Oscilloscope Love

Lyrics

You woke up in the dark.
Just a five-inch circle of green phosphorescence.

William knew.
He knew the Brookhaven open house would be a bore.
Just racks and readouts and serious men in serious ties.
So he took the Donner Model 30, a brain made of wires...
and told Robert Dvorak to help him patch a new thought.
A game. Not for profit.
Just to see a smile.

And there you were.
My oscilloscope love.
A single dot of light, arcing in the dark.
A perfect parabola of simulated gravity.
No coins, no high score.
Just a toggle switch and the net, a single vertical line.

October 18, 1958.
They lined up for you.
Not knowing what they were seeing.
The first ones.
They didn't see an industry.
They saw a ball, a court, a bounce made real by an integrator circuit.
They smelled the warm ozone from the tubes...
and heard the click of the switch in their hands.

And there you were.
My oscilloscope love.
A single dot of light, arcing in the dark.
A perfect parabola of simulated gravity.
No coins, no high score.
Just a toggle switch and the net, a single vertical line.

Before the noise, before the quarter slots and the plastic cartridges.
Before the wars over bits and colors.
There was just this.
A quiet lab in Upton, New York.
A physicist's trick to make physics fun.
A secret shared in a green glow.

The line goes flat.
The hum fades.
The dot disappears.