I got a ride to an 8:00AM optics midterm I was predictably unprepared for. In the car, leaky coffee thermos in one hand and my past homework assignments in the other, staring into traffic between every question to reassure my motion sickness that I hadn’t forgotten about it, I planned to ingest as much content as I could in the next 45 minutes. Could I still do well on this midterm? I believed so. It was an unlikely timeline, but all I needed was for the story to line up just enough to be possible.
An electromagnetic wave can cross through mediums, such as plastic and glass, that have different properties. The wave may propagate differently within each material, but at the boundary between the materials, certain equations must hold true. I doubt this is what it actually implies, but what I want to believe is that these equations string the wave together unconditionally, no matter where the wave was or what the wave was doing before—that within the constraints of the boundary conditions, anything can happen.
There I was, sitting in the car, wondering what sequence of events could possibly result in a good test score at this point. But no matter the improbability of the story, I trusted the universe could work its magic, threading just enough consistency through all the events to make the sequence possible.
Here are some unlikely ways life could’ve unfolded:
In my 45 minutes of studying, I’d be drawn to all—and only—the convenient practice problems. I would flip over the test, know how to answer every question, and try not to laugh.
The midterm would get cancelled, with everyone receiving an auto-100%.
The professor would pull me aside before the midterm and whisper: Tiffany, you don’t know it yet, but you are the next great optics mind of your generation. Find the Gaussian beam that lies within. Suddenly metamorphosed, I’d channel my inner Gaussian beam, whatever that means, and ace the hardest optics exam the world had ever known.
I can’t even remember how I did on this midterm. I’m sorry to report that none of the above comedies played out. Still, I think there was a non-zero chance of them happening. I’m willing to trade some plausibility for optimism! It makes room for the unexpected, the absurd, the fun. Sometimes it feels like that’s the whole point.
When I worry about how things could possibly work out the way I want them to, I want to think earnestly, gazing upwards, that stranger things have happened.