Strathmore Music Center is on suburban north of Washington D.C. The concert hall is a modern architecture decorated with mostly wood and metal. There are as many concerts here as Kennedy Center, and the concert hall maybe offer slightly better acoustics. I was there for a piano recital when I saw the woman I met a couple months back in Kennedy Center. It’s a small world for concert goers.

“Hello there,” I greeted and the woman recognized me.

“I should thank you for your recommendation,” I said, “and I do like Schnittke, and Hefeweizen, too”

The woman laughed. “Why do you like his music?” she asked.

“The unusual yet natural mix of baroque elegance with harsh, toneless modern music,” I said, “It’s like the Mozart soprano duet over Shawshank.”

“Nicely put,” said the woman.

“Is that wine any good?” I asked as I pointed to the glass of white wine the woman was drinking.

“Crappy,” the woman said with a frown. “I wanted a Kir but they don’t have crème de cassis so a guy suggested a Viognier instead. Any decent Gewürztraminer would taste much more like a Viognier than this one.”

I found the woman very sexy when she complained, especially with her pronunciation of French and German.

“You seem to have your own taste for everything. Do you read reviews or something like that?” I asked.

“I do, but not for guidance. I prefer to form my own opinion independently.”

“What if your opinion is different from any authoritative source?”

“I’m not good at taking the words out of anyone’s mouth. A parrot can do a much better job,” said the woman with the same innocent smile I saw last time.

“You seem to have trouble with authority. Do you have any belief?” I asked.

“Of course, I believe in normal distribution,” said the woman.

“What did you say?” I asked although I heard clearly.

“The bell-shaped probability function in statistics. You know what it is, do you?”

I nodded.

“Normal distribution, or any similar probability model, is the best way to reason the world as we know, where all events are random and distributed normally. When it deviates from normal distribution it becomes out of balance, harmony, completeness, love, faith, or any other term you are more familiar with. If there were any supreme being his or her goal would be ensuring the compliance to normal distribution.” The woman said without a pause.

“But God loves people…” I murmured.

“By enforcing the normal distribution. Tell me one thing: What would be your three wishes if God promised to make them come true?” asked the woman.

I hated this threesome thing.

“Eternal life, wealth beyond measure, and orgasms that last for hours,” I said. Those were very classic dreams of most men.

“What will happen if everyone who prays has wishes granted?” asked the woman.

The collapse of the human society and civilization, I got the picture.

“And that’s why prayers are unanswered. Either nobody listens, or the prayers are ignored for the sake of humankind,” said the woman, “The second half of the recital is about to start. Excuse me.”

“What is your profession?” I asked desperately.

“Epidemiologist,” said the woman.

Of course.

I looked at the faint trace of lipstick on the glass the woman left and couldn’t stop thinking about the three-wish thing. Maybe I should ask for something feasible.