The Lonely by Rod Sterling - A Modified Script

THE TWILIGHT ZONE, Episode 107: "THE LONELY"

Written by Rod Sterling

(Approx 6700 words)

Characters:

Corry

Allenby

Adams

Carnstairs

Alicia

Crewman

ACT ONE (of TWO)

NIGHT sky... the various nebulae and planet bodies stand out in sharp, sparkling relief. A cottage sits alone in the desert. This is a ramshackle, two room affair made of corrugated steel, driftwood and other nondescript material. Alongside is a beat-up vintage 1930's sedan. Beyond and behind this is a tiny tool shed that houses a small generator. A limp wire extends from the shed to the shack.

NARRATOR'S VOICE: Witness, if you will, a dungeon, made out of mountains, salt flats, and sand that stretch to infinity. The dungeon has an inmate, James A. Corry. And this is his residence, a metal shack. An old touring car that squats in the sun and goes nowhere -- for there is nowhere to go.

At this point Corry comes out of the house. He's dressed in jeans and a threadbare shirt. He looks up toward the pale sky and the strange, sick, white gleam of the sun, shades his eyes, walks over toward the car and stops, looks at it, touches it with his hand, then leans against it and stares once again toward the horizon.

Corry is a man in his early forties of medium height, perhaps a little more muscular than most men. His face was once a strong face; it is no longer. There is no will left and no resolve, resignation; a sense of dull, pervading hopelessness. He rather aimlessly opens the car door and leaving it open, slides in to sit in the driver's seat and look out the front windshield.

NARRATOR'S VOICE:  For the record let it be known that James A. Corry is a convicted criminal placed in solitary confinement. Confinement in this case stretches as far as the eye can see, because this particular dungeon is on an asteroid nine million miles from the Earth. Now witness, if you will, a man's mind and body shriveling in the sun, a man dying of loneliness.

Corry, shoulders slumped walking in a kind of draggy, aimless shuffle, goes back toward the shack and walks inside.

The inside, like the exterior, is makeshift and looks temporary. The furniture is made out of packing cases. There's an aged wind-up Victrola, an icebox. The bed is disheveled and dirty. He walks over to a small rickety table, takes out a dog-eared ledger, opens it and rifles through the pages slowly and rather aimlessly. Then he takes a pencil, sits down, and starts to write.

CORRY'S VOICE: Entry, fifteenth day, sixth month... the year four. And all the days and the months and the years the same. (a pause. Now he sits as he writes) There'll be a supply ship coming in soon. I think. They're either due or overdue, and I hope it's Allenby's ship because he's a decent man and he brings things for me. (he stops writing for a moment, looks down at the ledger, then continues to write) Like he brought in the parts to that antique automobile. I was a year putting that thing together -- such as it is. A whole year putting an old car together. (a pause) But thank God for that car and for the hours it used up and the days and the weeks. I can look at it out there and I know it's real and reality is what I need. Because what is there left that I can believe in? The desert and the wind? The silence? Or myself -- can I believe in myself anymore? (another pause) Disjointed thought... a little crazy... but maybe I'll become like that car. Inanimate. Just an item sitting in the sand – and then would I feel loneliness? Would I feel misery? I wonder...

He slowly lets the pencil drop out of his fingers, looks down at the book. His eyes close, then he slumps forward burying his face in his arms, leaning against the table.

[DAY] Corry is sleeping, still by the table. There's the distant roaring sound of engines, a flash of light that shines against the side of the shack and enters the window. Corry starts, rises and race to the door, flinging it open, peering out over the landscape.

A group of three men dressed in simple uniforms not unlike pilots of today. Corry races out to meet them. His fingers clench and unclench at his side. He takes a few fast stumbling steps toward them, then thinking better of it stops and then, giving in again, runs toward them again. As they suddenly meet a few feet from one another. The head of the space group stops. This is Allenby, a man in his fifties. He nods a little curtly.

ALLENBY:  How are you, Corry?

CORRY: All right. (There's a silence now)

Adams, one of the other two spacemen, looks around.

ADAMS: Quite a place you got here, Corry.

CORRY: I'm so glad you like it.

ADAMS: I didn't say I liked it. I think it stinks.

CORRY: You don't have to live here now, do you?

ADAMS: No, but I've got to come back here four times a year. And that's eight months out of twelve, Corry, away from earth. Sometimes my kids don't even recognize me when I come home.

CORRY: (very simply) I'm sorry.

ADAMS: (with a look) I'll bet you are! But you've got it made, don't you. Corry? Makes for simple living, doesn't it?(he bends down and picks up a handful of sand) This is Corry's kingdom.(he lets the sand run through his fingers) Right here. Six thousand miles north to south. Four thousand miles east to west --and all of its just like this!

Corey wets his lips. He wants to say something with desperate urgency. Allenby sees the look, looks away a little uncomfortably for a moment.

ALLENBY: We've only got a fifteen-minute layover, Corry.

Corry wets his lips and tries to keep the supplication out of his voice.

CORRY: Nobody's checking your schedule out here. Why don't we have a game of cards or something?

ALLENBY: (shakes his head) I'm sorry, Corry. This isn't an arbitrary decision. If we delay our time of departure any more than fifteen minutes, that places us in a different orbital position. We'd never make it back to earth. We'd have to stay here at least fourteen days before this place was in position again.

CORRY: So, fourteen days? Why not have us a ball? I've got some beer I've saved. We could play some cards, tell me what's going on back there --

ALLENBY: (with an embarrassed look at the others) I wish we could Corry, but like I said -- we've only got fifteen minutes...

CORRY: (his voice rising and getting shaky as if losing control) Well... well what's a few lousy days to you? Couple of card games (he nods toward the others). How about you guys? You think I'll murder you or something over a bad hand?

ALLENBY: (quietly and firmly) I'm sorry, Corry. (he starts to take Corry's arm) Let's go to the shack --Corry flings off his arm, not in anger, but in desperation.

