INTO HIS MIND

Thump ... Thump ... Thump ...
The regular, painful rhythm pounded on relentlessly. David Ransom rubbed his temples vigorously. Damn these headaches, he thought. I just HAVE to get this dratted report finished.
But the incessant thump, thump, thump continued. David Ransom was at his wit's end. He HAD to find relief from the persistent throbbing.
Why can't the mind be more like this computer in front of me, wondered David ? Computers can be controlled, undesired functions can be switched off or removed. If only I could switch off this throbbing inside my skull.
But, thought David, the mind is probably more like a bureaucracy : red tape, inefficiency, and baffling procedures understood only by those within the system.
David was not thinking rationally. He bashed his head against the wall. He thought that no head injury could be more painful than the headache.
Then he blacked out.

David Ransom awoke in front of an imposing office building he did not recognise ... but it seemed strangely familiar. He found himself lying on the pavement, on his side, a few metres from an impressive pair of glass doors. Shaking his head, he heard a voice speak from behind.
"May I help you up, sir ?"
David turned onto his other side to look at the voice's owner, who wore black shoes, blue socks, immaculate three piece suit, a sober blue tie, and a smile which emanated total self-assurance.
David took the hand offered. He straightened, brushed himself off, then took a right-way-up look at the office building.
"So nice of you to pay us a visit, sir."
"Do I know you ?" asked David, puzzled.
"Not as well as I know you, Mr Ransom. I, and the other staff here at the Mind Centre, have known you all of your life."
"The ... Mind Centre ?"
"Yes, sir. This structure, which you see as an office building, is your mind."
The man delivered this statement evenly and blandly, which was the exact opposite of David's reaction to it. The man continued.
"Everything which happens in or goes through your mind is processed here at Mind Centre."
David managed to shake off his flabbergasted state long enough to get the words out.
"Wait a sec. This ... building is my mind ?"
"Yes, sir."
"But minds don't look like office buildings. The mind is a squishy grey lump of cells inside the skull."
The man chuckled. "No, no, sir. That is the brain you are talking about. The mind and the brain are completely different. As dissimilar as the sun and sunlight ... but just as close."
David nodded slowly. It was starting to sink in. The man continued.
"But I forget my manners. My name is Peter, and I am the MODEM at Mind Centre."
"MODEM ?"
"Yes, sir. It's my title. Mind, Operational Division, Executive Manager. Broadly speaking, I'm the Chief Executive."
"Or Secretary of the Department ?"
"Yes, that's another way you could put it, sir. Would you like to come in and look around ?"
"Look around ?" echoed David, dumbly.
"Look around your mind, sir. Haven't you always wanted to?"
"I'd love to."
They walked through the glass doors into a comfortably furnished reception area.
"What would you like to see, sir ?"
"First of all, Peter, could we be a bit more casual about this ? Would you please stop calling me `sir' ? `David' is quite OK."
Peter chuckled. "Oh, no it wouldn't, Mr Ransom. Of all the names you've ever been called, you like `sir' the best."
"How do you know, Peter ?"
"Oh, really, sir. Haven't I just told you ? I've worked for you, and known you all your life. And I just happen to have been Manager in the Names dept for a number of years. That was a while ago, but ..."
David interrupted. "The Names dept ?"
" Yes, sir. And I can still recite every name you've ever been called off by heart. Oh, sir. Some of the things the children at school used to call you."
"Oh, God. Don't remind me" moaned David.
"Don't worry, sir. I was very discreet. I put all the really bad ones into a high-security database. Only three of the staff have a high enough clearance to access them. Some of them are so terrible that I won't even allow you, David, to remember them."
David frowned. "Let me get this straight. You, as Chief Executive, have the power to make me forget the worst names I was called in my childhood ?"
"Not only me, sir. Each dept which has jurisdiction over
some part of your memory has, as part of it's purpose statement, the responsibility to suppress memories, unpleasant or not, at the discretion of the manager of that dept." Peter paused for breath. "But there are strict guidelines, of course, setting down the sort of information subject to this type of ... protection."
"You mean, that whenever I forget something, it's because some dept manager decides to stop me remembering ?"
"I wish I could say yes to that question, sir. Unfortunately, the system isn't perfect. There are a lot of clerical errors which are prone to cause loss of memory. The more serious the loss, the worse the penalty for the officer responsible.
