The Emoticon Generation (15 page)

“But we’ll steer clear of those,” the anchor said. “I think our audience fell asleep halfway through your last sentence.”

Rose then Russell looked at their plates and started eating again.

“Exactly,” Doctor Burrows answered. “Although if you’re interested, there are quite a few details at our website.”

“I’ll be sure to check that,” Joan said.

“Shh,” Roger said.

“Let’s get to the bottom line, Dr. Burrows,” the fair-haired anchor said, “to the thing simple people like me and our viewers can understand. You discovered a freedom hormone?”

Roger squinted. So did Joan. Russell looked up.

“No, no, wait,” Doctor Burrows waved a hand as if to wipe away confusion. “Let’s be clear.”

“Be clear, but be clear quickly,” the anchor rushed him. Joan raised an eyebrow.

“Very well. The discovery most pertinent to your audience is that whenever we use our imagination, a hormone is released into our bodies that—”

“A freedom hormone?”

“No. A hormone that gives us the
feeling
of freedom.”

Joan leaned back as Doctor Burrows spoke, “Whenever we imagine, we feel a little bit freer.”

Roger frowned. Russell looked at Roger. Rose looked at Russell, then continued to eat.

“What are the implications of this, Dr. Burrows?” asked the anchor.

“We do not know the implications of this yet, but if you think about it, there is something philosophically beautiful about it.”

Joan bit her bottom lip, as the anchor prompted, “What do you mean?”

Doctor Burrows put his hands in front of him, trying to make a ball with his fingers. “Think about it... A person can live in a tiny prison cell. But if he has the actual ability to set his imagination loose whenever he wants, he will feel free.”

“Wow.”

Roger’s eyes widened. “Huh,” he said.

Russell looked at Joan, then at Roger again.

“Indeed,” Doctor Burrows continued. “Contrariwise, a person can have all the physical freedom in the world, but if he does not feel free to imagine, his brain believes it is in a cage and that the man is not free at all.”

“That’s almost impossible to believe.”

Joan, mesmerized, nodded. Russell also started to look at Doctor Burrows, intrigued.

“We’ve proven it scientifically,” Doctor Burrows said simply. “I can show you the documentation.”

“No need, no need,” the fair-haired anchor laughed, and laid a hand on Dr. Burrows’ arm. “I’ll take your word for it. Any more future discoveries you expect to make?”

Rose looked at Russell, then at the TV screen, then back at Russell.

“I doubt we’ve even scratched the surface,” Doctor Burrows said.

“You’ll keep us updated, I hope.”

“Of course.”

“Thanks. It’s been a pleasure having you here, Dr. Burrows.” The anchor turned to look at another camera, which now show a close-up of him and his fair hair. “You heard it here first. Scientists have discovered the freedom hormone!”

“No—” Dr. Burrows’ protest was heard off-camera. Almost immediately, his mike was cut off.

The anchor continued without blinking, “Moving on to our next item. Does cat food give your cat cancer? Susie Lang has mor—”

Roger muted the TV again, and returned to the food on his plate. “Interesting,” he said.

Joan looked at her plate, but for the moment did not continue eating, “What does it mean, though?”

“I don’t know,” Roger said, his mouth full.

“It sounds like it means something. We can feel free when we’re not free if we just think about whatever we want? That’s crazy.”

“I don’t know,” Roger said again.

“It means,” Russell said, “that when I’m in class and I think about playing outside, I’m free.”

“You just do your homework,” Joan said.

“You asked what it means,” Russell insisted. “It means I can think about whatever I want whenever I want any time I want!” And he smiled a devilish smile.

Rose clamored, “I also want to think about whatever you want!”

Roger laughed, Joan caressed Rose’s hair, and Russell raised his hands in triumph: “That’s right! Everyone has to think about whatever I want! Yes!”

Joan laughed, and said, “Eat your peas.”

~

Russell walked into the living room, holding his math book in his hand. Roger was lying on the sofa, reading the daily newspaper. Joan was sitting at the table, crossing things off a list.

“Mom,” Russell said, “I have homework for tomorrow and I don’t know how to do it and I don’t want to do it.”

Joan looked down at Russell. “What is it?”

