They were ecstatic about such a wonderful observation from one of their favorite scientific icons, and they knew she deserved so much more credit than she was ever given for the contributions she made to the scientific community. They felt she should have been duly awarded the honor of becoming a Nobel Laureate, and even more so upon hearing her speak.
On their way to the bus stop, Eliza and Yesha talked with each other, as the early summer breeze blew through the landscaped brush and the carpool parking lot. As they arrived, they discovered that Vesha was waiting for the bus as well. They were both there, and it would be a while. So, Vesha decided to spend what time she could with them while waiting to head back to Princeton. Since the bus was on a delay, Eliza, Yesha, and Vesha talked for hours about dark matter, dark energy, and the quanta of physics.
They also discussed how these particles, all smaller than atoms, played a significant role in keeping galaxies together, as well as how they affected the expansion of the Universe. What stayed with Eliza most was when Vesha mentioned, “There is a possibility, someday, that we will be able to harness some of these quantum energies for use in space travel and so many other wondrous possibilities. The trick, I believe, is creating or obtaining mechanisms to direct those particles, baryonic and non-baryonic, anti-particles, and the energies they produce in a manner that will stabilize and allow us to manipulate them. Once we do, they will help us to explore the Cosmos at speeds faster than light and we will be able to get them to express themselves in any manner of our choosing, creating machines that will move from one point to another in a matter of seconds, with all associated and connected baryonic materials intact.”
As their final high school year came to a close, in 1994, Eliza soon to be 14 and Yesha soon to be 17, both turned down being the valedictorian for their high school graduation despite the requests of their scholastic supervisors. Both had been the most accomplished and highest academic achievers of their class, one after the other and no one else came close. Still, they felt it was only fair to afford someone else the opportunity to be granted that honor since universities were already offering them full-on scholarships and the best schools were already knocking on their door.
They had their educational plans worked out, and very much in advance. First, they had planned to go to New York for a couple of years for their associate's degrees, then to New Jersey for a couple of years for their bachelor’s degrees, and then finally back to Massachusetts for their masters and doctorate degrees. They had both done exceptionally well on the SAT, the ACT, and the entrance exams, and had enrolled to study at New York City University, Princeton, MIT, and Harvard University. They were quickly accepted by each school, long before their high school graduation, just as they had hoped for and planned. In truth, any university would have been proud to have them, so the schools that accepted them, also interestingly accepted their proposed collegiate schedules and timelines from their associate's degrees to Ph.Ds.
Both very attractive young ladies, slender, pleasantly curvy, fit and healthy, with medium-length hair and Shirley Temple curls maturing into A-Frame medium length wavy bobs, sometimes pulled back in a darling up-do, Eliza with blonde hair, crystal blue eyes, and a soft complexion, and Yesha with brunette hair, green and hazel eyes, and a light tan complexion, found it would be easy to have dates with the boys at any moment they wished during their first year of college, but together they had decided to fend any potential suitors off for a while. They had goals.
Furthermore, as easy as it would be to date, Eliza was going to be turning fifteen the following summer after their first year in college, so she was more focused on her studies anyway. Together with Yesha, they both decided it would be best to wait until Eliza was eighteen.
In an effort to blow off steam and stay focused on and alerted to their priorities, both Eliza and Yesha went on jogs every day and concentrate on their school work. They would not let romance or premature parenting get in the way of their studies nor their goals, not that doing so was incompatible in any way with achievement or success, but they knew their attentions lie elsewhere. Both were serious about what they hoped to achieve in life, from increasing longevity and quality of life to raising the bar for humanity, making the world a safer place to be, and making exploration a safer and more enriching objective with successful and prosperous results.
It was at the end of their first year of college, studying for their associate’s degrees at New York City University, and shortly after Eliza’s fifteenth birthday when Eliza found out that her parents had been stricken by acute leukemia and passed away. This struck Eliza to the core and sent her into a sort of hysteria, tears streaming down her cheeks. She was crushed.
