Creation By Committee

A committee of five has been charged with designing a part of the universe. They set up the concept of time and submitted their outline on how to build the sun and an orb.  Much progress had been made since their plan was approved. All five have gathered today to begin their work. Phyllis, obviously in a bad mood, asks grumpily, “What happened while I was away? I had saved a period of time in order to be away a little longer than our three- day-away break each month so missed the last gathering of thoughts and activities.”

“You didn’t miss a gathering Phyllis, we have all been away for four periods,” said William. Remember, we quarreled so about the dinosaur phase on that orb we designed we decided we all needed a break.

“Really? Did you guys use your available away periods? I used one of my allotted periods and only have two left.”

Exasperated, Gordon, with a tendency to take charge, said, “OK where were we last work day?” He turned to Etta “Weren’t we talking about the effect of gravity if we decide to put people on that orb? What do your minutes say?”

“Yes we were talking about gravity,” and Etta read from her notes. ’How else are we going to keep people from flying off this orb we have designed?”

Phyllis sat up straight and said, “So everyone used some of your away days?”

“Yes Phyllis, we were all away.” said Gordon.

William, grimacing over Phyllis’ inane questions said “Can’t we get to and stay with the work we need to get done?” William was not very creative but he stayed alert and kept up and did his job.

James, a creative thinker, began to talk about the force of a spinning orb, “That would hold people onto P1. Isn’t that what we decided to call the orb, P1?”

“Hummmm, we would have to adjust very carefully so that they weren’t using all their strength to stand or move forward or just cling to something to stay on,” said William.

“Uuuuh, I think that would throw them out into space” said Gordon, looking incredulous at the suggestion.

“Yes,” said Etta, “who has the ability to calibrate that?” Etta is very efficient and keeps track of each meeting.

“George has the ability and a good staff to do those calculations for us,” said Gordon.

Once again Phyllis spoke up and said, “I want to settle what we are going to do about breeding plants. We started to talk about that but we always get interrupted with questions about the Sun. The Sun, the Sun, you’d think it was the most important thing in the plan. We just drop everything to work on the Sun.”

“Phyllis, the sun is just about the most important thing in the plan. You really need to understand that,” William answered.

Phyllis was hurt, she was often reminded that she was a little slow and it hurt all over again when someone got frustrated with her.

Etta said, “That plant business is unfinished; perhaps we should give it some thought.”

James spoke up, “I did give that some thought after our truncated session. We had discussed the impossibility of people having the strength or energy or even interest in mating the male and female flowers that we designed to multiply plants. If you remember, it took us a long time to come up with a plan for plants to proliferate but no idea how to get the male and female flowers joined. So! I came up with the possible solution of a third party.”

“You mean like a ménage a trois?” squeeked Phyllis.

“Insects!!!” crowed James proudly with a big smile.

“What is an insect?” asked William.

“How about a flying being, a small being to fly from flower to flower carrying semen from the male plants to the female plants?”

“A little person with wings to do nothing but mate plants?”

“No,no, an animal. A tiny thing like a miniature animal.”

“Like a tiny flying dog. He would lick the male plants then lick the female plant?”

Everyone was very quiet as they tried to visualize this process.

“Make the male plants issue taste like food that a flying insect would desire and after it ate it could spit some food on the next flower when it went there to eat,” said James.

“What if the insect went to a male flower next?” asked Etta.

William, with a huge sigh said, “Let’s go back to flowers. Review for me the make-up of flowers.”

Etta looked back through her notes, “What period was that when we worked up flowers? By the way have we gotten a mock-up back from the work shop?”

Everyone muttered something like “no” - - - “haven’t seen anything” - - - “we should check on that.”

“OK” Etta said. “We have had more than enough time to get a mock-up back. I’ll contact the work shop after we finish here,” and reading from her notes she said “The flower will be part of the plant that erupts in the spring, male and female flowers to mate and create seeds to plant the following year. How do they mate?”

The meeting was interrupted by Jason, a passionate designer. He was agitated and muttered something about another orb out there, right in the path where his design was supposed to go.