CORRY: All right. Two minutes are gone now. You've got thirteen minutes left. I wouldn't want to foul up your schedule, Allenby. Not for a... (he looks away) Not for a lousy game of cards. Not for a few bottles of crummy beer.

Then he looks up slowly, turns to lock eyes with Allenby. He seems to catch his breath for a moment.

CORRY: Allenby... what about the pardon?

ADAMS: (squinting up toward the sky, his voice very matter of fact) You're out of luck, Corry. Sentence reads fifty years and they're not even reviewing cases of homicide. You've been here four now. That makes forty-six to go, so get comfortable, dad huh?

He laughs until his eyes reach Allenby's. Allenby stares at him, then wets his lips and looks away. Adams's laugh dies out. As the three men head toward the shack. Corry's eyes are down, staring at the sand where his feet make crunchy sounds as they sink down over the crust of the top layer. Allenby, alongside of him as they walk, looks at him intermittently.  As they reach a small knoll. The shack and car sitting here in mute, ugly loneliness. Corry stops instinctively to stare at them. Allenby touches his arm compassionately with an instinctive gentleness.

ALLENBY: (quietly) I'm sorry, Corry. Unfortunately, we don't make the rules. All we do is deliver your supplies and pass on information. I told you last time there's been a lot of pressure back home about this kind of punishment. There are a whole lot of people who think it is unnecessarily cruel. Well who knows what the next couple of years will bring? They may change their minds, alter the law, imprison you on earth like the old days.

CORRY: (turns to stare intently into the older man's face) Allenby, I have to tell you something. Every morning... every morning when I get up I tell myself that this is my last day of sanity. I won't be able to live another day of loneliness. Not another day, and by noon when I can't keep my fingers still and the inside of my mouth feels like gun powder and burnt copper and deep inside my gut I've got an ache that won't go away and seems to be crawling all over the inside of my body, prickling at me, tearing little chunks out of me -- and then I think I've got to hold out for another day, just another day. (then he turns to stare down at the shack) But I can't keep doing that day after day for the next forty-six years. I'll lose my mind, Allenby.

ADAMS: You're breakin' my heart –

Corry whirls around to stare at him. His features contort. There's an animal-like growl that shouts out deep from his throat and suddenly, losing all control he lunges at Adams, hitting him twice, crunching, desperate blows that smash against Adams's face and propel him backwards to sprawl face- first in the sand. Allenby and the other officer grab Corry's arms.

ALLENBY: (shouting) Easy, Corry, easy!

Gradually Corry lets his body relax, going the route from a trembling, shaking ague to a heavy, tired motionlessness. As he rises from the sand, gingerly touches the bruise on his face.

ADAMS: I wouldn't worry about going off my rocker, Corry. It's already happened. Stir crazy, they used to call it. Well, that's what you are now. Stir crazy.

ALLENBY: (taking a step toward him to keep him back) Back off, Adams. You and Carstairs go back and get the supplies. Bring them over to the shack.

ADAMS: (bridling) Mr. Corry has a broken leg or something? He points to Corry.

ALLENBY: Go ahead, do as I tell you. And the big crate with the red tag -- handle that one gently.

CARSTAIRS: How about the use of his buggy there? Some of the stuff's heavy.

CORRY: (as if shaken out of a dream softly) It isn't running today.

ADAMS: (laughs) It isn't running today! What's the matter, Corry -- use it too much, do you? (to Carstairs) You know, there's so many places a guy can go out here. There's the country club over the mound there and the seashore over that way, and the drive-in theater, that's someplace around here, isn't it, Corry?

ALLENBY: Knock it off, Adams, and go get the stuff.

Adams and Carstairs turn with another look toward Corry and start back across the desert. Allenby takes Corry's arm and the two men walk toward the shack. CORRY AND ALLENBY walk past the car and the shed and into the shack. Corry goes over to sit on the bed to stare numbly across the room at nothing. Allenby crosses over to the icebox, takes out a jug of water, looks around the room and then over to Corry.

ALLENBY: Glasses?

CORRY: (motions) Paper Cups. On the shelf there.

Allenby unscrews the jar and sniffs, makes a face, then pours some water into a cup, takes it in a quick gulp.

ALLENBY: We've got some fresh on board. They'll be bringing it over. Corry nods numbly. Allenby pulls up a chair so that he's sitting directly opposite Corry.

ALLENBY: Brought you some magazines, too. Strictly on my own.

CORRY: (nods) Thanks.

ALLENBY: And some old paperback science fictions. You'll get a kick out of it.

CORRY: (nods, looks up unsmiling) I'm sure I will.

Allenby bites his lip and looks at Corry for a long, silent moment, then he rises and crosses to the window.

ALLENBY: I brought you something else, Corry. It would mean my job if they suspected. (then he turns toward Corry) It would be my neck if they found out for sure.

CORRY: Look, Allenby, I don't want gifts now. I don't want tidbits. It makes me feel like an animal in a cage and there's a nice old lady out there who wants to throw peanuts at me (he suddenly lashes out and grabs Allenby) A pardon, Allenby, that's the only gift I want. I'm not a murderer, I killed in self-defense. A lot of people believe me and it happens to be the truth. I killed in self-defense

ALLENBY:  (gently takes Corry's hands off of him) I know, Corry. I know all about it. (he retraces his steps back over the chair and sits down) I doubt if it'll be much consolation to you, but it's not easy handling this kind of assignment. Stopping here four times a year and having to look at a man's agony.

CORRY: You're quite right. That's precious little consolation. There's a long, long silence. Allenby rises.

ALLENBY: Well, I can't bring you freedom, Corry. All I can do... all I can do is to try to bring you things to help keep your sanity. (a pause) Something... anything so you can fight loneliness.

Adams and Carstairs are both lugging a small metal cart loaded down with crates and supplies. They enter the area of the shack to bring the cart up close to the front door. The two of them take a heavy crate off the top of the pile, a red tag fluttering from one end. They lay it down in the sand.

CARSTAIRS: (calls) You want this big crate opened up, Captain?

ALLENBY: (calls out) Not yet. Stay out there. I'll be right out.

