The afternoon sun that washed the Harvard Yard in gold. was in contrast to its mood of despair. Sullen students crossed the brick pathways carrying backpacks, coffee cups, and laptops. Some hurried toward class. Others sat beneath ancient oaks studying, talking, or staring into their phones. But it was as if they had just heard a funeral bell and wondered who it was for. But of course they knew. 

A tour group, totally blind to the feeling about them, drifted by behind a guide holding a crimson umbrella. In the distance, the bells of Memorial Church rang across the compound. To them it looked like paradise. The best and brightest. How they wanted their little genius to be one of them. 

Yet at a weathered wooden table near the center of the Yard, six depressed students sat in unusually somber silence, deep concentration, as if facing an impossible problem. A copy of the Harvard Crimson lay open before them. No one was studying orlaughing. Finally, a young anorexic woman, Melinda, broke the silence, “I still can’t believe Eric is dead.” 

 “I saw him,” said Aaron an athletic young man wearing torn jeans and a black “T” shirt. His room was two down from mine. He was always so eager and smiling. And then he was just hanging there. He clenched his jaw against the emotion and he was stilling seeing Eric. 

“I remember,” said Alecia a well-built blond coed. “But his smile was like my tits. Fixed, not real, it stayed the same even when he was looking at the TV.” For a moment they all looked at her breasts. “They don’t mean shit,” she said. “They were my mother’s idea. Just like Harvard.” 

“You’d be beautiful even if flat,” said Aaron. Her smile was grateful and whimsical. “Thanks Aaron.” 

Julie was 6’4″ black, and played volley ball. Her black hair was cut very short. “Sometimes it seems like we open the Cracker Jacks box and there is no prize. Maybe Eric felt that way. Look at the next page in the paper. They did a survey and 40% of the students here say there life as no meaning or purpose.” 

“Dude!” said Robert a Fox Terrier in a man’s body. “That is what they teach us. You say anything about value, meaning, that kind of stuff and you will be one of the few not getting the mandatory meaningless “A”. 

“No prize!” said Julie. “We spend our whole lives chasing grades, internships, careers, status.” 

“And then what?” Alicia asked. “Then you die.” Robert pointed to the newspaper. “Did you read that fucking survey?” He picked it up, “Listen to this, Forty percent of Harvard students reported struggling with meaninglessness, loneliness, or a lack of purpose.” 

“Well,” said Aaron, “Tell me your purpose? What Meaning do you have that makes you get up tomorrow and go to class. Anyone?” 

“Breakfast,” said Bobby. 

“AI can take our place, and…” started Alicia. 

“Doesn’t have to!” cut in Robert. “It already knows what we are supposed to memorize for a few weeks.” 

“I love AI!, “said Akecia, “I call mine Orion.” They were quite for a few moments and looked at the scene around them. Now it seemed the campus was more back to normal, and Eric was just a name on a paper blowing in the wind. 

“Amazing that at the premier university in the world there is no class on meaning and purpose,” said Julie. “We are given meaningless grades, for meaningless diplomas, and we will automatically get meaningless jobs that are very similar to what we are doing now.” 

The debate stalled. No one had an answer. Nearby, students continued walking across the Yard. A bicycle rolled by. Someone laughed in the distance. Life continued. 

 A shadow crossed the newspaper. The students looked up. Standing beside the table was an old man apparently in excellent physical condition. Actually almost intimidating in his presence. “Did you ever see the movie ‘Blade Runner’, he asked. His voice was gravely, but strong. 

“I saw it,” said Aaron. “Androids. Walking AI’s, trained for specific off world tasks, with no feelings, meaning or purpose other than to execute their programs, they rebel and return to Earth. 

You’re saying that’s us?” 

“That would be impossible, wouldn’t it?” the old man asked. He smiled as he waited. 

I saw that movie,’ said Alecia. “Four times! The androids were developing feelings. They wanted to live.” 

The old man said nothing for awhile. No one did. They had all seen the movie and it was coming back to them now. “Do you remember the last words of the dying android?” He asked. 

