CREATIVE NONFICTION 53knowingly. Azimuth and elevation; an east, north,
up vector system; GPS coordinates; an XYZ
coordinate system with an origin placed anywhere
you wanted, augur-style—these were all geodetic
datums I had to connect mathematically in my
conversion program.
“Which coordinate system do we most need for
the cosmic ray data?” I asked him, pretending to
know what I was talking about. Stan reached up to
readjust his giant tinted glasses.
“Depends on what you want to measure.”
Creating Geolib was not easy, but I did it. In my
brown notebook, I drew many oblate ellipsoids
skewered by various sets of axis lines without fully
understanding what I was seeing. I actually used
the trigonometry and pre-calculus I had learned
in school. I tried to imagine what the Earth would
look like as a geoid—a more accurate model of
our bumpy, uneven planet—so we could measure
surface elevations more precisely. I fell asleep on my
keyboard trying to learn how to create an array of
pointers in the C programming language. I ate an
obscene number of Nutty Buddy bars. I asked the
other undergraduates for help with partial differen-
tial equations and was frustrated by my inability to
understand the math.
Whenever I’d banged my head against the
mathematical wall for more than a few hours, I’d
take my calculations to Stan’s cubicle. His desk
was overflowing, mad scientist-like, with papers,
folders, mugs with various levels of dark liquid,
multiple computers, and assorted gizmos and
gadgets, including a high-tech laser photometer.
Stan was a conundrum: he’d never gotten a
college degree, but he had worked for decades in
astrophysics research for a reputable university; he
was atheist, but he loved living in Utah. Sometimes
we’d get sidetracked from our Geolib diagrams by
intense dialogues about religion. I’d rib him about
drinking coffee—forbidden to Mormons—and he’d
retort that I was supposed to eat meat only in times
of winter or famine, or didn’t I know my own
Word of Wisdom scriptures? It turned out that Stan
was technically one of those ex-Mormons I had
been taught to fear, but he was not like any kind
of anti-Christ Korihor I had pictured: Stan had
refused to attend church at the ripe old age of eight,
when he felt pressured to proclaim in front of the
entire congregation that he knew the Church was
true. He didn’t know, he said. He could believe, he
could even want to believe, but he couldn’t know.
“But there are many ways of knowing some-
thing’s true,” I countered. I talked about how God
sends powerful experiences and feelings to those
who ask in faith. This is great missionary experience,
I inwardly crowed, spiritually patting myself on
the back.
“I thought you weren’t supposed to seek for
signs,” Stan responded. “I thought you were
supposed to live by faith.”
“Well, the scriptures tell us to search for truth,
and God’s willing to open the door if we knock.
But the more we know, the more we’re responsible
for, so it’s really an act of mercy if he withholds
something we’re not ready for. Milk before meat,
and all that.”
“Whatever you say!” Stan replied cheerfully,
lifting his ever-present coffee mug to his lips. “I’m
vegan, so I don’t want milk or meat. I’ll stick with
coffee, thanks.”
“You’re so frustrating, Stan!”
He just grinned. “I think you mean Sa-tan. Now,
get back to work. You’re going to kick ass in college
if you keep working this hard.”
A more pleasant apostate you will never, ever meet.on my eighteenth birthday, one of my
little sisters came clattering down the stairs to tell
me that Paul, a boy from my physics class, was at
the front door. I had begun to consider that black
holes and boys were not mutually exclusive topics
of interest after all, and I had developed a crush on
him. Paul delivered two gifts: a burned CD of the
NeverEnding Story soundtrack (Mormons love their
cult classics) and a book by Richard Ingebretsen
titled Joseph Smith and Modern Astronomy. I still have
the book: the pages fall out no matter how lightly I
try to turn them.
Ingebretsen was part of a cadre of Mormon
science lovers who wrote books describing their
grand unified theories of science and religion.
These books were never official publications of
the Church, but they still pervaded our discourse
and occupied hallowed spaces on our bookshelves.
“With his mind,” Ingebretsen decrees on page one,
“Albert Einstein reasoned what Abraham had been
told by God thousands of years before. It took
science over 3,500 years and the superb intellect