CORRY: I'll bite, Captain. What's the present? (he looks briefly through the window) What is it?

He rises, goes over to the window to stare out at the long, rectangular box.

CORRY: If it's a twenty-year supply of puzzles, I'll have to decline with thanks. I don't need any puzzles, Allenby. If I want to try to probe any mysteries -- I can look in the mirror and try to figure out my own.

ALLENBY: (crosses over to the door, opens it, turns back to Corry) We've got to go now. We'll be back in three months. (a pause) Are you listening to me, Corry? This is important. Corry stares at him. When you open up the crate there's nothing you need do. The... item has been vacuum packed. It needs no activator of any kind. The air will do that. There'll be a booklet inside, too, that can answer any of your questions.

CORRY: You're mysterious as hell.

ALLENBY: I don't mean to be. It's just like I told you, though -- I'm risking a lot to havebrought this here. (he points to the door) They don't know what it is I brought. I'd appreciate your waiting until we get out of sight.

CORRY: (unemotionally) All right. Have a good trip back... Give my regards to...(he wets his lips) ...to Broadway. And every place else while you're at it.

ALLENBY: Sure, Corry. I'll see you.

He goes out the door, motions to the other two men. They start to follow him. Corry i’s standing at the door.

CORRY: Allenby!

The three men pause to look toward the shack. Corry walks down the step and stands near the box, points to it.

CORRY: I don't much care what it is. For the thought, Allenby, for the... for the decency of it... I thank you.

ALLENBY: You're quite welcome, Corry. He turns and the other two follow him.

They slowly tramp across the sand and disappear over the line of dunes. He watches them go, shading his eyes again at the sun, then very slowly he looks down at the box. He stares at it for a long moment, then he kneels down to feel its sides and finally finds the two release catches. His hands go out to touch them simultaneously. He pushes them, and very slowly the top of the box opens. Corry'’s eyes widen with astonishment.

Carstairs is just clambering up them to disappear inside this ship. Adams starts to follow him. He pauses halfway up to look toward Allenby, who in turn is staring off into the distance.

ADAMS: Captain -- just man to man, huh?

ALLENBY: What?

ADAMS: What did you bring him? What was in the box? 
(As he slowly scratches the beard stubble of his square jaw.)

ALLENBY: (very softly as if to no one in particular) I'm not sure really. Maybe just an illusion -- or maybe salvation.

He turns, motions Adams up the ladder, and then follows him up.

---

The top of the box has been opened and it is empty. Corry stands at the far end of the room. He has a book in his hand which he suddenly seems to remember. He looks down at it, stares at the cover for a long moment, then opens it with both his hands. He studies it perplexed for a long moment; then he looks up again. Then he looks down at the book again and slowly he reads aloud.

CORRY: You are now the proud owner of a robot built in the form of a woman. To all intent and purpose this creature is a woman. Physiologically and psychologically she is a human being with a set of emotions, a memory track, the ability to reason, to think, and to speak. She is beyond illness and under normal circumstances should have a life span similar to that of a comparable human being. Her name is Alicia.

Very slowly Corry's head rises. Alicia sits in a chair looking back at him. While she looks human, there is something too immobile, too emotionless about her features. There is a deadness to the eyes when they look back at him, showing neither resignation nor interest and only bare awareness. She's dressed in a simple loose, flowing garment that neither adds to nor detracts from her femininity. Corry takes a few hesitant steps toward her, his eyes wide, a fright working its way out. His mouth moves but nothing comes.

ALICIA: That's my name -- Alicia. What's yours?

He stops dead in his tracks and suddenly he looks horrified, sick with distaste. He shakes his head from side to side and backs away.

CORRY: (in a very low voice) Get out of here. (now a shout) Get out of here! I don't want any machine in here! Go on, get out of here!

With an effort he grabs the girl and propels her out the door and slams it behind her. Then he leans against the door, eyes closed, breathing heavily and gradually his composure comes back. He takes a few steps back toward the center of the room. In the process he looks toward the window.

The girl stands there in the yard staring at him.

ACT TWO

DESERT DAY Corry is in the process of putting up a shelf. He stands on a small aluminum ladder, pounding with hammer and nails. The sweat pours down his face. He tests the shelf, then gets down off the ladder, picks up a towel and wipes his face, suddenly looks down at his feet. Alicia is standing there.

CORRY: Well?

ALICIA: I brought you some water. Where shall I put it?

CORRY: Just leave it there and get out.

ALICIA: It will get warm just sitting there.

CORRY: (takes a glass, dips it in the water) You'd know, huh? He takes a drink.

ALICIA: I can feel thirst. Corry wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and looks at her intensely.

As he stares at her. The same look of abhorrence as if clinically examining some foreign object.

CORRY: What else can you feel?

ALICIA: I don't understand --

CORRY: I suppose you can feel heat and cold? How about pain? Can you feel pain?

ALICIA: (nods softly) That too.

Corry takes a step over toward her, looking down at her.

CORRY: How? How can you? You're a machine, aren't you?

ALICIA: (whispering) Yes.

CORRY: Of course you are. So why didn't they build you to look like a machine? Why aren't you made out of metal with nuts and bolts sticking out of you? With wires and electrodes and things like that? (his face contorts now and his voice rises) Why do they turn you into a lie? Why do they cover you with what looks like flesh? Why do they give you a face? A face that if I look at long enough makes me think... makes me believe that... His hands grab her shoulders and go up past her neck to cup her face in a hard, painful grasp. Alicia closes her eyes against the pain.

ALICIA:  Corry --

He releases her, strides past her and out the door. Corry stands halfway to the car, his back to the shack.

CORRY: You mock me, you know that? When you look at me. When you talk to me -- I'm being mocked.

ALICIA: I'm sorry. (then she slowly reaches up, feels of her neck and shoulders) You hurt me, Corry.

CORRY: (turns to her, walks over very close to her) Hurt you? How could I hurt you? (he grabs her again) This isn't flesh. There aren't any nerves under there. There aren't any tendons or muscles.

