Should Alice take a walk?

Alice woke up early one winter morning. She logged into her PC and printed her paper for computer class. After taking a quick shower she pulled on a light sweater over her short-sleeved shirt. In Key West not much else is needed. She had to walk about two miles to get to class across the island. Stock Island got its name from the stocks of cattle kept there many years ago. Now it was just a bad neighborhood one island north of Key West.

Alice, saving for a car still usually takes her bike but today it’s in the shop. She tried to find a ride but couldn’t. The weather isn’t bad, she thought as she walked out the door. She says good-bye to Buzz (short for Buzz-Kill, so named by her older brother), the dog, and heads down Cross Street, one of the main streets of Stock Island. She sees broken cars in front of wire fences, which pen in big dogs chased by babies that are naked except for the baggy diaper.

A man is yelling in a language only described as Spanglish (half Spanish, half English) to another man inside a monstrosity of ill planned architecture. The structure was once a trailer. Alice knows it was once a trailer because all the homes on these streets are trailers. But the owner wasn’t satisfied with a trailer so he built a two-story house around the trailer with scrap wood and metal. The trailers are very close. The street has lots of potholes. She was sure anything would be left if The Big One hit.

No one took the fact that The Big One could hit seriously. After all we hadn’t had a real serious hurricane since the one that took out Flagler’s railroad. Georges hit the middle keys. But that won’t happen again. Down here we are special, right? The whole “Key West is special” mind set irritates Alice very much so she walks faster as if she were walking faster away from such foolish ignorant views to the refuge she’d find at college.

She was different. Not at all like the rest of them. She was going to make something of her self. She had dreams. She was going to move to a big city the minute she graduated with her degree in Computer Science. She’d get a great job and an apartment. Then later she’d buy a lot of land and build her dream house in the middle of nowhere and retire there. Her plans went way beyond building a house out of driftwood around a broken down trailer.

The semester was almost over. In the spring she only had to take two classes to graduate. The last paper was due today. The paper was worth 60 percent of her grade. She had been working on it since the beginning of the semester. The class was a prerequisite for her last two computer classes. So everything rested on her passing this class.

Leaving the residential area, she had crossed US1 and was almost half way to the school. She was now on a long stretch of road with mangroves on both sides that separated US1 from the hospital. Florida Keys Community College was just a few steps past the hospital. The smell of seaweed and salt stung her nose. She pulled off her sweater sticking it in her backpack. In the middle of December it’s still hot. She picked up the pace since there weren’t a lot of cars around. Her nerves were bugging her a bit. She took a deep breath. It was still really early. She could spend all morning in the library double-checking all her facts before class.

Suddenly she stopped. There were voices in the mangroves to the right. A man emerged.

“Hey there pretty thing” said a short thick man in a drunken slur.

His two friends stumbled out after him. They were close, only a few feet away.

“Well. Well. Well.” Said a tall man. There was a third man. He didn’t say anything.

They all were wearing dirty overalls so she assumed they were fishermen. She began to back up but the taller man grabbed her by the shoulders. The short man grabbed her legs and they totted off the struggling Alice into the mangroves.

“Let me go” She screamed at the top of her lungs.

They took her to a boat they had tied up and put her down but still held her. It was a 12-foot fishing boat in need of a good painting and cleaning.

“Please let me go!” She demanded but she wasn’t struggling so much anymore.

“What were you doing? How long had you been watching us?” The taller one asked.

“Yeah, what did you see?” Asked the short drunk one. It’s amazing how people go thru their entire lives drunk she thought. Why do I have to live in a place where this happens? Being kidnapped by three crazy and most likely drunk fishermen. Think. Think. Think. What is going on here? What did I see? She straightened up and smoothed her hair. They let go of her.

“I didn’t see anything. I am on my way to college. I heard voices so I stopped.” The boat rocked and she caught hold of the tall man’s arm, then looked at him resentfully for doing it like it was his fault.

“One moment,” The short one said as he waved the tall man over to him but he put his arm out to hold her arm. So she stood there wondering if she should bolt. Salt water gushed over her sneakers as the boat rocked again. She bent down and held the side of the boat so she wouldn’t fall in.

The short one stood in the middle of the other two men and whispered something to the tall man. The tall man nodded looking at Alice. Then the short man whispered something to the silent man and he also nodded.

“Today is your lucky day.” Said the silent man loosing his silence and his nickname.

Alice rolls her eyes. “Why’s that?”

“If you help us then we’ll split the proceeds with you.”

“What kind of proceeds are we talking about here?”

“Dinero, money, cha ching.”

Images flow into her mind, first of a car, then of a new apartment somewhere Normal.

She checks her watch. It’s 8am. She really didn’t need to do any research in the library. She had five hours till her class at 1pm. She definitely had time to get home and take a shower before going to class.

“Ok guys. What’s involved?”

“There is a treasure buried here in these mangroves,” said the tall man.

“We are going to be rich!” said the short man excitedly.

“Right.” She says unenthusiastically. She thinks again. What am I doing here? I have research to do. Right? But there could be some money involved and I sure do need money if I want to move out of the Keys. ”OK, I am in.”

She puts her backpack in the center and she hopes the driest place on the boat. I must be crazy, she thinks.

The mangroves were full of beer cans, milk jugs, fishing net, fishing line, bouyies, plus everything else imaginable. They each took twenty feet of the coastline. They’d searching each strip 1 foot before moving to the next strip. She had more seaweed in her hair than Arial. Her hands and legs were covered with cuts.

She checked her watch. “Dang it!” It was noon. She was just finishing her last strip. She felt something unusual at her feet. Unusual is a relative term she suddenly realized. She felt down with her hands. Yep it was something strange. It felt metal. She cleared the slug off of it and tried to yank it. The mangrove roots covered it too much to get any movement out of it.

