Say a person who is male, a certain age, from a certain family, with a certain body type and state of health, a certain history of loving and being loved, of wanting to be loved, of being cared for and abandoned … say this man, who does certain types of exercise, has certain religious and spiritual beliefs, works at a particular job, earns a certain amount which covers, partly covers or doesn’t cover his expenses, which are in a certain pattern relating to his sources of pleasure … say he meets a woman …
Naturally your life reveals itself to her and hers to you … you think she is beautiful and she is kind and gentle to you.
Phase equilibrium
You enjoy having a drink with her after work, it reminds you of your parents, the way things start so quietly when you are tired after work and so keen to relax, and then there are times with lots of laughs and good music and you enjoy having a drink with her.
Solid phase
It reminds you of your parents, the way things start so quietly when you are tired after work, and then there are times with lots of laughs and good music, and then about 9 or 10 you want to eat dinner and she says she doesn’t feel hungry, so you cook and she stands around watching, telling you she could do it all better, and when it is ready you dish her some, but mostly she doesn’t eat it.
Pressure
And then she is mean and nothing pleases her. Or she laughs and drinks some more and you hear her being sick.
The presence of line-like excitations such as defect lines
But you still think she is beautiful when she is sober and cleaned up. She is often very sweet and gentle to you and only nasty for a couple of hours at night, and she always apologises the next morning, and anyway it reminds you of your parents.
Things start so quietly when you are tired after work, and there are times with lots of laughs and it seems as though this will be a nice night, but then a fight starts and sometimes you get angry at her and swear at her and maybe you leave the house for a walk or maybe you don’t.
Water does not instantly turn into gas, but forms a turbulent mixture.
She drinks anything at this time, rummages round in the cupboards for any half bottle of something she didn’t drink the night before, and you are tired but too scared to go to bed and leave her raging round the flat, falling against walls, sometimes breaking dishes and glasses and cutting herself.
One day you come home from work and she is on the couch, unconscious.
At the phase transition point the two phases of a substance have identical free energies and therefore are equally likely to exist.
You call the ambulance. You clean the place up and go.