He suddenly pushes her bodily away. She sprawls head first into the sand. Then in the same fury that knows neither logic nor understanding, he searches wildly around and then picks up a shovel. He holds it by the handle and brandishes it up high. He shouts at her.

CORRY: You know what you are? You're like that broken-down heap I've got sitting in the yard. You're a hunk of metal with arms and legs instead of wheels. But that heap doesn't mock me like you do. It doesn't look at me with make-believe eyes and talk to me with a make-believe voice. (he takes a step toward her, now the shovel up high) Well listen you... listen machine, I'm sick at being mocked by a ghost. By a memory of women. And that's all you are. You're a reminder to me that I'm so lonely I'm about to lose my mind. (And now his face is completely contorted, wild-eyed. He raises the shovel and is about to bring it down on her.)

She looks up at him and then her eyes close and tears appear. Then when she opens her eyes again we look at her as from a new and fresh perspective. The face is no longer inanimate, no longer immobile. It now has depth, emotion. It is filled with the nuances and mysteries of the woman and there is a beauty now that shines out. As he reacts. He hesitates and then lets the shovel drop out of his hand onto the sand. Very, very slowly he kneels down to crouch very close to her. His hand reaches out and touches the tears on her face and now his voice is gentle.

CORRY: You can cry too, can't you?

ALICIA: (nods) With reason. And I can feel loneliness, too.

Corry takes her arm and helps her to her feet, then stands very close to her, looking down at her face.

CORRY: We'll go back inside now. We'll eat our dinner.

ALICIA: All right. She starts to walk on ahead of him.

CORRY: Alicia.  (She turns to look at him.)

CORRY: I don't care... I don't care how you were born... or made. You're flesh and blood to me. You're a woman. (a pause) You're my companion, Alicia. I need you desperately.

ALICIA: (She smiles) And I need you, Corry.

---


He goes up to walk alongside of her as he sits in the homemade rocker. He looks off toward the horizon and then slowly begins to write as we hear his voice.

CORRY'S VOICE: Alicia has been with me now for eleven months. Twice when Allenby has brought the ship in with supplies I've hidden her so that the others wouldn't see her and I've seen the question in Allenby's eyes each time. It's a question I have myself. It's difficult to write down what has been the sum total of this very strange and bizarre relationship. It is man and woman, man and machine, and there are times even when I know that Alicia is simply an extension of me. I hear my words coming from her. My emotions. The things that she has learned to love are those things that I've loved. 

He stops abruptly as he listens to Alicia singing from inside the shack, He smiles and then continues to write again.

CORRY'S VOICE: But I think I've reached the point now where I shall not analyze Alicia any longer. I shall accept her here simply as a part of my life -- an integral part.

He continues to write silently now, turning the page to continue on the other side, and then he stops, puts the book and pencil down, rises, goes to the door and stands there looking at Alicia, She turns to smile at him and he enters the room.

CORRY'S VOICE: Because I'm not lonely any longer. Each day can now be lived with... (a pause) I love Alicia. Nothing else matters.

DESERT NIGHT Hand in hand Alicia and Corry race down toward the Sky. He stops her abruptly and points to the sky.

CORRY:  Alicia, look. That's the star, Betelgeuse. It's in the constellation of Orion. And there's the "Great Bear" with its pointer stars in line with the Northern Star. And there's the constellation Hercules. You see, Alicia?

He traces a path across the sky with his upraised hand and her eyes follow it. Then he turns to look down at her face upturned in the half-light.

ALICIA: (softly) God's beauty.

CORRY: (nods) That's right, Alicia. God's beauty.

Suddenly the girl's eyes stop as they traverse the sky. She points.

ALICIA: That star, Corry? What's that star?

CORRY stares at something in the sky.

CORRY: That's not a star. That's a ship, Alicia.

ALICIA: A ship?

Very slowly there's a ray of light that plays on both their faces and gets brighter and larger. Alicia moves closer to him.

ALICIA: There's no ship due here now, Corry. You said not for another three months. You said after the last time it wouldn't be for another --

CORRY: (thoughtfully) It must be Allenby's ship. It's the only one that ever comes close. They stop at other asteroids, then come here. (he looks away again, pensively) That means they'll probably be here in the morning. (another pause) I wonder why.

ALICIA: (takes a few steps toward him, concerned) Corry -- what's it mean?

CORRY: (turns to her and smiles) In the morning... we'll find out. Come on, let's go back to the house.

DESERT DAY, TOP OF DUNES. Three space-suited figures appear. Allenby's in the foreground.

ALLENBY: Hello, Corry. We wondered where you were.

CORRY: You have trouble?

ALLENBY: No, we had no trouble. He motions the others to follow him and they walk down thedune to stand close to Corry.

ALLENBY: This is a scheduled stop.

ADAMS: We've got good news for you, Corry.

CORRY: (looks from face to face) I'm not interested.

The others exchange looks of surprise.

ALLENBY: You better hear what it is.

CORRY: You heard me, Allenby. I'm not interested.

ALLENBY: You will be. This I guarantee!

Corry takes a few backward steps looking paranoically from one to the other.

CORRY: Allenby, give me a break, will you? I don't want trouble.

ALLENBY: We don't either.

ADAMS: (to one of the others) He gets worse! If we'd come a month later he'd have been eating sand or something. Corry now turns and starts to walk away from them, occasionally looking over his shoulder.

ALLENBY: (calls out to him) Corry!

Cory runs faster and faster and is about to break into a dead run

ALLENBY: (shouts) Corry!

He runs, crunching on the hard sand, to come up close to Corry, He grabs him, whirls him around.

ALLENBY: It's this way, Corry, All the sentences have been reviewed. They've given you a pardon, We're to take you back home on the ship, But we've got to take off from here in exactly twenty minutes, We can't wait any longer. We've been dodging meteor storms all the way out. We're almost out of fuel. Any longer than twenty minutes we'll have passed the point of departure and then I don't think we'd ever make it.

