A cold breeze was blowing in off the street. A young man heard sounds of students walking.
Connor Witt, a first-year student, was standing in front of the faculty building, nervous about taking the first step in the world of knowledge.
.
It was quite a long journey for him to get here. He was a curious child, highly interested in the world around him. He wanted to know everything! How does TV work? How do car rides? How does plane flies? Why are the sky blue and the grass is green? There were so many questions and so many answers back then!
At the age of four, Connor had learned how to read and write. Seeing his child's curiosity, His father bought him a book on his birthday, not some ordinary book, but the Physical encyclopedia for children! When baby Connor opened it for the first time, he felt like he had found a treasure. Answers to practically all of his questions, the book even contained the answers to questions he couldn't think about, book of human wisdom uncovered mysteries one by one.
At the age of six, our curious child has read many pop-science books, watched sci-fi films, and was eager to finally go to school, where competent teachers will tell him how this world works in detail. But to Connor's disappointment, when he finally went to the school, teachers there weren't so competent as he thought. They couldn't answer his questions and tell him to: "Behave properly and not cause a commotion." while his curiosity was left unsatisfied. His classmates treated him like a weird boy and a bookworm, so his peers' relationships weren't as smooth as he would like to.
Although, there was one good point in school life - math. His math teacher was a strict, middle-aged woman. All of Connor's classmates hated math and her in particular, but for him, she was the first real teacher on his path. She was the only teacher who answered his questions, tried to teach him something, treated his curiosity with respect. She was the first to tell Connor how science worked, how people found out answers from his books in the first place. With her help, Connor finally understood the difference between pop-science and fundamental science. It was accuracy.
Pop-science tried to simplify and popularize complicated scientific theories and inventions to the mass public, but fundamental science was different. The primary goal of fundamental science was to explain reality in every smallest detail! To answer every possible question! To grasp all the wisdom of the world! To create an absolute theory that will connect every piece of knowledge that humans can learn!
After understanding that, Connor fell in love with science.
At the age of ten, Connor learned the basics of math, physics, biology, and chemistry. He was greedily consuming everything that he could learn. Every time he learned an answer to one of his questions, there were five new questions, and it was of the things that Connor hated and loved at the same time. The feeling of not knowing something ignited his inner interest, but at the same time, he felt like 24 hours in a day were not enough to learn everything he wanted.
Loneliness was a thing that bothered Connor. All his classmates were just regular kids and not scientific freaks like him, so he didn't know how to communicate appropriately with them. It is possible that his studies were a way to escape reality for him. From the chaotic world of feelings, relationships, and personalities, to the world of laws, logic, and theories. Study reality to escape the reality, ironically, isn't it?
At the age of fifteen, his knowledge was at the level of a first-year student in math, physics, biology, and chemistry. He also studied sociology as a hobby, to learn some humanitarian side of science and not only the technical part. As his age was growing, most of his peers were pretending that Connor didn't exist, they just got used to him and didn't pay attention anymore, but to their surprise, he made a friend! It was a boy an age older than him, called Harry. Harry loved sci-fi movies, comics, and games, so they got along quite nicely.
It was his first experience in friendship, so Connor didn't know anything, he tried to read some books about relationships, but he couldn't find a practical approach.
As Connor was trying to study the matter of friendship, he was changing his behavior according to the last book he had read, trying to figure out which behavior would satisfy his friend. Harry felt that their relationships with Connor became more and more artificial, it wasn't something that Harry could not withstand, but it made their friendship feel way too formal and not natural. Harry finds some new friends and distanced himself from Connor as time goes by. It wasn't like Harry made a decision or something. Still, he naturally picked the second option between awkward Connor, who behaves differently every time they have met, and his new friends, just ordinary boys. Gradually, the friendship between Harry and Connor faded away, there were some attempts from Connor to save it, but it was already too late.
On his way home, Connor ran into Harry and his friends, he tried to make some small talk with them, but he certainly didn't expect to hear what he had heard:
-Hey, Harry, is it your friend that we heard about?
-Oh..... Nah, we just talked a few times
-Ah, okay, let's go then
-Let's go
And they left. Connor finally realized that his first and only friend became just a mere acquaintance, and it was painful. The sense of losing something struck him like lightning. It wasn't a feel from the movies or books, where characters scream and cry loudly from emotions. It was hollowness. Dull feeling that slowly eats you, your good mood and your will to do something, he walked home empty-minded, feeling nothing, if earlier on his way home he would think about some questions and problems he would study at home, then now it was just empty void and nothingness in his thoughts.