"Omissions such as forgetting your wife's birthday or neglecting to pay a speeding fine are usually corrected the next day, and are not followed up. But important items such as forgetting to buy grand final tickets carry heavy penalties."
David's reply was indignant. "Are you saying that I don't consider my wife to be important ?"
"Oh, NO, sir." The word `no' was stretched to its limit of soothing denial. "It's just that you like football more than her. Don't protest, David. Remember, you can't lie to me. I know almost everything about you."
"Alright" conceded David, in a huff. "But tell me, so I know next time I forget something : what are some of the penalties ?"
"Well, sir, there's quite a wide range. Light penalties include time in the Manufacture of Lies dept. That's the area which supplies you with excuses, putoffs, insults and the like. Some officers find it very difficult to think of new, fresh excuses, but others enjoy working in Lies for the creative challenge.
"One of the harsher penalties is to be assigned to a sorting job in the Useless Information dept. That is among the most boring and repetitive work in the entire Centre.
"But the worst punishment, the most feared of all, is to be sent to the Childhood Trauma dept."
David raised a protest. "But that can't be a very big section. As I remember, I had a great childhood. I loved every minute of it."
Peter chuckled. "That's only because, sir, of my hard work, which resulted in your forgetting every major trauma you ever encountered. Until the age of thirteen, of course, when I was promoted up to the Executive."
"Yes" said David. "I can remember a few terrible things around that time."
"We had a lot of problems with your adjustment to puberty and adulthood, sir. I had to keep a large number of the staff back for overtime in those years. It was a nightmare for us, keeping up with those hormonal imbalances, adolescent fears and growth spurts. And keeping track of the girls you fancied ! We had to call in extra staff from the Intelligence dept just to keep up with them."
"Then THAT'S why I did so badly in lower High School ?" "Yes, sir. I'm afraid our resources just couldn't handle
it. And on top of that, we suffered several bad (computer memory) crashes around that time. Remember when you failed your year ten English exam ?"
"That's one memory I wish you make me forget. Do I ever remember that !"
That was one of the system crashes. We lost nearly everything you'd ever learned about the novels of John Steinbeck which, as you recall ..."
"... was the subject of the essay I had to write" completed David, groaning. "And what made it worse, the next day I remembered everything I should have written in the essay."
"Yes, sir. And would you like to know why that happened ?"
"You bet."
"Well, it took 24 hours to find the backed-up records. Then some idiot clerk, who'd just started in the section that day, thought you'd be pleased to remember all that stuff right away. So he immediately transferred an A-grade essay on Steinbeck into your conscious memory. You'll recall that you were in the middle of a Geography exam at the time."
"That's right ! I nearly failed Geog, too. What happened to the guy who did that ?"
"It was a pretty serious offence. Transmitting the right information at the wrong time without permission from the supervisor. The prescribed punishment is hard-disk labour for twenty microseconds, but we thought that was too light a sentence."
"So what did he get ?"
"The manager there, in the Arts dept, had him sent to the cells."
"The cells ?"
"Yes. Pretty harsh. He was put into one of the brain cells due for destruction that day. He's ... no longer with us."
David did not share Peter's concern for a lost staff member. He thought it was a case of just desserts.
David asked : "As a matter of interest, how many brain cells per day am I losing ?"
"Only about two million. No need to worry. Many of your colleagues are going downhill much faster."
"Speaking of losing brain cells, can anything be done to stop this godawful headache ?"
"I was rather hoping you wouldn't mention it, sir. In these past twenty minutes or so I've been talking to you, I'd rather hoped you'd be so preoccupied as to forget about the headache. Now you've remembered it, and I'll have to find some other way."
"Can't you just ring up the Headache dept and ask them to switch it off ?"
Peter chuckled. "Oh, sir. What wit ! If only it were that simple. Do you realise the procedures and red tape we have to go through to get a headache switched off ?"
"Now, Peter" said David, slowly and deliberately, "let's
get something straight. You work for me. Correct ?" "Correct, sir."
"So if I make a request, or give an order, you have to do it. Right ?"
"Well ... if it were up to me, sir, that would be true. Unfortunately, the mind is not so easily controlled as that. Many people think the mind is like one powerful super-computer. It isn't. It's like this office you see here. A number of staff, manning a number of different, unconnected small computer systems. Oh, we have several large computer systems as well, and some of those are cross-linked. But, for the most part, each dept works practically by itself, to its own rules. Basically, sir, we do the best with the equipment you have."
"It sounds like I should trade my mind in on a new model."