Yesha took her for a walk, and listened to her, “How is it that my parents were so strong, so intelligent, living such healthy lives, and then this? Ugh, I can’t stand it!” she said. “This isn’t right! Nature is playing a brutal game. Much of what it does is random and has led to so much beautiful evolution, but with all that is going on and the suffering prevalent, I am going to figure out just what the pieces of that game are and make all the right moves! We’ll never get anywhere letting Nature take its course alone. So then, I dare to say we are going to change that game, so life doesn’t have to be so miserable and so short! It has never had to be, so why do we let it be?”
While Eliza knew there was much more to her question than she let on, and that perhaps it was time for humanity to take over its own destiny and give Nature a break, both Eliza and Yesha were sorry for the loss of the two people they considered two of the most precious in their lives. They stayed with Yesenia, grieving together in her parents’ home that summer.
Eliza, Yesha, and Yesenia attended the funeral. After the proceedings and the burial service, they went home in somber spirits. Yesenia tried to change the focus of sadness to an emphasis on honesty and matter-of-factness, letting Eliza know that their parents had established a large trust for her. She helped both Eliza and Yesha go through their grieving process all the while helping them psychologically with their cognitive frame-working. Since Yesha was very close to Eliza’s Dad, both had an interest in neuroscience, and she too was torn apart.
Despite the emotional dilemma, at age fifteen and as an emancipated minor, Eliza analyzed the financial details and realized a vast estate and a financial trust were in her name—large enough to fund several lifetimes of laziness. She crunched the numbers further and realized that she could ensure Yesenia had enough money to maintain the family estate for a very long time while also giving her sufficient funds to take breaks, hire maids, go on cruises, and enjoy the world. The trust was big enough to fund a broad, high-end education for a thousand students or more. Her parents, even in death, had gifted her beyond measure, and now she would never be able to repay them. The only way she possibly could reciprocate their generosity and wisdom would be to become who they saw in her, so she began by funding her and Yesha’s academic studies, reinvesting much of the rest in some of the latest, promising, and even somewhat risky emerging tech companies, and taking care of forthcoming bills for the foreseeable future.
After the funeral services and the managing of the estate, Yesenia gave Eliza a letter from her parents:
“We’re writing this together for you, dear Eliza. We’re sorry to leave you so soon, but we have imparted a gift to the world, through you.
“Science has not yet caught up to a cure for cancer, and sadly enough, it may be possible that our society or the powers-that-be cannot yet see fit to do what is necessary to relieve the suffering and misery rampant throughout our mortal lives due to diseases that could, in fact, be resolvable. Perhaps, our dear sweet daughter, we can go on through those that live, and you must go on. We all have great hopes for you, our beloved and fearsome daughter. We have a profound love for you, and even through death. What comes after death is the endless question we all have, the answer to which I am sure we both, your father and I are about to discover. We very much would like to have
gone on this grand journey of life with you, Eliza and our wonderful friends Yesenia and Yesha, but at last, it just wasn’t ours to grace the stage of life or travel on these temporal roads any longer.
“While we’d wish to traverse the Universe with you in endless mortality, it seems that unfortunate as it may be, mankind has become a-wash in mediocrity and lust for misery and death. They choose to squander their time away from the societal norms, status, and in un-purposeful pursuits. They dedicate every waking hour to entrenched establishments and overgrown bureaucracies rather than transcend those mockeries of breakthroughs to carry humanity’s legacy to the farthest reaches of the Universe and beyond.
“Now, we’ll be going to the place that no honest man or woman knows exists or does not exist; yet, no matter where we go, our hope is to see you again, whether it is in trillions of years or in a grouping of decades. May your love for humanity stay within your heart, may the peace within that comes from being well-grounded in the ethics of well-being stay within your mind and your soul, and may much promise, knowledge, discovery, innovation, peace, love, and kind laughter accompany your days forward.
