"Yeah, but that's one wild coincidence, isn't it?" [said Zaphod.]
"Yes."
"Picking someone up at that point? Out of the whole of the Universe to choose from? That's just too . . . I want to work this out. Computer!"
The Sirius Cybermetics Shipboard Computer, which controlled and permeated every particle of the ship, switched into communication mode.
"Hi there!" it said brightly and simultaneously spewed out a tiny ribbon of ticker tape just for the record. The ticker tape said, Hi there!
"Oh God," said Zaphod. He hadn't worked with this computer for long but had already learned to loathe it.
The computer continued, brash and cheery as if it were selling detergent.
"I want you to know that whatever your problem, I am here to help you solve it."
"Yeah, yeah," said Zaphod. "Look, I think I'll just use a piece of paper."
"Sure thing," said the computer, spilling out its message into a waste bin at the same time. "I understand. If you ever want . . ."
"Shut up!" said Zaphod, and snatching up a pencil sat down next to Trillian at the console.
"Okay, okay," said the computer in a hurt tone of voice and closed down its speech channel again.
Zaphod and Trillian pored over the figures that the Improbability flight-path scanner flashed silently up in front of them.
"Can we work out," said Zaphod, "from their point of view what the Improbability of their rescue was?"
"Yes, that's a constant," said Trillian, "two to the power of two hundred and seventy-six thousand, seven hundred and nine to one against."
"That's high. They're two lucky lucky guys."
"Yes."
"But relative to what we were doing when the ship picked them up . . ."
Trillian punched up the figures. They showed two-to-the-power-of-Infinity-minus-one to one against (an irrational number that only has a conventional meaning in Improbability Physics).
"It's pretty low," continued Zaphod with a slight whistle.
"Yes," agreed Trillian, and looked at him quizzically.
"That's one big whack of Improbability to be accounted for. Something pretty improbable has got to show up on the balance sheet if it's all going to add up into a pretty sum."
Zaphod scribbled a few sums, crossed them out and threw the pencil away.
Believe it or not, I am pretty good at math. Of course, I don't think I could do complicated statistics with sums like two-to-the-power-of-Infinity-minus-one. That goes a little bit beyond the math and computer science minor I earned as an undergraduate. But I used to be able to do calculus problems in my sleep. Took a class in abstract algebra, and figured out how many moves exist on a standard Rubik's Cube. (It's a very large number.) Yes, I used to be on speaking terms with math.
Right now, I'm calculating the possibility that I am home alone yet again. It happened on Friday evening, and it has happened again this afternoon. That's twice in one weekend. Unprecedented. It might be two-to-the-power-of-Infinity-minus-one. Of course, it's not going to last forever. In two hours, the members of my Book Club will appear at my front door, and we will eat and talk and discuss poet Donald Hall's final book--a collection of essays titled A Carnival of Losses: Notes Nearing Ninety. Hall died last summer at the age of 89.
I am a fan on Donald Hall's work, although his poetry can be a little uneven at times. When you write as much as Hall did during his life, you're bound to write some mediocre material. His best work, for me, are the poems he wrote after the death of his wife, poet Jane Kenyon. They are full of so much sorrow and beauty and longing. (Some of you might argue with me, but I've always thought that Jane Kenyon was a better poet than Hall. Just sayin'.)
One of the members of my book club is the widow of a retired English professor. She and her husband used to be friends with Hall. Hall came to the university a few times, to give readings and do interviews and visit classes. They became friends through these occasions.
I, myself, met Donald Hall once at a dinner honoring him. It was a brief encounter. He was quite frail at the time, sitting in a char, signing books. I knelt beside him, told him how much his work had meant to me as a poet. I'm not sure how much he actually heard of my gushing. Then, I mentioned my friend from book club to him. He immediately brightened and spoke to me for a couple of minutes of their friendship. It was an honest moment of connection at an occasion that really bred superficial interaction. The food was pretty good, but seeing Donald Hall come to life for those skinny moments was kind of magical.
So, tonight's book club meeting is sort of like visiting a person that I really knew. As I was reading Carnival of Losses this month, I could hear Hall's voice full of gravel and cigarettes. It reminded me of how lucky I've been to meet and listen to so many great poets and writers in my lifetime. Donald Hall. Sharon Olds. Jorie Graham. Kurt Vonnegut. Maya Angelou. Gwendolyn Brooks. Many others. These are people who have shaped American literature AND culture. And, despite the improbability against it, I've met them, if only for a few brief moments.
Saint Marty is two-to-the-power-of-Infinity-minus-one grateful for that.
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