"Now, I know that's not the first time you've thought of doing that, sir. But don't worry. Most other people's minds have the same limitations placed on them as yours/ours. So, be happy with what you've got."
David paused. "OK. What's the procedure for getting rid of a headache ?"
"First, take an aspirin."
"I know that !"
"I know that you know that."
"And I've already taken some, anyway. What's next ?"
Peter beckoned David to the nearby elevator. "Come in. We'll go to the Tension dept first. I'll get a damage report there."
David stepped into the lift, after Peter.
"What floor is it on ?" asked David.
"Four" replied Peter.
"Hey ! This down button. The basement. What's down there?"
"Sorry, sir. That's off limits to you. You can't go down there."
"But what's there ?" persisted David.
Peter paused. "The subconscious."
"I've always wanted to know a few things about my sub- conscious. Let's go."
"Sorry, sir. But there are only certain times you can go there."
"When ?"
"Only at night, after a prescribed period of deep sleep, or under general anaesthetic."
"Oh no. You're talking about dreaming, aren't you ?" said David, stupidly. "I can never understand any of that stuff, even when I remember it. Dreams never make sense."
"Yes, we're working on that, sir. The staff we employ down there don't speak our language. The messages they send aboveground, to the conscious, don't make sense unless you know the languages that THEY speak."
"Then why don't you replace them with English speaking staff ?"
"The work down there is terrible. The ordinary workers
simply refuse to do it. So we have to import cheap, under-educated foreign labour. And not only do they not understand us, in the conscious, they can't understand each other. We're trying to put as many of them as possible through Migrant English courses, but it takes so long. We're always short-staffed there, so we can only let two at a time attend the English courses. And a lot of them leave
anyway, so we're fighting a losing battle."
"But that's atrocious, Peter. Exploiting foreign labour cheaply went out last century."
Peter chuckled. "Then it seems, sir, that your mind has not moved with the times. You're not as modern as you like to think you are."
David let that one pass. "But what are the unions doing about it."
"The Unions are run by Conscience Dept. Problem is, ``Consh'' has very little influence in the subconcious. Which means that conditions aren't likely to improve."
David gave up that line, but was still curious about an earlier point. "Peter, do you mean that every now and again, something I dream should make sense ?"
"Yes, but only when one of the foreign labourers down there has learned enough English to put through a sensible message. But as soon as they can speak English properly, they can and do apply for promotions above-ground. So we lose them from the basement as fast as we can train them."
It was all getting too much for David Ransom. He decided against persisting along this line of enquiry.
The lift arrived at the fourth floor. Peter strolled out, and beckoned Ben, the dept manager.
When he arrived, Ben bowed to David. "Always a pleasure to meet the big boss" he said.
Peter asked him "What's the Headache situation, Ben ?" "Pretty serious, Chief" replied Ben, to Peter. "It's the worst since the Great 'Ache of '81."
"Oh, and don't we all remember that one, eh sir ?" Peter elbowed David lightly. "That was the morning after your wife went back to her mother's. I've never before or since seen you try to put so much alcohol into the bloodstream."
"OK, let's forget that" said David. "She eventually returned, and we're alright now." Then returning to the matter in hand, "What's to be done with the present headache ?"
David proceeded to spend what seemed like hours following Peter around the building. Every time he asked Peter to explain why they had to go to this particular floor or see that particular person, Peter would simply smile and say "It's part of the procedure, sir."
Eventually, Peter flicked a series of switches in the Main Control Room, and calmly announced "The Headache has been cancelled."
David felt his previously throbbing temples. They were fine.
"Thank you, Peter. Now I really must be going. I have ..."
"... an appointment with the Divisional Manager across town at 3.30" completed Peter. "I was just about to remind you, sir."
"Thanks again, Peter. See you later."
"Call back anytime, sir."
David awoke, sprawled across his messy desk. He shook his head, and rubbed his temples. No more headache. Good. He looked at the clock. 2.59. Just enough time to get across town. A short nap always leaves me refreshed.
He fossicked around for the car keys. Damn ! Where did I put them ?"
From nowhere in particular, a voice said "In the third drawer, sir."
"Thanks, Peter."
"Anytime, sir."
David picked up the keys - from in the third drawer,of course, how silly of me to forget - and rushed out to the car. Why did I say `Peter' just then, wondered David as he started the car. Do I know anyone by that name ? No. Of course not. He pulled out of the driveway and into the pre-rush hour traffic.

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