“Guys. Help! I found something!”

They spent the next twenty minutes hacking away the roots – she was quite sure it was a federal offence.

Finally it came up and they dragged it to the boat. Five more minutes had passed. The chest was evidentially made of a heavy metal and had a big lock.

“Come on guys. I have only 35 minutes left before class.” I can go straight to class she thought. Money or not I need to have this degree. As they pulled the chest on the boat rocked violently.

“Ahhh,” Alice screamed as her backpack slide into the ocean.

“No NO!” she cried as she splashed to the spot where it was disappearing under the waves.

The men paid no attention but were making a lot of metal on metal clanking and banging noises. Alice stood there in the dirty waist high water. Her clothes were torn and covered in seaweed. Fish swam around her legs. She didn’t notice. She was holding her research paper in front of her, watching the black ink drip off. Tears ran down her face and mixed with the ocean of salt water. She soaked in self-pity. She quietly sobbed and watched her career run down the white pages in black streams.

Quietly. Quiet. Why was it quiet? She turned to look at the boat. The men had stopped knocking and banging and where standing with open mouths and wide eyes. She threw her backpack over the side and pulled her self over. She stumbled over to the chest.

Treasure (trezh’er), n., v., -ured, -ur-ing. –n. 1.weath or riches stored or accumulated, esp in the form of precious metal, money, jewels, or plate.

Plate? Plates? China plates? She looked in disgust. I spent almost five hours searching for plates? I am such an idiot, she thought. Each was bubble wrapped and cloudy seawater was flowing between them making them look like islands. I hate islands, she thought.

“Wow,” said the short one.

“Yeah, Wow. There goes my life. Thanks guys. I have to go to class now.”

She bent to pick up her bag, “Have a good one.”

“Don’t forget your share!” said the Short one.

Get sober guy, She thought.

“Can we give you a ride anywhere?” the Tall one said.

“Sure, to FKCC. Please.”

The silent one earned his nickname back and took the helm. The Tall one started to take out the dishes and count them. Alice sat down as the boat pulled away with a jolt she didn’t expect the old boat to muster. She began to pull seaweed from her hair and felt the hot sun begin to dry her cloths. The Short one got a beer out of a cooler and smiled.

The tall man evidentially finished counting they pulled next to the sea wall of FKCC. He handed her four plates, four cups, four saucers, and four of some other dish.

“Thanks guys,” she said as she put the last one in her bag and stepped off the boat. “It’s been a real pleasure.”

“Thanks to you too little missy.” Said the Short one as they pulled away.

She flung the wet bag over her shoulders and started drugging towards the school with water sloshing out of her shoes.

Fifteen minutes left, I’ll go and ask Smith. If he knows how much these things are worth she decided.

As she walked up to the history teacher’s office she got a lot of weird looks from everyone she saw.

Smith looked up and had a surprised look for a second then he said, “Hello Alice. What can I do for you?”

“I was wondering if you could tell me how much this is worth.” She ripped of the wrapping and handed him the plate.

“Wow, A lot. A whole lot. You should ask Lisa in the art department. She knows a lot about ancient China wear. Don’t you have class?”

Alice hadn’t heard anything after he said that the plate was worth “A Whole lot.”

He notices this and being the great teacher he is he takes her arm and leads her to her classroom puts her in a seat and hands her the plate.

“Good Luck. You look like you need it.” He leaves and bumps into Jones on the way out. He nods at Alice and Jones looks at her disapprovingly.

She quickly pulled out her soggy three ring binder and started to write her paper. Maybe I can finish it before the end of class she thinks.

“Alice,” She looks up, “You need to turn in your paper. I have everyone else’s except yours. The policy is to turn in the paper before class. You should know that.”

“Umm Oh. Well.. Sir. I am sorry Sir. I can explain. I was on my way to class when I was kidnapped by fishermen and they talked me into, well kind of forced me to, help them find some treasure in the mangroves…”

“Excuse me. Do you have your paper or not?”

‘Umm, no sir”

“Then why don’t you leave so I don’t waste any more of your time.”

“Please sir, Is there anyway I can make it up?”

“Make it up?” He asks mockingly.

“Ok, you can give an oral presentation of your paper.”

First she feels the glimmer of hope that she might actually pass this class. Then she feels a strike of terror of having to stand in front of all these people. Thankfully she does have the paper memorized.

She walks up to the front of the class. Her shoes are still soggy. A piece of seaweed falls from her hair on to the podium. She clears her throat.

“I have a theory that humans are so complicated that we wouldn't be able to create an AI to match our intelligence.

Why do we do the things we do? I know this sounds like psychology class but hear me out. We don't actually want to create an intelligence like ours. We are too erratic. Just today on my way to class I almost threw my career away because of a whim. When we say we want to create Artificial Intelligence what we mean is we want a computer to make judgment choices. Good ones. But how do we decide what the best choice is? Since we are dealing with computers we have to boil everything down to numbers. I tried to come up with a scheme of numbers for choices…”

“Being able to make the best choice is the reason my AI program had such success in the series of tests I gave it. Thank you all.” Most of the class was awake and some were smiling. She took this as a good sign. Alice bowed slightly to Jones. He was smiling which was almost unheard of. She smiled back. He got up and shook her hand, her salty hand.

“Very interesting Alice. You have come long long way. You have a very exciting career ahead of you. I look forward to having you in my advanced AI class next semester.”

Alice walked out of that class that day and into a brand new bright future with more confidence than she had ever before, plus “A Whole Lot” of pricey China in her backpack.

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