“It is impossible that there is another orb out there Jason, you must be mistaken. Committee has not set up another orb,” Etta said as she stood to follow Jason out so that he could show her what he had seen.

“Another orb? We haven’t even finished the first orb,” said Gordon.

As Etta and Jason came back in, Etta was obviously disturbed, muttering. “It’s there!! That orb was not approved by committee.”

Everyone turned to Etta. “Is there another orb out there?” James asked.

“Yes” Etta said softly.

Over in another corner, James was explaining to Phyllis that there could not be something out there that committee had not generated.

Phyllis said, “But we are not the only committee. Couldn’t another shift have thought it up?”

“Of course not,” said Etta. All votes and decisions must be entered into The Record by either Donna, who keeps records for her committee or me, and there is nothing in The Record about another orb being established.”

Had someone failed to enter notes into The Record? Everyone spoke at once. Was there some other ominous reason that there was another orb out there?

~

The following session of the committee found only five members present. “Where is Phyllis?” Gordon asked. “Can someone find her so that we can get to work?”

James sat down dejectedly. “The more work we do, the more complicated things become. The Devil is in the details.” He and Gordon burst out laughing.

“Who was that that suggested we design a Devil?” asked Gordon.

“I don’t remember. We worked on that for a few sessions but I don’t think anything came of it,” replied James.

Phyllis came in, so with six members they got to work. They had decided what people should look like. James had come up with a good description that all members had liked and Etta had designed some refining characteristics. They had decided on conception and birth to get them onto the planet but had not decided how to get them off. Gordon and William had worked with George and his staff to fine tune the mechanics of how people would function and the next step was to talk about emotions.

James looked at Gordon and mouthed, “The Devil is in the details.”

Gordon, covered his smile and said, “Let’s start with compassion.”

~

No one had mentioned the new orb that Jason had discovered weeks ago in quite a while. There had been intense investigation into which committee members had created it and who had failed to record it. Nothing, absolutely nothing had come of that. They had never had to face anything like this and did not know where to go next. The orb was dutifully floating alongside P1. Jason had been very proud of a carpet of particles he had designed to be strewn alongside P1 for a few thousand miles. It was to reflect the sun once they had that up and running and he thought it would be something beautiful and sparkling for the people to enjoy. It had been approved and he had repeatedly asked everyone “Don’t you think the people will enjoy it?” But now this orb was there in the way.

After weeks of dedicated meetings working out the details of P1 and its people, the committee was to begin work on the sun. They had worked with George and discussed many options and procedures and were ready to finalize the creation. As Gordon was on his way to the meeting, he was stunned to see the orb floating. No one had mentioned it to him and he seldom left the lab and had not seen it. What is that? 

                                                                                                                                                  Everyone was dejected, puzzled. The mystery of the orb was very distressing. They had started work on designing the sun and were amazed at the intricacies that were going to be involved to get the temperature correct. How could they keep P1 at the right distance from it to provide enough heat and light but not too much and they still had the challenge of the mystery orb appearing out of nowhere. George had been, once again, unusually invited to the meeting to report on progress of calculations for the design of the sun and said, “Before we get to the sun project, another problem has been brought to my attention. The rain from the clouds we created just washed all the plants and soil away. It all fell down in a huge gush and just washed everything away.”

“How do we get water to the plants then?” William asked, “Smaller clouds?”

“What do you think George?” asked Gordon.

George was deep in thought when Etta said, “sprinkles,” can you get the clouds to hold the water back and just release a little at a time?”

“Sprinkles, your right, sprinkles,” said George. He made a note. “We will work on that when we get back to the lab; now, back to the sun. My staff and I have done a month of calculations and there is no way we can get the heat needed from the sun the way we have it designed. We either have to redesign the sun or the people.”

“What about the plants to sustain the people, what kind of temperature do they require?” William asked.

“If we up the temperature to accommodate the people the way we have them designed, the plants will just curl up and die.”

“Won’t the rain we just talked about keep the plants alive?”

“I don’t think so. Not with the temperature we need, it won’t be enough.”