“Much love to you, Eliza, our lovely daughter, and to our dearest friends, Yesenia and Yesha.
“X’s and O’s…”
“Your Mother and Father and Friend to the very End.”
After everything was taken care of, hugs and tears shared, and Eliza and Yesha returned to New York to finish their associate’s degrees, life continued on. They both progressed forward with their life-long journey and their quests of personal development. They also had many other experiences in store for them, beyond what they could imagine at that time in their lives.
Despite her grief, Eliza was dedicated to understanding what had caused this ill state of affairs and was already well-versed on how to overcome it. She would not give up on life to the evangelization of society’s increasing quantity of preachers of doom and politically theatrical titans of destiny, become vulnerable to superstitions that remove her control over her future, nor their fear-mongering and hatred of those that despite all, she loved. Instead, she would fight for those who preached love, kindness, compassion, consent, and empathy. For the dreamers and the disadvantaged, she would battle, and she would do everything and anything she could to create an opportunity for life in a Universe of hope rather than of despair. There was so much to live for, even though there were so many lost in their paths of life, and there were so many they had lost to the unfortunate circumstances that led to death. She was going to do everything within her power to do something to reign in the sadness and bring in the hope. Humanity needed hope, and she would do everything to bring that to this Earth. She would do this to not only bring it in droves but to ensure it was most certainly the kind of hope that would not be in vain.
Chapter 07: Eliza Williams, Section 4
Eliza had already enrolled in physics as her major but following the passing of her parents she realized she was only human, and she too thirsted to bury her suffering. She chose to bury her suffering by additionally enrolling in Neuroscience and Bio-Technology majors, for a triple-wham focus toward the understanding of the disease and neurological disorders—even the type of complications that suggested pain, suffering, misery, and death through negligence or design were factors that were necessary for life. She knew joy could be had through diligence, and that challenges would present themselves without humanity increasing that suffering of their own accord. All the while, Yesha was at her side, working with her, studying with her, listening to her, and even studying her own major in Neurology, now coupled with Psychology. Yesha had admired Eliza’s father, because he had been a good man, and she too felt that both Eliza’s parents had shared so much and been so wonderful to her mother and her. She also felt that Eliza’s parents had so much in common with them when it came to personal values and ethics. She too wanted to understand the physical and socially-experiential mental nuances.
Through all of the challenges that lie before her, Yesha knew that Eliza was more than one of many and in fact her parents’ greatest accomplishment. She was grateful for their unique relationship, and she knew that due to their friendship as well as Janice’s, Gale’s, and Yesenia’s phenomenal parenting, mentoring, and training, Eliza was truly growing to be a mighty character and the amazing and powerful human being they always knew she would become. Yesha also saw that Eliza had no lust for power and wanted to protect her in every way possible.
Yesha was indeed brilliant and bless her soul for she was as genuine and amazing in every way a friend could be. She knew that just like she did, Eliza too, at this tough time in her life needed social, emotional, and moral support. Yesha looked to Eliza many times, as a little sister and much more. She happened to see Eliza as vulnerable at times, even though they were the best of friends. Yesha noticed of late that Eliza had buried herself in her studies quite a bit more than usual, so she decided to confront her about it. Perhaps her pursuits were noble, but she had seemed to lose interest in the ideal balance of life her parents had always taught.
“You know, studying what you are studying is an amazing ability at your age. You’re only fifteen, yet you’re taking on three different majors. I’ll go down in the history books as telling you that that is quite impressive.” Yesha paused, “Do you mind if we go for a walk, enjoy a play, and then get back to these tasks at hand? I think we both need fresh air. What do you say?”
