Magdelena's Teahouse

The following events recorded are absolutely true. Word for word.

It is a bitter cold night. FRANCIS is sitting at the bar of a teahouse with friend KIELA**. Their mugs are empty. I sit one chair away from them, order coffee, and observe.

FRANCIS: What is a void?

KIELA: A void is nothing.

FRANCIS: No! Nothing is something. Void doesn’t exist in the physical world; rather, it exists only in logic, in philosophy.

KIELA: Well except in black holes. A black hole is a void by definition.

FRANCIS: That’s very interesting but now we are talking astrophysics.

KIELA: We were talking metaphysics.

FRANCIS: Subjects aside, are you familiar with math? I can draw you a black hole and explain it to you. (walks over and grabs a flyer and pen) So tell me what fraction yields .9999 and so on for forever?

KIELA: Ummmm….

FRANCIS: It’s one over nine. Now look what happens as I continue the graph…

KIELA: It goes to zero.

FRANCIS: No. It goes on forever until it reaches nothing.

KIELA: So it goes to zero.

FRANCIS: No. Zero is something. Zero loops around nothing but it is something.

KIELA: So if zero is something, what is nothing?

FRANCIS: A black hole.

Pause as they notice I am watching them.

KIELA: What do you think?

ME: pause. Well, it depends. What came first, the chicken or the egg?

**Name almost certainly spelled incorrectly.