. It wasn't that I was scared of Devin, it was just that... well, he was unsettling, and everyone knew it. His office (called by some of us, though not to his face, his lair) was in the basement, near the mainframe that our terminals connected to. It was there because he wanted it to be there, saying that he liked the privacy. No one objected, because no one was even sure who he reported to or what projects he worked on.
With his long black hair and frequent sneering criticisms of the very government he worked for, rumours swirled that he was a homosexual or a communist, or maybe a homosexual communist. But someone higher up must have liked him, because he never faced any trouble for either allegation. And then there was the open secret that he kept a loaded .45 in his desk...
The elevator doors creaked open, and I made my way through the concrete hallways until I reached Devin's office. The door was closed, but I could see light seeping out from beneath it. I knocked, and entered after hearing a curt "come in!"
The overhead light wasn't on, the only illumination coming from a desk lamp. Harsh shadows engulfed the office, making Devin's angular face all the more sharper. He sipped from a coffee cup and motioned towards a simple plastic chair. "Sit."
I did as ordered. I knew Devin has served in Vietnam, and though he never talked about his time there, I was confident he must have been an NCO, because when he told someone to do something, you could hear in his tone that he expected to be obeyed.
"Well, well, well," he drawled. Kevin Schumer. I haven't seen you around recently, but I'm not surprised. I hear the Minuteman integration is kicking your ass -- that right?"
"Well, I wouldn't say kicking my ass," I started to say defensively, then stopped. "No, sorry, you're absolutely right. That's actually why I'm here..."
As I recounted my tale of woe, Devin said nothing, content to merely sip his coffee. His shadowed face was impassive and inscrutable.
"...and so," I finished, "I came here. I know you've done lots of great work -- I mean, I don't know what you actually do, haha, no one does -- but uh, it's, uh, I'm assuming it's good because you haven't been fired, haha..."
Devin sipped his coffee and continued saying nothing. I nervously cleared my throat, trying to forget the conversation I'd had with a coworker, in which she swore she'd seen a photograph of Devin in Vietnam, wearing a necklace of human ears. "What I'm trying to say is, do you have any suggestions for what I can try? I mean, it's probably too late now, but..."
I fell silent. Devin carefully placed his coffee cup back on his desk. He leaned forward, steepling his fingers. "Do you think you lack the ability to write this code?"
"I... I don't know, honestly. I hoped I did, but it hasn't been working out so far..."
"You said that Dr. Sandberg was going to write this code originally, correct? What knowledge did he have that you don't?"
"Well, he knew the Minuteman interface better than anyone --"
"How did he acquire this knowledge?"
I frowned. "Well... I guess he just read through the technical specifications --"
"Of course I have," I snapped. "Over and over again. But I don't have Sandberg's years of experience, or his deep understanding of system design, or --"
"I think you're wrong. Sandberg picked you specifically as his second in command, and he wasn't known for making bad decisions. I think you have both the knowledge and skillset to pull this off. What you lack is the confidence. Riddle me this: if the code you needed to write already existed, and someone were to read it aloud to you, how long would it take to type it in?"
I thought about it for a moment, comparing the expected work to previous projects I'd worked on. "Um, probably about eight hours?"
"Then it shouldn't take much longer to write it from scratch, because you know what? You already wrote the code in your mind, you just don't know it. All you have to do is turn off the thinking portion of your brain and let the code flow through you. And for that, I have something that will help you. This coffee mug isn't filled with coffee, you know."
I was momentarily nonplussed at the seeming non sequitur. "What?"
Devin opened a desk drawer and pulled something out. I saw a glint of silver, and was briefly convinced I was going to see the rumoured .45 up-close and personal. But then I realized it wasn't a gun, it was a silver flask. Devin spun the cap off and tilted the contents into his mug, refilling it.
"This is the secret to my success -- whenever I need to do something difficult, dangerous, or potentially risky, I get drunk. The part of my brain that thinks things like "your manager won't ever agree to this idea" or "maybe there's children in those huts" turns off, and I can focus on what I need to do. It's what got me through the war, and it's what's kept me employed." He held the flask out. "Here, take it."
The hours passed in a blur. Devin had been right -- my doubts were erased, my confidence was at record high levels. My fingers danced over the keyboard, producing code of amazing quality. When I began to get tired, I chugged a cup of black coffee and resumed work. After everyone else in the office had left for the day, I grabbed the coffee machine from the break room and sat it on my desk.
When I finally finished, real birds were chirping in the tree outside my window, and metaphorical early birds were beginning to arrive in the office. I copied my code onto floppy disks, addressed them to the appropriate office in the Pentagon, and delivered them to the mailroom for delivery. They'd be at their destination by mid day, and the code would be loaded into the Minuteman silos in the coming weeks -- the final part of the United State's complete missile defense and nuclear response system. Right on schedule.
I tried to take a victory swig from the flask, but it was now empty. Well, no matter -- it had served its purpose. I put it in my desk drawer and headed home.
I was asleep before my head hit my pillow.
I locked my car, tugged on the handle to make sure it was locked -- just a habit; it's never not been locked -- and headed towards my office building. It was a bright and crisp August morning, almost three weeks after I'd finished the Minuteman integration project. It may have been Fall, but I had a spring in my step; management had been very pleased with my performance, and I'd been promoted. Today would be the first day leading my own team.
I was blissful enough that it took a few seconds of hearing a low, distant rumble, before I truly registered what I was hearing. I spun around and looked out towards the countryside, through a gap in the nearby office buildings. A rocket was rising into the sky, atop a pillar of flame and smoke. I knew it was from one of the Minuteman silos scattered around the country, and the rocket was carrying a nuclear payload and destined for Russia.
I couldn't believe the crazy Russians had actually done it. They'd gone and started World War Three --
Wait. Something was wrong. I spun around frantically, looking in all directions. I knew the playbook -- a nuclear response wouldn't just be one rocket, there should be dozens of missiles in the vicinity launching simultaneously. But I only saw the one...
I watched it rise higher and higher. With a sinking feeling, I realized that its trail of exhaust looked for all the world like a single, solitary fencepost.