“God yes,” said Robert. It went like this, I’ve seen things you little people couldn’t imagine. Starships on fire off Shoulder of Orion, Sea Bees off the Gates of Tannhauser. And all the sights I have seen, will vanish into time, like tears in rain.” There was emotion in his voice as he finished. 

“I seem to recall some French pseudo intellectual saying that the meaning of life is that it ends,” said Julie. 

“I think it was Camus, said Robert. “Didn’t he say that the only philosophical question was suicide?” 

“Eric answered that one,” said Melinda 

For a time there was pensive silence, then the old man spoke. “Meaninglessness is natural to you. It must be, or else how could half the students feel that way.” 

“What do you mean?” Alecia asked. 

You say your grades are meaningless, and you are more right than you know.” as he spoke his face harden and he was almost commanding like a sergeant. Then he smiled and relaxed. “Surely you know you learn what you do. You do “Meaningless,” and that is what you become. His voice wasn’t harsh, but commanding. It didn’t invite frivolity, and they weren’t feeling that way. 

He’s right,” said Alecia.

 

“That’s ridiculous!” said Bobby. 

“If half say that’s how they feel, then that’s the proof,” said Robert. 

 Said Aaron. “Who are you.” 

“I am Ronin, a guest of your campus karate instructor.” And pulled out an empty chair and sat down. “Let’s talk about the androids in Blade Runner, they had found meaning in whatever life they had.” 

“They should have come to Harvard!” said Julie, and that lightened the mood. 

“I will help you,” said Ronin. “With karate?” smirked Bobby. Ronin just looked at him and he squirmed, but was silent. “What is the meaning of life?” you are asked. Ronin’s eyes bored into each in turn. “I will give you the answer, and more.” He paused a moment as if framing his words. “It is a meaningless question. Much like what color is Tuesday, how does justice taste, how much does freedom weigh?.” He stared at each intently, and all except Aaron looked away. “You see,” he went on in a softer tone, smiling. “You can arrange the words correctly, but they have no referent. 

“You expect us to put that down on a final exam?” Asked Robert. 

“Only if it is true for you. If you can, from now on this is how you should answer all questions, just with what is true for you.”

“That doesn’t work for me, “said Bobby. “You’ll have to do better than that Obi Wan.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Then I will give you another. What is life?” They looked at each other.

 

Julie opened her mouth to speak.” Wait! I don’t…”

 

Ronin cut her off. “Do this!” he said in a commanding voice.”Put your thumbs over your nostrils,” and he demonstrated. “Now bring your fingers up to where they can block your ears. “When I tell you, push in with your thumbs so you can’t breath, hold your breath, shut your eyes, and put your fingers in your ears.” They shuffled around, got ready and waited. 

“Now!” he said. They did as he instructed and he waited.

“Just open your nostrils and taste the air,” he saw them inhale and after a breath, “Open your ears!” They pulled their fingers out. “And now see.” There was a big smile on Alecia’s face. The others were taking everything in as if for the first time. “Do this when you are troubled, when you feel meaningless or purposeless.” 

The bells rang again in the distance, and a breeze moved through the oak trees. “Your worldview is your Matrix, to use another movie metaphor. ” He paused for awhile and then got up. 

“Where are the pills?” asked Aaron. 

Ronin stood up and extended his hands toward them. “They are in your mind. He opened one hand, empty. “The Blue pill, you continue wondering about the meaning of life. 

“And the Red Pill?” said Julie. Ronin extended the other hand and slowly opened it. It too was empty. “The Red Pill is for Traveler’s who want to take the journey of transformation. A difficult path,” 

””What the fuck does all that mean?” asked Bobby.

“It means,” said Ronin, “That you may continue as you are, a purposeless creature of the Matrix. Or you may begin the adventure of discovering who you are, why you are here, and what you are capable of.” Ronin walked off with all of them watching him. 

“Fuck you,” said Bobby.

“I could almost take that Red Pill,” said Julie. 

After Ronin was halfway across the commons Aaron took off after him.