'I feel kind of ridiculous, even discussing her with a psychologist.
She's a baby, for God's sake-what kind of neuroses could she have?
Though I guess with all this she could end up with plenty,' couldn't she? All the stress. Are we talking major psychotherapy for the rest of her life?'
'No.'
'Has anyone ever studied it?'
'There's been quite a bit of research,' I said. 'Chronically ill children tend to do better than experts predict- people do, in general.'
'Tend to?'
'Most do.'
He smiled. 'I know. It's not physics. Okay, I'll allow myself some momentary optimism.'
He tensed, then relaxed-deliberately, as if schooled in meditation.
Letting his arms drop and dangle and stretching his legs.
Dropping his head back and massaging his temples.
'Doesn't it get to you?' he said. 'Listening to people all day?
Having to nod and be sympathetic and tell them they're okay.'
'Sometimes,' I said. 'But usually you get to know people, start to see their humanity.'
'Well, this is sure the place to remind you of that-A rarer spirit never did steer humanity; but you, gods, will give us some faults to make us men. Words, Willy Shakespeare; italics, mine. I know it sounds pretentious, but I find the old hard reassures me-something for every situation. Wonder if he spent any time in hospitals.'
'He may have. He lived during the height of the black plague, didn't he?'
'True. Well'-he sat up and unwrapped the second cookie-'all credit to you, I couldn't do it. Give me something neat and clean and theoretical, anytime.'
'I never thought of sociology as hard science.
'Most of it isn't. But Formal Org has all sorts of nifty models and measurable hypotheses. The illusion of precision. I delude myself regularly.'
'What kinds of things do you deal with? Industrial management?
Systems analysis?'
He shook his head. 'No, that's the applied side. I'm theoretical-setting up models of how groups and institutions function on a structural level, how components mesh, phenomenologically. Ivory tower stuff, but I find it great fun. I was schooled in the ivory tower.'
'Where's that?'
'Yale, oundergrad; University of Connecticut, grad. Never finished my dissertation after I found out teaching turns me on a lot more than research.'
He stared down the empty basement corridor, watching the occasional passage of wraithlike white-coated figures in the distance.
'Scary,' he said.
'What is?'
'This place.' He yawned, glanced at his watch. 'Think I'll go up and check on the ladies. Thanks for your time.'
