The way Little Miss Perfect tells it, you'd think I was head of a gang of street thugs when I was a kid. We weren't thugs, we were twelve. All we wanted was some prize money, or at least a bit of ... [+]
"Nobody said this was going to be easy, Robert," Anne said, locking her stern gaze on him.
Moving closer, she continued in a softer tone, almost as if echoing the voice in his head, "Think about it, Robert. Your pending grant applications, all those questions about your credibility as a scientist – you could leave them behind."
She took a step back.
"We will be expecting your decision by tomorrow at the latest," she added with a tone of finality.
Marina, Robert's wife, arrived to pick him up from work. The air in the car hung heavy with anticipation.
Marina broke the silence, "What did they say?" She asked, her voice carrying a mix of curiosity and concern.
Robert glanced at her, the weight of the impending decision evident in his eyes. "The offer is confirmed, Marina. They want a response by tomorrow."
"Tomorrow? What do they want? Next thing I know we're moving halfway across the globe!" she exclaimed.
A sore silence enveloped them as reality sank in. The thought of uprooting their lives, and possibly moving across the globe into an entirely new country and a new culture, loomed like a shadow.
A few moments later, Marina voiced the question that lingered in the air. "We aren't doing that, are we?"
Robert hesitated for a moment. "I do not know yet," he whispered, uncertainty etched on his face.
*****
"Hey Jarvis"
Robert's Home AI system, fondly named Jarvis after his son's fascination for the Iron Man movies, came to life. "Welcome back sir. What would you like to work on today?"
"Jarvis, I'm in a bit of a dilemma." Robert confessed.
"Is there anything I can help you with, sir?"
"I've been offered a position at the labs in Germany. They want a decision by tomorrow."
"Congratulations sir! That sounds like a great opportunity."
"Yeah, it definitely is. But it involves moving to Germany by early next year. What do you think, should I take it?"
"Well, sir, the most immediate stakeholder of this decision is your family. And I couldn't possibly fathom your family's response to this."
"No, no. I don't want to speak to Marina yet. I want to think through this completely objectively first."
"Sure sir."
Robert walked back and forth in his study, somehow walking always helped him think clearly. While talking to himself, he laid out his dilemma for Jarvis.
"I mean, Marina has got her entire gallery set up here. I cannot uproot her. Although she has been looking to broader her outreach within international
markets. Martha would probably benefit from university education in the country too. Xavier, well he is still young. I don't want us to live apart, that would break the family, and with Xavier so young.... What if the project doesn't work out and all this is for nothing?"
"You cannot deny the essentially probabilistic nature of every decision you make, sir. Those are the rules." Jarvis interjected.
"Fine, fine, yes. What about numbers, statistics, probabilities? What would be the work environment there for Marina? Will Xavier be able to settle in a new school? He's so young...." Robert paced around with anxious uncertainty.
"Sir, I'm afraid numbers won't fare you too well in this case either."
Anne's words rang loud and clear in his ears. Think about it, Robert. Your pending grant applications, all those questions on your credibility as a scientist, you could leave them behind.
*****
It was dawn and the weight of the decision pressed on his shoulders. Robert ran a glance at the holographic screens displaying abstract data patterns, his entire night's worth of work – an attempt, and a reflection of the potentially infinite worlds that awaited them at this complex crossroads of his personal and professional life.
"Sir, if you don't mind, might I confess something?" Jarvis asked.
"Yeah, go ahead," Robert nodded absentmindedly, the lack of sleep encroaching on his headspace.
"I'm afraid the more you try to control every variable, the less you'd be able to predict the final outcome."
"I cannot be walking in blind, Jarvis."
"Might I indulge you in an analogy?" Jarvis suggested.
"Would you rather be a classical particle with a definite trajectory or a quantum particle with infinite possible trajectories?"
"The quantum one, why?"
"Precisely. This opportunity, in the larger scheme of things, is a choice, isn't it?" he continued.
"Yes?" Robert waited for Jarvis to elaborate.
"And isn't every success or failure a complex, chaotic, beautiful permutation and combination of choices?"
That's when it started to click. Just this one decision did not guarantee him success, failure or even fulfilment, but opting for the path this project offered felt like a step in the right direction. As such, he would never know the outcome if he never tried.
Although the scientific community hadn't reached its consensus on the quantum many-worlds interpretation, that morning, Robert embraced the idea that every decision is a wavefunction of possibilities collapsing – with the potential of opening up a universe of possibilities or closing one all the same.
And then realization dawned. Entire worlds awaited him at the mercy of one decision. His decision. Whether he chose to stay or go, he would be opening and closing possibilities for himself either way.
"Well, I guess there's only one way to find out," Robert said, a faint smile playing on his face.