Calban Visits His Parents : Part 5 : The Return Of Father

A short buzz pierced that awkward moment. It was Father returning home. He was activating the door sensors which always set off a warning buzz throughout the house. In a few seconds the door was open and he was in the house. Another sharper buzz gave notice of the door's opening. Relieved to be free of Mother's lecture he nonetheless felt quite unprepared to meet his father.

Father took his time to enter the guest room. Calban could hear him standing in the hallway. Perhaps he was taking his jacket off or changing his shoes, or just listening to determine whether there was anyone in the guest room before he entered it. The interruption had ended Mother's opposition and until Father entered there was little to be said. Calban imagined that his father would be like this before entering a lecture theatre. He would take a few moments to prepare himself before entering a roomful of students, so that his arrival would be imposing and he would get straight down to the business of his subject. There was no grand entrance now in private.

Stepping slowly through the doorway he looked first at Calban, taking his wife in at a glance, before venturing to speak. His deep eyes flickered sensitively and refused to look squarely into Calban's. He would stare more confidently at him later on. “Hello, Calban, it has been a long time, has it not?” He was prone to turning his words into questions. It was a polite deference which he gave to everyone he came into contact with, individually or collectively. While he might be deferential towards others he was not always attentive. Always polite, he could quite easily ignore what people around him were saying and quite frequently did. While Calban believed most people liked him because he was polite, they tended to fail to warm to him because he was so unresponsive. Some, particularly students, probably feared him a little because it was difficult to tell what he was thinking. He was difficult to read and Calban himself had always slightly feared him for this very reason. It was difficult to communicate with him because he was always distant. He was rarely angry although he could be awkward but one felt that his polite phrases belied an accusing mind.

Father was a Lecturer in an important position in the Education Department of Cato Technologies, which had been awarded the title of "University" of Cato some twenty years before, at a time when it had suddenly become fashionable for every educational establishment which could to apply for status as a university. Cash rich Cato Technologies had seen it as a major opportunity for expansion into a related field. Like all large organisations they had carried on much of their own training for years so it had been logical to broaden their training functions and expand teaching into wider subject areas, although they had remained limited to courses based on the Sciences and Engineering. Business and legal topics impinged on courses only where they related to the work of particular science and engineering specialists.

“Are you learning anything new at work these days, Calban?” asked Father obliquely. There was a sense that he knew what Calban's answer would be before he asked the question, but it was a question a father was expected to ask of his son when they had not seen each other face to face for some months. There was little else to say which would lead into the subject of Calban's career progress more subtly. Father never approached a subject too directly. To do so would have been in bad taste or even rude but even so he lacked the interest in or knowledge of anything outside the subject of education, careers and work to enter conversation on a lighter footing. Father was so used to being in authority and being the repository of wisdom which it was his duty to impart that he was not well suited to asking personal questions, or talking lightly about simple subjects.

Calban felt the usual reluctance to begin to answer because he knew how the conversation would run, and he had already explained himself to Mother and did not wish to repeat himself. At least his father would allow him to talk. Father had so few thoughts and his answers on this subject were so simple and logical that his considered opinion took up almost no time in its delivery. Unlike Mother, who could not wait to shut Calban up and begin on a topic more relevant to her own interests which she could deliver, Father would be content to let Calban ramble on while only half listening to what he had to say. Given little helpful encouragement and his own lack of words Calban usually had little to say except to state his negative feelings on the subject of his work baldly and straightforwardly. Mother would interrupt her flow of ideas and information for the sake of Father, letting him have his turn.

Calban began to explain that he had not learned anything new which was of any interest to him, except for a number of different and diverse new forms, some of which had had to be learned and then unlearned when they had been found to be unnecessary or too brief. A number of new changes to the way certain things were to be accounted for had been introduced. Again, some of these had been withdrawn or altered since. Having begun on a tangent from Father's question and realising that his question had not been directed at this kind of detail Calban began to summarise what he assumed Father wanted to know. Basically Calban had not restarted his studies and was therefore learning little that was new. He had travelled no further forward towards the distant goal of full qualification. Calban added that he did not find his work stimulating any more and that this was a reason for his lack of motivation which had resulted in his lack of progress. He wanted to ensure that Father could not possibly assume from the earlier part of his reply that Calban was learning something and therefore progressing. He could not allow Father to ignore his failure because he wanted to give him the opportunity to aid him in his predicament, even if it was only with sympathy.

Calban could see that Father was finding it difficult to concentrate on what he was saying. He never could tell whether this was because Father had heard him say those things before and did not need to listen fully, or whether he was really not interested in what he was saying. Father was used to speaking on his own subjects. In his time he had to listen plenty to the lecturers and teachers who had taught him all he knew, but that had been necessary to acquire the knowledge he had today so that he could become the successful man he was today.

Father had spent so much of his life working hard that he had become focused almost completely on his advanced scientific subject and ignored most of the rest of his life. He had been lucky to find Mother at Cato Technologies, a soul mate equally dedicated to her personal career progress. The dedication they shared attracted them to each other. Their obvious suitability made it possible for them to declare their interest in each other. The good sense in forming a partnership led them quickly into marriage and it had worked quite well over the years. They had well-worked arrangements which accorded both of them the privacy they required for study or thought. They had their own separate studies and bedrooms and spent most of their time separately. This arrangement meant that they did not get on each other's nerves and enabled them to enjoy each other's company when they did get together. Both were out working for most of the day. In the old days, which Calban remembered well, they had often talked for long periods, sharing the scientific theories and knowledge they had gained over the hard years of study. They had been chosen as a part of the brightest part of society for promotion up the career ladder as they had proved themselves in the hard competition of the classroom. It had made them a race apart from even the averagely well educated which made up the bulk of society. It gave them knowledge which enabled them to sit in the higher planes of thought trading ideas in isolation from the average man or woman.

Latterly the silence which comes from knowing someone too well for too long had fallen upon them and they talked less often as far as Calban could observe but understanding each other derived from long experience made it a successful and rewarding relationship.