“I don’t understand how you divide the thingies.”

“What thingies?”

“You know, the thingies... Fractions.”

“Ah,” Joan said. “Give me the book. I don’t remember exactly myself, but maybe I’ll figure it out...”

Roger looked over his newspaper at Russell and Joan, as she opened the book. Roger’s eyes slipped past the TV on their way to the newspaper.

“Oh!” Roger said, his hand looking for the remote, “the news is already on.”

“Not now, Roger,” Joan said. “I’m trying to read Russell’s math.”

“I’ll put it on quietly.”

“—Have an exclusive interview with Doctor Burrows, whose research team has discovered the secrets of imagination,” the fifty-year-old anchor was saying, his hair moving as if it was a statue glued to his head.

“Exclusive interview?” Joan looked up from Russell’s book. “Wasn’t he on TV yesterday?”

“That was another network,” Roger said. “They can’t say he said something to someone else, so they’re talking as if they’re the ones who discovered him.”

“Nice,” Joan returned to the book.

“Good to have you with us, Doctor Burrows.”

“Thank you for having me.”

“Doctor Burrows, let’s get to the nitty gritty: You are saying that imagination is literally good for us.”

“Not exactly. My research has shown that imagination is
physically
good for us. When we use our imagination, a hormone is released, granting us a feeling of well-being. It is an interesting philosophical point that though imagination is good for us we spend most of our lives caging it. It would behoove us to let it roam.”

The anchor with the perfectly-aligned hair glanced at the camera nervously, then looked back at Doctor Burrows. “Doctor Burrows, we’re on television. Use simpler words, please.”

Doctor Burrows blinked a couple of times, then said, “All right. My point was that we are keeping imagination locked in a cage most of our lives. A team under my supervision has begun researching what exactly is the nature of this cage.”

Rose came into the room shrieking, and, just as she reached the couch, jumped up, and landed on top of Roger’s stomach.

Roger doubled-over, as Dr. Burrows continued, counting points of research, “How can imagination be blocked? What are the bars made of, synaptically? What are the long-term implications?”

“What have you discovered so far?” the anchor asked.

“We’ve discovered nothing, we have only begun this avenue of research last week.”

“But what can you tell us about the results?”

Joan looked up at the TV screen with disapproval, then looked back down.

Russell, who was looking at her, looked at the TV screen. Roger took Rose in his hands, turned her around, and lay her on top of his stomach and chest.

“Look. I can only answer about what I know,” Dr. Burrows said. “These are the facts that we have discovered that prompted this additional avenue of research. Whenever someone blocks your imagination by saying ‘no’, a feeling of pressure inside your mind is created, while saying ‘yes’ helps release the pressure, gives rise to imagination, and creates a feeling of freedom. This much is clear, although I cannot tell you the exact neuron specifications that cause—”

“What are you saying, Doctor Burrows? Did you just say we should let kids do whatever they want?”

Roger, Russell, and Joan all looked at the television at once.

“Did you just tell us,” the anchor continued, as Rose followed everyone’s glances and looked at the screen, “that to never say ‘no’ to our kids is the most healthy thing we can do?”

“Of course not,” Dr. Burrows said. “There are two kinds of ‘no’. One is of a disciplinarian nature, and regards actions and not thoughts. You should tell kids to not run into the streets, not do bad things, not to touch electricity, and to behave properly.”

Russell blinked. Joan crooked her neck.

“Limits are healthy and necessary for the human beast,” Dr. Burrows continued, “and cause no psychological damage as far as we could determine. However...” Roger sat up. “Limiting people’s
ideas
with ‘no’s or any similar variation, like ‘that would never work’, ‘what were you thinking’, ‘that’s a stupid idea’, etc., is limiting to their imagination and triggers a psychological response that lasts longer than that particular episode. The person’s imagination, in a very small way, is blocked neurologically as a result. Headaches could ensue. Blood pressure marginally spikes, and so on.”

Joan looked at Russell, then back at the TV.