Corry stares at him and then at the other men who have come down the dune behind him.His eyes dart about, going wide as the sense of what's been said to him seeps in. He tries to speak, but for a moment nothing comes out.

CORRY: Wait a minute, Allenby. Wait just a minute. (he closes his eyes tightly, then opens them) What did you just say? What did you just say about a --

ALLENBY: (filling it in) A pardon.

ADAMS: (coming up alongside) But it won't do any of us any good unless you get your stuff together and get ready to move, Corry. We've picked up seven other men off asteroids and we've only got room for about fifteen pounds of stuff, so you'd better pick up what you need in a hurry and leave the rest of it behind. (then with a grin, looking off in the direction of the shack) Such as it is.

CORRY: (struggling to keep his voice firm but already it begins to shake with joy and excitement) Stuff? My stuff? I don't even have fifteen pounds of stuff! He laughs uproaringly, turns, and again starts to walk toward the shack.

Corry's voice goes up and down in uncontrollable laughter a combination of nerves, relief and almost unbeatable excitement. The words spew out as he walks.

CORRY: I've got a shirt, a pencil and a ledger book. A pair of shoes. (then he throws back hishead and laughs again) The car you can keep here. That'll be for the next poor devil.

ALLENBY: (evenly) There won't be any next poor devil. There won't be any more exiles, Corry. This was the last time.

CORRY: Good! Wonderful! Thank God for that! (They continue to walk again.)

CORRY: We'll let it rest here then. The farthest auto graveyard in the universe! And Alicia and I will wave to it as we leave. We'll just look out of a porthole and throw it a kiss goodbye. The car, the shack, the salt lakes, the range. The whole works! Alicia and I will just –

He stops abruptly, suddenly conscious of the silence and the looks.As they stare at him.

ADAMS: (his eyes narrow) Who? Who, Corry?

ALLENBY: (Allenby'’s eyes close for a moment) (sotto) Oh my dear God, I forgot her!

CORRY: Allenby -- (and then accusative) Allenby, it's Alicia --

CARSTAIRS: (whispers under his breath to Adams) He's out of his mind, isn't he?

ADAMS: Who's Alicia, Corry?

CORRY: (laughs uproariously) Who's Alicia? Adams, you idiot! Who's Alicia! You brought her! You brought her here in a box! She's a woman -- (and then he stops, looks away for a moment, softly, then looks toward Allenby) A robot. (and then once again looks at Allenby) But closer to a woman. She's kept me alive, Allenby. I swear to you -- if it weren't for her – (He looks around again at the circle of silent faces that stare at him) What's the matter? You worried about Alicia? (he shakes his head) You needn't be. Alicia's harmless. I tell you she's like a woman. And she's gentle and kind and without her, Allenby, I tell you without her I'd have been finished. I'd have given up. (a long pause and then very quietly) You would have only had to come back to bury me!

ADAMS: (to Allenby) That's what you wouldn't let us look at, huh? The crate with the red tag --

CORRY: (to Allenby) Sorry, Captain, but I had to let it out --

ALLENBY: That's all right, Corry. That's all over with, but unfortunately that's not the problem --

CORRY: (again with a high uncontrollable laugh) Problem? There aren't any problems! There are no more problems left on heaven or earth! We'll pack up fifteen pounds of stuff and we'll climb in that ship of yours and when we get back to that beautiful green earth -- (whispers) Fifteen pounds. (and then he shouts it) Fifteen pounds? (he looks from face to face again) You've got to have room for more than that. Throw out stuff. Throw out equipment. Alicia weighs more than fifteen pounds.

ALLENBY: (quietly) That's the point, Corry. We're stripped now. We've got room for you and nothing else except that ledger of yours and the pencil. (he shakes his head) You'll have to leave the robot here.

CORRY: (shouting) She's not just a robot, Allenby. You don't understand. You leave her behind -- that's murder.

ALLENBY: (shakes his head) I'm sorry, Corry -- I don't have any choice --

CORRY: (backing away, his voice desperate) No, Allenby. You don't understand. You can't leave her behind. (and then he screams) Alicia, come here! (then he turns to them) You'll see. You'll see why you can't leave her behind. (then he shouts again) Alicia!

As Corry races toward the shack followed by the others. As Corry smashes open the door and races inside only to find the room empty. He stands in the middle of the room looking around and then over toward the door as Allenby enters followed by the other men.

ALLENBY: Where is she, Corry?

CORRY: I don't know. But when you see her you'll know why you can't leave her behind.

ADAMS: Look, Corry. We just want you to get your gear packed and get out of here. (he looks at his watch, nervously to Allenby) We've only got about ten minutes. How about it, Captain?

ALLENBY: (gently) Come on, Corry.

CORRY: (backs further into the room) No! I'm not leaving, Allenby. I told you that. I can't leave.

ALLENBY: You don't understand. This is our last trip here. This is anybody's last trip. This is off the route now. That means no supplies, no nothing. That means it you stay here you die here. And that way, there'd be a day, Corry, when you'd pray for that death to come quicker than it's bargained for --

CORRY: (illogically, half- wildly) I can't help it Allenby. I can't leave her behind. And you won't take her. So that means I stay. (and then looking over his shoulder wildly, he screams) Alicia! Come here, Alicia! Let them see you. Don't be afraid –

ALLENBY: Corry, listen to me. I saw this... this thing get crated, shoved into a box.

CORRY: (shakes his head) I don't care.

ALLENBY: She's a machine, Corry. She's a motor with wires and tubes and batteries.

CORRY: (screaming) She's a woman! 

Allenby wets his lips, bites his lip for a moment standing there unsure, not knowing what to do.

CREWMAN: Captain? Captain Allenby?

ALLENBY: What?

CREWMAN: Captain, we've got just four minutes left. We've got to take off! If we wait longer than that, sir, we'll have moved to a point too far out. I don't think we'll make it, sir.

ADAMS: (his voice frightened) How about it, Captain Allenby, leave him here!

ALLENBY: We can't leave him here. Sick mad, or half alive, we've got to bring him back. Those are the orders. He takes another step toward Corry who backs against the wall.