 “The plants will be the easiest to redesign.” “Can you get your staff to work on that?”

“I’ll need more workers. We are maxed out with the sun project.”

“Once the people and plants can manage the same temperature are we going to be able to have the sun provide that?” asked Etta.

“I think so,” George said, almost to himself, rubbing his chin with head down as he headed for the lab. “We might have to make it bigger,” he mumbled.

“Can you do that?”

“Of course,” he exclaimed. “Back to the drawing board, so to speak,” as he rushed away.

Gordon said he would find more staff members for George so that work on the sun and the plants could both go forward and he left also.

In the meantime, Donna and Jason were chatting as they watched the new orb and P1. “The first time you saw the new orb was how many weeks ago?” asked Donna.

“I don’t know, several,” shrugged Jason.

“It’s much smaller than P1 isn’t it?”

“Yes but prettier.”

“In what way?”

“Well I put - - uh it has little puffy clouds scattered around it.”

“What did you say?”

“Puffy clouds, don’t you think that’s attractive?”

“Jason, what do you know about the appearance of the orb?”

“Nothing, I swear, nothing,” and he rushed away.

Donna went into the committee immediately to voice her opinion about who created the new orb. She reiterated her conversation with Jason. Everyone was very silent as they stared at Donna. Could this be true? This was a serious matter. There were strict rules about creation. All had the ability but it had been decided early on that creation must be done by committee. What to do if someone acted alone? Should they approach Jason with Donna’s suspicions? What if he admitted he had created the orb? What could they do to enforce the rules? The meeting broke up as everyone contemplated this turn of events.

~

It came to light that Jason had everyone so excited about his carpet of particles that he was going to spread alongside P1 that when he could not make it work, he had created the orb to distract everyone’s attention.

“Jason, we have called you here to talk about the orb that you created. I am sure you are aware of the rules concerning “Creation by Committee.” Gordon spoke for the members of the committee who were all present at this meeting in order to confront Jason. Jason did not respond and was obviously shaken.

“We must not have this happen again. Do you have any suggestions how we can make sure this sort of thing never happens again?”

Jason said “I understand that this is a serious infraction. I got carried away and behaved foolishly. I don’t know what I was thinking. I will accept whatever punishment you prescribe.”

The committee sentenced Jason to work with George for an undetermined period of time. To leave his creativity behind and help with the methodical calculations and engineering work of that department would not be easy for him.

~

Work on the sun had moved along slowly. It was so very complicated. The first test models required more heat, which required more space, which required more fuel and the work had slowed for a while as the committee worked on perfecting their people. Phyllis suggested a name for P1 and was very proud when everyone liked it. They were about ready to add people to Earth.

The following weekend, all committees, George and his staff and the designers had gathered to celebrate completion of the sun and Earth. They gathered to observe and celebrate their work. As they saluted one another and watched their beautiful pair, someone mumbled “What is that?”

James moaned - “Earth is melting, it’s on fire.”

“What!” Everyone stared. Oh horrors, one side of the Earth was black with roiling black smoke billowing up towards the little moon they had put in place. The side of Earth facing the sun was melting away.

“Get it out, get the fire out,” shouted Phyllis with hands to her face and eyes closed.

Donna and Etta stood transfixed as they watched the roaring fire.

Gordon and William quickly backed Earth away from the sun and got the fire under control.  

George kept repeating, “It’s my fault. My calculations must have been off.”

 ~

Two days after the fire, all members of the committee met with George. “We had decided that the Earth should rotate in order to have light on all sides of the planet on a regular basis and to keep the temperature regulated but I had gotten so carried away with finalizing the sun design – I - -uh - - - - well, I just forgot to start the rotation. I never dreamed it would burn the Earth to a crisp so quickly in its static position.”

James asked, “George, can we repair Earth?”

“It would be almost impossible. The internal thermal heat balance is destroyed and would have to be corrected before trying to match the outer layers to what is left.”

Turning to the group James said, “So, destruction it is. Do we need to vote?”

“No” everyone replied.