“We must remember that imagination is not limited to kids,” Doctor Burrows continued, as the anchor seemed out of questions. “As kids, we get one ‘no’, and another one, and another one, until our lives are filled with pressure of this ‘cage’ which has been built over decades.” Rose began softly hitting her father’s chest for fun. He put his hand between hers and his chest, but was distracted and did not look at her. Dr. Burrows continued, “So much so that the pressure feels natural to adults, in the same we way get used to a bad smell. Most likely, most of us don’t even feel that pressure is there.”

Joan’s fingers, which were resting on the math book, slipped, and the book’s pages flipped back, closing the book.

“Are you saying,” the anchor said, “that most of our health problems are because our imagination was limited as children?” Rose gave up trying to hit her distracted father and looked up at the TV.

“I cannot answer that without further research,” Dr. Burrows said. “I
can
say that our empiric evidence shows that adults have as much imagination as kids do. In this regard at least our brains are structured in the same way as when we were children. As far as the ability to imagine goes, our ability to imagine is not lessened in time, it is just less used. Or, more accurately, caged.”

Joan let her finger rest between her lips.

The anchor was saying, “We have as much imagination as kids?”

“Absolutely. And just as readily available.”

“Huh,” Roger said.

Joan squinted.

“That’s not possible,” the anchor said. “My kids are an exploding mass of imagination. Every second they come up with something new and crazy to drive me and my wife up the wall.” Russell smiled. Rose giggled.

“It is a scientific fact,” Dr. Burrows insisted, “that the imagination we had as kids is ours for the taking
now
.” Joan’s hands came to rest on her legs. “In the same way, the wild freedom your children feel is also yours for the taking
now
. It is within your grasp
now
. All you have to do is stop... and imagine.” Joan’s fingers began to tap on her leg. “Stop yourself from stopping to imagine, from limiting imagination... and imagine something outside your world today. A hormone will be released in your brain, giving you a minute feeling of freedom, and a minute bit of the pressure you’ve come to feel as normal will be taken from you.” Roger looked at Joan, then back at the TV screen. “Tomorrow, take time to imagine something else, outside your known purview. And the day after that, and the day after that... Within days, the feeling of freedom will be quite abundant and active within you. Do this constantly, and you will feel as free as a child.”

Russell, Rose, Roger, and Joan were all looking at the TV at the same time.

“That sounds life-changing, Dr. Burrows.”

“Responding to that is slightly outside my scope of research.”

“Yes... So what you’re saying is that freedom is... only a step away?”

“Freedom is only a step away. That’s right.”

“Thank you, Dr. Burrows.”

“My pleasure.”

“You heard it in our exclusive interview with Doctor Burrows: Science shows that freedom is only a step away. We’ll be back after these messages from our sponso—” Roger muted the TV and looked at Joan.

“That’s something, isn’t it?” he said.

“Did he say,” Russell asked, “you’re not allowed to tell me no?”

“What do
you
think he said?” Joan asked Roger.

Russell grabbed Rose and touched foreheads gently. “The scientist says they’re not allowed to tell me ‘no’,” he stage-whispered.

Rose giggled. “Really?”

“Absolutely. So I want to fly an airplane!”

“No!” Rose pointed a finger at his nose.

“I want to stop going to school and start going to circus school!”

“No!” Rose touched his nose again.

“I want to eat ten dinners every day!”

“No!”

“I want to only eat ice cream!”

“No!”

“I want to take out Rose and teach her how to drive a bus!”

Rose put a finger on his nose for a fifth time, “Okay!”

Roger laughed.

“Great!” Russell lifted Rose up in the air, “We’re taking you out to drive a bus!”

“No!” both parents exclaimed at once.

“Russell,” Joan pointed. “Go to your room. Take Rose with you.”

“But—”

“Go! Now! I’ll be in in a second with your math homework.”

“Mom!”

“Go!” Roger said loudly. And with that, Russell went to his room, head bowed, Rose in tow.

“Now close the door,” Roger shouted.

The door closed with a bang.

“That was strange,” Joan said.

“Yeah.”

“Adults have as much imagination as kids?”

“Yeah.”

“It can’t be true. It can’t.”

“Why?”

“Because it can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because it can’t be true. Do you have as much imagination as Russell?”

Roger thought for a second before he answered. “No.”

“Neither do I. Not even close. It’s every second a new idea with him. And the same with Rose. We are not like that. Our brains are different. It can’t be true what he said.”