ALLENBY: Corry, now it isn't just you. Now it's all of us. So that means we can't talk anymore and we can't argue with you. We simply just have to take you!

He makes a quick motion with one hand. Adams and Carstairs take a step into the room to flank Allenby and to converge on Corry. Corry, with a kind of animal shout bulls his way past them pushing Adams out of the way and bolts out of the door.

THE DESERT Corry races, stumbling, falling, picking himself up again. His voice can be heard shouting over and over again.

CORRY: (shouting) Alicia! Alicia!

The others in pursuit.

He suddenly appears at the top of a dune and stares down. Alicia is standing alone down in the depression of the sand. Hiding as she had done every time a ship comes.

CORRY: Alicia! (Behind him Allenby and the others appear, Corry starts toward the girl, Carstairs tackles him and then Adams pounces on him, They hold him tight as he shouts.) Alicia, talk to them. Tell them you're a woman -- Allenby takes a few steps down the dune and stops halfway down. He looks back at Corry.

ALLENBY: I'm sorry, Corry, I don't have any choice. (a pause. His voice is quiet) I have no choice at all.

He unbuckles the gun holster on his belt. His eyes go wide.

CORRY: (screams) No, Allenby! No! She's a human being!

Looking straight up at the dune at Allenby, who takes the gun out and fires directly into her face. Very slowly she crumples to the sand His fingers convulsively move away from his face and fall to his side. He takes three slow steps down the dune toward the crumpled figure. Then he looks down Alicia's hand clenched tightly. remnants of a broken machine, twisted and bent wires, a cracked eye, a couple of fragments of plastic, all the remains of a familiar face. 

A crewman comes.

CREWMAN: It's got to be now, Captain Allenby!

ALLENBY: (nods, softly) It will be now! (then he turns to Corry) Come on, Corry. It's time to go home.

Now numbly, without direction, Corry allows himself to be led up the dune and across the desert. As they walk. The light from the ship gets brighter and brighter as they approach it. For a moment, Corry looks back at the crumpled figure in the distance, then again turns and begins to walk. Their feet crunch on the sand past the shed, the car and all the rest of it.

ALLENBY: It's all behind you now, Corry. All behind you. Like a bad dream. A nightmare... and when you wake up you'll be on earth. You'll be home.

CORRY: Home?

ALLENBY: That's right. (a long pause, putting his hand on Corry's arm) All you're leaving behind Corry, is loneliness.

As the tears roll down his cheeks. His eyes move down to the sand by his feet and for a moment his face is impassive and immobile. He nods slowly.

CORRY: I must remember to... I must remember to keep that in mind!

THE END

Statement of Purpose, PhD - Econ

Mz Personal - Applicant Ph.D. Economics - Fall 2013

SoP Page 1/1
draft  2

STATEMENT OF PURPOSE

1\6 [opening]

The area of my interest is anything that has a lot of Greek symbols and makes me feel like I know more than anyone about a subject no one cares about. If selected for a PhD at the Great American University, I want to start understanding what these symbols stand for. In the short term my career goal is to make a stipend which is more than my salary in INR. In a few years' time I want to earn a title of doctor which will justify my claim that I had a plan in my mind all the many years that I did not have a consistent career. In the long term, everyone will leave me alone.

2\6 [education]

Throughout my education I have taken many courses in linear algebra, matrix algebra, methods of induction, conics, proof based calculus, multivariate differential and integral calculus and differential equations, 3-D calculus and thus have constantly been wondering if I was inside one of those never-ending nightmares where you keep falling. In preparation for a doctoral study I am in conversation with Professor Semiponnu of the Indian Statistical Institute who has agreed to write to you to say that I understand the title of the book he published, if I clean his motorcycle every day for six months.

In course of my dual master's degree from The School Indulged in Parties and Affair (TSIPA), Bigapple University and The Asian Version, Some University Notaversetoidiots (SUN), I studied International Economic and Monetary Finance with esteemed academics such as Prof. Bigshot Prezadvisor and Prof Eximf Economist.


Two experiences influenced my understanding of Monetary Finance greatly.

I was sitting in an exciting class on International Financial Markets at SUN and was dozing when I suddenly understood that the Greek Letters are not a language but stand as symbols for something else like bread and noodles. Consequently I unregistered myself from the class in Classic Greek.

The other was a class on Latin American crises taught jointly by Professors Raremoneymakingeconomist Whorunsahedgefund and Prof Thelawyerwho Knowshowtomakemoney. Like other professor who have ever taught me anything, they also listened to my questions and observation patiently, smiled at me and each other, and patted me on my back. I think they think I am smart.

I studied econometrics with Prof. Yetanother Greateconomist at SUN, for which I received an A+. It took inviting him to eight dinners and 20 hours of listening to his family woes. I also studied econometrics with Prof. Thirdauthorof Thetextbook at TSIPA who once openly expressed his complete shock and dismay about my being in his course.* I think he thinks I deserved much better. Both these teachers were very smart and made a course curriculum that I can send to Economics schools like yours. If you read it you will think I know a lot, but in reality, with people like me in their class, they were not able to go past page 2 of any of the readings.

3\6 [work and research experience]

In Aug 2011 I finished an internship in Investment Banking with a leading infrastructure finance company in India where I found out that some people, who have studied only till high school, make many times more money than you make. Precisely because they are good at typing very fast without making errors and they don't know or care too much about the problems of this world. They call them traders and worship them. Did you know this before you chose your career?

Since February 2012 I am working as a Research Associate with a Small Research Center Funded by an Ivyleague Prof. (SRCFIP) for a project funded by the Gatesandwindows Foundation, that studies something no one else will. Or should. I am working under the guidance of Prof. Whofundsthis Centre, Ivy League University.

At SRCFIP for the first time I came to know that graphs can also have numbers on the straight up and the sideways lines. At TSIPA and SUN we never had any numbers on the graphs.