Connor procrastinated for a long time after that. It just felt like his friend betrayed him. He had no will to study anything, neither did he has the will to watch movies or read books. Dullness. Infinite Dullness
Connor was in his room, lying on a bed and looking at the ceiling aimlessly. He heard a knock on the door and his father's voice.
-Can I come in?
Connor got out of bed and lazily opened the door. His father walked in with a worried look on his face and sat down.
-Hey, son, are you okay?
-Um, why do you ask?
I have noticed that you were acting strangely last time, so I'll ask again, is everything okay?
-Uhh, if you look from that perspective, I'm not okay, I suppose...
-What happened? Can you tell me?
And Connor told his father everything about Harry, his condition, and his overall situation.
-I see.....
-But I still don't understand why he said he doesn't know me. I've been trying to act as a friend, read so many about it, and still failed. Why?
-Well, it is because friendship can't be learned from the books.
-Huh?
-You see, Connor, relationships aren't science-like. You can't derive a formula for a successful friendship. It's all about sincerity and honesty. You can't lie to him because all relationships are built on trust, and if you lie once, your trust will be broken forever.
-But I never lied to him!
-Are you sure? Were you honest in communication with him?
-Um, I don't know...
-You are smart, Connor, very smart, but there are no correct answers in the relationships. You tried to form a new personality for Harry according to the guides you have read, but Harry, as I can see, wanted to be friends with you and not the books you have read, so he wanted you to be yourself, speak and act like you wanted to, and not how the books had told you.
-What does it mean to be myself? Not I am myself every time? Isn't my trait to find the correct answers making me myself? I don't understand.
-Good question Connor, not many adults have figured it out, this is a highly personal question that no one but you can answer, but I can give you a hint.
-What is it?
Try to reminisce the feeling when you are passionate about something, like when you study something with a fire in your eyes?
-I can remember it, yes...
-It is it, the time when you are completely honest with yourself and the world. This is the key. Someday you will figure out what it means to be yourself, but I think the most honest and pure feeling you have is curiosity, so hold on to it.
-I... I... I don't completely understand what you mean, but somehow, I feel that you are correct... I feel like if I continue to walk the path of science, I will figure out how to be myself someday.
-Then pursue this feeling, it may be quite hard for you because you're a man of logic, but I believe you will succeed.
Connor's father stood up and would leave his son's room but was stopped by a voice.
-Hey, dad
-Hm, what is it?
-Thank you
A soft smile appeared on father's face
-You're welcome
Connor will remember this day as one of the happiest and warm in his life. He finally understood what he had done wrong and what to do next. The most challenging thing in his life - relationships, finally became more straightforward than it ever was
At the age of seventeen, Connor has raised his knowledge of math, physics, biology, and chemistry to the level of a third-year student. Also, he was preparing for the exams to go to university, It's not like he had insufficient knowledge to pass the exams, but he needed to adjust his raw wisdom to the exam format. Of course, Connor passed all of the needed exams ideally in the end. He decided to study physics at university because it would give him the most fundamental explanation of world laws.
At the age of eighteen, Connor Witt, a first-year student, was standing in front of the faculty building, nervous about taking the first step in the world of knowledge.
University, the sanctuary of knowledge and wisdom, a place that was designed purely for scientific purposes, Connor stood here for the first time in his life, eager to enter and worried at the same time. After a deep breath, he finally made up his mind.
The first step, then the second step.
Connor muttered to himself: "Why am I even hesitating..."
Third step, Fourth st.....
The world around him became black.
There was nothing in his field of vision, not "black" but nothing, void, space. Connor started to feel how this nothingness slowly devoured him, or was it just an illusion? No one knew.
Maybe it was seconds, or it was decades before Connor saw the rays of light made of different colors rush through and beside him. The river of light seemed everlasting. In this stream of eternal light, Connor felt something. It was something that was a part of him from the beginning. It was like one of his senses was inactive in his life and this sense awakened. It was a sense of energy. An energy that connected every part of the world, from the smallest particles to giant stars, everything had this energy in them, and Connor had it too. Indeed a wonderful feeling.
While enjoying his newly acquired sixth sense, Connor saw the bright flash of white light and instinctively closed his eyes to protect them, and the scene around him changed.
When Connor slowly opened his eyes, he saw a beautiful starry sky in front of him, the words of all languages in the world will not be enough to describe the grace and elegance that Connor was seeing right now, a truly magnificent scene. It would be perfect if not for the question that was raging in Connor's mind right now
-WHERE AM I???????????