Lars always worked too hard, trying to impress his boss. At 10pm on most days, Lars would be closing up his programs, and shutting down the computer. He’d dump the files onto his portable drive, just in case he wanted to touch up some of the details later that night. Svehn would usually be in early, looking over the interns shoulders and scowling at what he saw.

Since Lars was a boy, he’d imagined a vast structural span over a majestic landscape. He’d gone over the details of the image in his head for years. It would be a simple waffle slab in a triangluar pattern, forming a cantilevered frame, arching across a chasm in a gently bowing form. As Lars drifted to sleep, the image would come into focus. His right hand would move as if he was gliding a mouse across his desktop, drafting lines, and panning in and out. His bedroom would fade into darkness, until all he would see would be a 22″ flat screen reflecting the dim lights overhead. Then he’d feel Svehn’s gaze over his shoulder and wake, reflexively hittting an imaginary “esc” key on the top left corner of his sheet.

Lars was tired, weary really. He’d second guess his decisions over breakfast, thinking of what Svehn would do. Would he choose Cheerios? no, surely not a brand name? Maybe oats and honey? no, probably just coffee. Lars needed to get back to the office anyway. Svehn was expecting a design concept to review.

At 8:15 Lars was at his desk, staring at the 22″ monitor, gliding the mouse in his right hand across his desktop. For a moment his mind wandered. He saw a pattern of triangles rise in front of his monitor, arranging themselves in an elegant pattern rotating and undulating into a parabolic curve.

“Yes” Lars whispered to himself, “exactly”, realizing a path he hadn’t explored. He began to reach around the desk for a pen to jot something down, when he felt Svehn’s gaze over his shoulder.

“Morning Lars… How’s the toilet partition layouts looking? The client’s coming in at 9:00”

Lars slowly took a sip of his coffee and turned around.

Lars was screwed…

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photos from Wojtek Gurak’s photostream on Flickr (Used Under creative Commons License)

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