My work at SRCFIP has directly inspired my interest in PhD. It took me three months to figure out what the project is about and five more to figure out that I cannot do it. So I needed to leave before they caught up. I also realized that at my current saving rate it will take me 102 year and 11 months to repay the loans I took to study at the Bigapple University.  Around the same time I also realized that universities are big and old and thus good places to hide.


4\6 [why Great American Uni?]

Through graduate education and work, I realized the need for more training in Economics and Mathematics to reveal my true potential and reach my goals. Of the places I am considering for my doctoral studies in Economics, Great American University is my first choice for many reasons.

At Great American University, I will learn from, and perhaps collaborate with researchers like Professor Ohmyhe Iscute and Prof. Ohmyshe Ishot.
Professor Ohmyhe Iscute the nobel laureate once gave a talk at SUN and during this talk he spoke looking in my direction. Of course he realized how smart I am. I went up to ask him some questions after the talk. He smiled at me and patted me on my back. I think he thinks I am very intelligent. Now that I think of it he never actually said anything to me.

Prof. Ohmyshe Ishot has been my goddess for many years since I saw a pic. of her on your university website. I can easily say she is the best looking professor in America. I know she also does some Economics research.^

At Great American University, I will have some of the brightest people from around the world as classmates and colleagues. In company of such colleagues, my superpower of invisibility becomes overcharged. These bright people seem to never be able to see that I am standing near, even in front of them. Or hear what I am saying for that matter. I do even better than Bilbo Baggins who could be heard when he was invisible.

The courses at Great American University are geared toward a strong base needed for rigorous research. Such as Math Camp. I think I will take it for a whole semester. The special focus on workshops and seminars in Monetary Economics/ Macroeconomics make the PhD at Great American University an ideal place for me. No home work.

And above all, you guys may actually pay me a stipend to live in your beautiful city for many years. If I was to try and look for jobs on my own, no one will give me even a janitor's job in that place.

5\6 [why me?]

I have demonstrated at every opportunity that I am a self-motivated, organized and disciplined individual (...not! If I had been I would not) have worked as a Research Associate/Assistant for two years. From 2004 to 2009 I was a school teacher. That was the only time I was in a roomful of people who knew less than me. But then they asked me to teach higher grades. Like 5 and 6. There were some moments in teaching higher and complicated grade 6 Math when I started wishing for powers of invisibility. As I mentioned earlier I have acquired these powers now. Which proves my point about being disciplined and finishing what I start.


6\6 [closing]

My zeal and acumen for Economics research, work with esteemed professors, an excellent graduate education and power of invisibility make me a highly qualified candidate for a PhD in Economics. Add to that, my other attributes that render me utterly unable to work at anything else, you have someone that you can bet will finish the PhD program even if it takes him ten years. I have nowhere else to go.

I look forward to a favorable response from the admissions committee of the Great American University.

THE END

---

* This one is factual. Not that other things are not, but this prof actually asked me to explain the z- test to him and after listening to my response said, "I think you should not be in this course. All your colleagues are at a different level of learning. But since this is 6 weeks into the course, I will pretend this meeting never happened."

^ I must apologize for this joke, really! It does reflect some people's (and presidents') attitude towards women, not mine.

Family or Ambition - Is It That Simple?

I came across this article published in The Atlantic just now. It has got few of my Facebook friends reviewing their lives and priorities.

The article starts by making itself relevant in this particular month, this is the time of the year when many youngsters will leave homes for college or University for degrees and maybe never return home. It talks about a person who left his small town in Louisiana for good, a long time ago and was thus separated from his sister. While this person went on to be a hot-shot reporter with all the glamour and living the life of big cities, his sister stayed in the town, lived near parents, and worked as a school teacher in a local school. Many years later when the sister was diagnosed with lung cancer the reporter came back to be with her for 19 months. In this time he saw how the closely knit community supported her and took care of her. So the reporter decided to give up his career and moved to the town with his wife and two children.

The article quotes Barry Schwartz. I have been read and listened to Barry many times since I first heard his Ted Talk about happiness and constrains. In this article he is quoted to mention that family members and community are constrains and as his theory goes, restrictions can lead to a more satisfied and happy life, if not the most accomplished one.

The author characterizes ambitious people as inhuman: ambitious people tend to use other people as objects are unable to empathize with others, are unwilling to give up anything for the community, etc.. You get a picture of Dicken's Ebenezer Scrooge.

I want to make a few observations about this article:

First of all, I agree with the article and the general idea that ambition and accomplishment may not be correlated with long term happiness. This although can work in either direction. While this article uses it to say that ambitious people gave up a lot and ended up only as happy as the people who stayed with the community, I can use it to say the less ambitious gave up all the fun, experiences, and perhaps money and did not end up being happier than the (successful) ambitious person even if the ambitious person is more lonely at the end of life perhaps.

I like the qualifier that Barry Schwarz uses for the ambitious people'’s happiness. He says the ambitious people “who achieved what they wanted” are as happy... … Many ambitious people will not achieve what they want. That is the nature of the quest of ambition, whether it is for finding the gold mine (migrating with community and family and making new ones) or of discovering/fashioning mathematical theories (utilizing the stereotype of scientists) success is not guaranteed. You may end up as unhappy a person as your country cousin! 

I have read some Tolstoy, Robert Brown, and other poets who idealize the idyllic bucolic life. And then I have also read Anton Chekhov who italisizes (being Chekhov he would not have highlighted (: ) the frustrations of such a life.

Isn'’t it the personal ambition that has driven the Edward Jenners of our world to work against the ridicule of the community and experiment with inoculation? In fact the word Vaccine comes from the jokes the community members played on him when they suggested he was turning people into cows (Vacca, latin - n. cow). Later he decided to call the inocculations as vaccinations to make a point.

And isn't it that the idyllic and beautiful community in the article can also be the most mean and narrow minded community, keeping an eye on every move you make and telling you what to wear, who to talk to, what to talk about, and in some instances, how the world was made and how it will end. 

