The dipole field pattern below might work as a 2 dimensional "building block" for the fields of our bits. It shows some promise and potential problems.
Let the graph above represent the electric field of a point dipole in 2 dimensions (I think the graph is the field of a point dipole in 3 dimensions but the gross properties are the same in 2 dimensions?). One must imagine removing the circle above with the single large arrow and then continuing the field lines towards the center. Let this field pattern be a 2 dimensional slice of the electric field of our bit at some instant in time. Suppose we look towards the antenna our field observation plane above is then perpendicular to the line of sight towards the antenna. As the bit passes through our observation plane let the field pattern above rotate either clockwise or counter clockwise with the frequency of the radiation from the antenna. Let one full rotation of the electric field arbitrarily represent the fields of one bit, the electric field of our bit has one full twist about the propagation direction, our bit is arbitrarily one wavelength long. The arbitrary one twist is a bit ugly but lets start with that.
Take the above graph and rotate it 90 degrees to get the magnetic field of our bit (no explanation why for now, it just seems to work), it rotates in the same plane as the electric field, always ahead or behind by 90 degrees. Let it also undergo one full rotation to give the magnetic field of our bit. If we overlay the two graphs I think they have the interesting property (when using the correct 2 dimensional graphs) that where ever the E and B field lines meet they do so at right angles (See the 10:55 minute mark of the video, Fluid Mechanics Lesson 12F: Superposition in Potential Flow,
)?
As a check for our toy fields we want the cross product of the electric and magnetic fields, E X B, to be proportional to the energy and momentum flows. My fields above give linear momentum but no angular momentum, show this by evaluating E X B at 4 symmetric points, you get only momentum in the direction of propagation and no angular momentum? We need to tweak the field patterns above to get angular momentum. The field lines must have components in the direction of propagation to get angular momentum? I think this might be approximated by evaluating the electric field of two infinitely long 1 dimensional oppositely charged lines twisted around each other somewhat like a DNA helix (one twist per wavelength) in the limit that distance between the lines goes to zero and charge density goes to infinity keeping the product of the charge density and separation distance a constant. This should give us an electric field with components in the direction of propagation and perpendicular to the propagation direction?
As a check we would like the angular momentum of our bits to be independent of the energy, we want the angular momentum to be quantized, this puts a severe constraint on our guess.
As a check we will want the energy of each bit (E^2 + B^2 integrated over all space) to be finite and to be inversely proportional to the wavelength of the bit, that could be trouble as the fields grow very large near the axis of the bit.
As a check we want the field lines to have zero divergence and I think they do as long as the observation volume contains one bit?
As a check we want the fields of many bits to sum to the classical fields of an antenna. I don't know how to show or argue this.
There is a term in Maxwell's equations called the displacement current. We are told it is not a real current but it still has the dimensions of a "real" current. The displacement current is simply the time rate change of the electric field. Far from the antenna this current has the interesting property that the graph of this current looks exactly like the graph of the electric field but shifted in time by 90 degrees and normalized. The mathematics of Maxwell's equations may allow us to think of our bits as a propagating, localized, mostly transvers flow of some type of current that gives rise to electric and magnetic fields?
Maybe there is a connection between displacement current and some bit of curvature of space that is a function of space and time and can propagate?
Thanks for any thoughts or corrections.