Turning to George, Gordon asked, “Do you think you can get things adjusted so that once we put another Earth in place it will be safe?”

“Yes and I think it would also be a good idea if the Earth rotated around the sun,” and George, warming to the subject. “I’ll even have the Earth tilt one way and then another at times to create colder and then warming areas.”

“Yes, I like that,” and turning to the group again Gordon asked if they needed to take a vote on that.

Everyone said no, they all liked the ideas.

“Thank you George,” they chorused.

As George left, the committee members took a break. William spoke up about the dilemma of destroying the burned Earth. “Do we just shove it out into space, way out in space?”

“Let’s blow her up! Let’s have a giant explosion then start from scratch,” exclaimed James.

“We will have to make sure none of the particles blow toward the sun,” warned Etta.

“We can do that. Think about it, we can make anything happen just the way we want it to. Let’s do something spectacular,” James cried.

“Yeah!” they all agreed. “Let’s do something spectacular.”

The next morning the committee called Jason into their meeting. Gordon spoke for the group. “Jason we want to blow up the burned Earth and have the particles float out into space. Some will be large, some will be small, some will be way, way out and some will be closer in but all will reflect the light of the sun to some degree and the people will be able to see that sparkling sight when their part of Earth is in darkness. Will you get with George and see if our idea will really work?”

Jason’s eyes lit up, “I will get with him immediately.”

“Before you go, we want to tell you that we want to have your orb to rotate around the sun just as the new Earth will.”

“You don’t want to blow it up too?”

“No, it’s sound and will reflect the sun well just as it is, and Jason, you have done an outstanding job working with George. We think you have served your time and can go back to designing.”

“Thank you,” Jason smiled and rushed off to tell George.

It took some time, but finally the committee had the replacement Earth, and its little moon, rotating around the sun at the proper distance. They had moved Jason’s orb and had it rotating around the sun also.  They had accomplished keeping them safe from debris when they exploded the burned Earth. The remains scattered just as they had planned so that the night sky from earth had a show of lights.

“It has been a long time coming but we are just about ready to populate Earth with people,” said Gordon.

~

Finally, people were thriving on Earth. The sun was a raging mass of heat and light. Animals were evolving and providing food as were plants. Committee members were very pleased with themselves. They were looking forward to the upcoming gathering of both committees. They felt sure they would win first place when awards were handed out. They were very proud of their work and had all gathered today to determine who would accept the trophy for the group. They were all lined up observing their creation.

 “Just look at the results of our work, the beauty of it,” said James.

“And how smoothly everything works,” exclaimed Phyllis.

 “My favorites are those beautiful snow covered mountains and the golden undulating grasslands as far as the eye can see,” William quietly observed.

 “The green tropical forests are my favorite,” whispered Phyllis.

Gordon expressed his delight in the deserts of the Earth and they were all admiring the smooth blue lagoons and the crashing waves of the oceans onto rocky shores. Gordon spoke up, reminiscing about the week they put Earth’s little moon in place. “Remember how we had to make it smaller and move it out a little to adjust the tides because the oceans were sloshing up onto the land for miles at high tide?” Everyone laughed.

 “I love that our people and animals seem so content and happy,” said Etta.

William added, “Did you notice? That group of people over there planted seeds and harvested grain for the first time, how clever of them to discover that.”

“Look at the family on that beach over there fishing. Wait! What is that?” exclaimed Phyllis.

The committee members stared in disbelief.

“What are they doing?” uttered James.

“Did we plan that for people?” Phyllis whispered.

Gordon stared at William. “What is that?”

Two men had just stabbed a third man who was trying to defend himself.  Blood was streaming down his naked chest. Both attackers continued to thrust their knives into their victim until he collapsed onto the ground. He did not move. His blood seeped into the sand of the beach they were on.

Phyllis shouted, “Look!”

Other men, totally nude like the attackers, long black hair flying, appeared out of the trees and ran out onto the beach towards the companions of the victim. They drove their spears into the startled men and threw the women to the ground and raped them.

“What are they doing?”

“Oh my God, what have we done?”