Which directly brings me to my next point. Being with a community is not always a personal choice. I know a man (a Muslim) and a woman (a Hindu/Buddhist) who married each other in love, and their family was given up on by their communities (which is to put it mildly since the man was attacked many times to the threat of death.)

10 years after the marriage when a brother of this man passed away, family and community members asked him to return to the native town. So the man decided to leave his job relocate his family. Children were in the middle of the school year. As soon as the family arrived everyone tried to convert his wife to Islam and telling the children that their mother was going to go to hell. And if they love their mother and be like her they too may be triple fried and salted. Luckily the man saw his senses and came back to his life and the far away city where he had made his ambitious career. In less than 3 months these same people who wanted him to come were fed up of him and his kafir family.

35 years after the marriage their second born daughter decided to try to mend the gaps in the families and start by going to a marriage function of a cousin on mother’s side (the Hindu/Buddhist version). She traveled to another city with much effort and sacrifice with her little daughters (3,5) where they were taunted, ridiculed and insulted repeatedly over her stay. She called her father and brothers and cried a lot and returned a smarter person with a rigid determination to never ever mix with the uneducated, uncouth and uncivilized lot.

My next thought is about being alone or loneliness at an older age. 

Charles Darwin was not a particularly dislikeable person. He was a nervous sort, but him and his family were destined to be lonely not because of that. He was bound to be lonely since he believed in, and said out loud, outrageous things like humans evolved out of monkey like species by some convoluted process of evolution instead of the nice and simple, and thus utmost logical theory that God created us from muck on His last working day, just before He went on a long vacation and stopped worrying about us. [By the way this does explain how George Bush became the president of the most influential nation of the world, evolution and logic cannot explain this.]


Inside of a quaint, cute, and cuddly little community, you can be forced to be lonely. Driving the wrong kind of motored vehicle (a motorcycle for example) can make you an outcast, forget about asking tough questions, or many other simple reasons: having a child with special needs, falling in love with the wrong person (different religion or caste) or at the wrong time (too young or too old), or with a wrong gendered person. 

There is a good reason why creative, ambitious, and generally different people flock to the cities. Cities and metro centers are (comparatively more) liberated spaces, where people are allowed to be different without the penalty of banishment or good old fashioned lynching. We are still left with the reported problem of ambitious people who are left alone at the end of their lives. Is that something any ambitious (and/or curious and/or individualistic) person should worry so much about that they live all their lives doing a job they don'’t like, stay married to a wrong person (or a person of wrong gender) or say hollow prayers to the God of the community per force? Or give up live music performances? Museums? International cuisines?

I guess the answer is personal. Your native community may be based in city and may be more educated, sensitive, flexible, and accommodating than mine. I guess the answer also changes depending on where you are in life. 

This month I have been accepted at a university in USA for a PhD course in Economics. I am going to leave India for a few years. I am not very ambitious in terms of a career, I just want to be an expert at a subject. I don’'t want to make a lot of money, just enough to be able to afford myself and my parents a comfortable life. I can’'t say I like everyone I meet, but no one can accuse me of using people as objects (and escape the projectile of the first heavy person I can get hold of). I have a couple of amazing friends a half-dozen family members I truly care about. But I am proving, even to myself, to be different. I am hoping I will find like-minded people in  my university, but I have a feeling that it is not the dearth of like-minded people that keeps me alone. I am just turned inwards. I am emotionally and socially different from most people.

Today I think: 'naaaahhh! I don'’t mind being alone'. I don’'t mind being alone in Chennai, I don’t mind being alone in Santa Cruz. There is so much to do and learn and read and write. And then there is Facebook (hah!). I will learn to live and be alone like a pro and when I am 70, I will be an expert loner. But this is today. Perhaps when I am sick and old, I may not agree with what I am thinking and saying now. I may regret my choices. I may even have become religious then!

What the eff, everything rots.

O Tell Me The Truth About Love

- W. H. Auden

Some say love's a little boy,
And some say it's a bird,
Some say it makes the world go around,
Some say that's absurd,
And when I asked the man next-door,
Who looked as if he knew,
His wife got very cross indeed,
And said it wouldn't do.*

Does it look like a pair of pyjamas,
Or the ham in a temperance hotel?
Does its odour remind one of llamas,
Or has it a comforting smell?
Is it prickly to touch as a hedge is,
Or soft as eiderdown fluff?
Is it sharp or quite smooth at the edges?
O tell me the truth about love.

Our history books refer to it
In cryptic little notes,
It's quite a common topic on
The Transatlantic boats;
I've found the subject mentioned in
Accounts of suicides,
And even seen it scribbled on
The backs of railway guides.

Does it howl like a hungry Alsatian,
Or boom like a military band?
Could one give a first-rate imitation
On a saw or a Steinway Grand?
Is its singing at parties a riot?
Does it only like Classical stuff?
Will it stop when one wants to be quiet?
O tell me the truth about love.

I looked inside the summer-house;
It wasn't over there;
I tried the Thames at Maidenhead,
And Brighton's bracing air.
I don't know what the blackbird sang,
Or what the tulip said;
But it wasn't in the chicken-run,
Or underneath the bed.

Can it pull extraordinary faces?
Is it usually sick on a swing?
Does it spend all its time at the races,
or fiddling with pieces of string?
Has it views of its own about money?
Does it think Patriotism enough?
Are its stories vulgar but funny?
O tell me the truth about love.

When it comes, will it come without warning
Just as I'm picking my nose?
Will it knock on my door in the morning,
Or tread in the bus on my toes?
Will it come like a change in the weather?
Will its greeting be courteous or rough?
Will it alter my life altogether?
O tell me the truth about love.

* maybe because Auden is gay

More Tagore

Like my heart’s pain that has long missed its meaning,

the sun’s ray robed in dark

hide themselves under the ground.

Like my heart’s pain at love’s sudden touch,

they change their veil at the spring’s call

and come out in the carnival of colours,

in flowers and leaves

___

Your smile, my love, like the smell of a strange flower,

Is simple and inexplicable.

___

The world has kissed my soul with its pain,

asking for its return in songs.