The Fourth State of Matter

“The Fourth State of Matter'' is a braided essay. Given that this is a “personal history,” as The New Yorker categorizes it, this structure helps Beard braid together multiple “threads” to create a unique whole, much like a braid where the three or more sections of hair are still distinguishable from one another, and yet the whole braid holds a unique beauty that the individual sections of hair don’t hold individually. In the case of this essay, there are four threads: the arc of Beard’s ailing collie, the arc of the squirrels occupation of Beard’s spare bedroom, the slow percolation of Beard’s impending divorce, and the rhythmic cadence of Beard’s life at work as the managing editor of a space-physics monthly at the University of Iowa, which ultimately strays from its rhythm due to the tragedy of the mass shooting of her colleagues, the central tension and focus of the essay, which the other threads serve to investigate. The braided structure is produced by the oscillation between these threads throughout the essay as Beard moves us from home, focusing on the dog, to work, then back to home, focusing on the squirrels, and so on and so forth.