Eliza loved her friend greatly for being there for her, through thick and thin. They’d spent their entire lives together and were more sisterly to each other than most who were born from the same parents. They had even developed their own sisterhood, and one of honesty, gentleness, kindness, and sincerity. She had confided in Yesha throughout so many occasions, and on this occasion, she told her, “I don’t look at any of this as burying myself in my studies; instead I view it as taking the initiative and having the drive to push toward a better understanding of things, so we can overcome the worst, as I am sure you would like to do so as well. I am looking for the keys that can lead us to connect the dots of neuroscience, physics, and biology so we can evolve beyond the current misery, suffering, and devastation and into a brighter and more hopeful future. I know there is something that can be done and that more ought to be done to prevent the loss of so many great hearts, lives, and minds.”
Eliza was very impressed when the President at the time had announced the Human Genome Project. She was, however, slightly appalled at humanity’s consistent lack of progress and the obstacles humanity created for itself through irrational thinking, apathy, unfounded and sometimes reasonable fears. Nevertheless, a thru quiet celebration as the visionaries and scientists moved through all of their frustrations and made each discovery and breakthrough possible, she maintained vigilance through each advance since the idea of gene therapy had taken off. All-too-often it seemed scientists had missed considering the fact that in so many cases mutations of genes could lead to leukemia. When they finally discovered this, there was an unhealthy moratorium on this type of research, setting rejuvenation science research back at least by two decades. She at least could see the writing on the wall, and she was determined to see through each study. She would see through to the truth of it all—cell to cell communication was at its core. Eliza began to understand how cells communicated to each other their various complementary assignments and found a way to encourage and augment their healing processes.
By 1999, Eliza, nineteen, and Yesha, twenty-two, had spent countless hours in the labs of Princeton, visiting Vesha and her family regularly, and they finished their bachelor’s degrees in stellar form. They had also barreled through their master’s degrees in much the same way at MIT, through lab time, study time, and conducted extensive verification of their results, while immersed in academic achievements. During the summer just before the last year of their graduate studies, they both had begun dating. Eliza had met her boyfriend, Charles—a tall, dark-skinned, golden-eyed, clean-cut, and hand
some “metro-casual” man from Ohio, when Yesha had hosted her eighteenth birthday party bash at home in Massachusetts. From there Eliza and Charles had begun to go on double dates with Yesha and her boyfriend, Eugene, a clean-cut young man whose heritage was of the inhabitants that existed in the Americas prior to modern expansion by western civilization, from Cheyenne, Wyoming, regularly.
Charles and Eugene had become well-acquainted and friends during their studies in Cambridge, and it was by chance that they had all met since the two young men were set to complete their doctorates in 2001. In their private lives as well as their pursuits, each of them understood the other quite well; they were a tightly-knit friendship unit helping each other with studies and making life both enjoyable and purposeful.
No matter how they enjoyed their time together, they were still firm with their emphasis on studies. Charles and Eugene were mature enough to appreciate vision, drive, and intellect in anyone, and they saw that in Eliza and Yesha. Each of the four had similar ideas of a better world—a world where kindness, compassion, drive, and innovation for well-being ruled the day. Because Charles and Eugene were thus compassionate, dedicated, and gentlemanly, both Eliza and Yesha knew that they would make an excellent addition to their team, and quite possibly for the long-haul. They had known that at some point they needed to be a little more social anyway, to get out and into the World, enjoy the arts, and have some fullness in the balance of life. Their rhythm in academics was so solid, they were now ready to embrace emotional connections.
By 2000, both Eliza and Yesha had finished their Master’s Degrees at MIT and had begun their Doctoral studies at Harvard. Together, the two young ladies, along with Charles and Eugene, had decided to move to a shared apartment with shared expenses in every way. The four young pre-doctorates would take the time from everything on occasion to go on trips to the city, county, state and national parks for camping, along with many other inexpensive forms of exploring and enjoying their world. They pinched pennies and visited the water slides for thrills and fun, danced at the Raves in Miami to let loose, and they even went on a cruise to breathe in the ocean mist and drink in the starry nights, and all of this during their weekends and their winter, spring, and summer breaks.
Further than Before- Pathway to the Stars Page 15