Thursday, March 31, 2016

GO ABOUT IT IN AN ORDERLY FASHION COME HELL AND HIGH WATER



UFFDA

Surprisingly, the timing couldn't have ended up any better.

At any rate, I've been working on the research for COME HELL AND HIGH WATER and it's time to begin the actual writing of the book.

Because I want easy access to a lot of the results of that research, it's gone into GO ABOUT IT IN AN ORDERLY FASHION.

As far as being orderly goes, no it really isn't all that orderly. It does, however have a Table of Contents so we're making progress here, right?

One last edit, mainly on the photos, a cover chosen, and WHEW. I'll have a handy dandy book of reminders at my fingertips. 59,857 words but at least halfway organized.

You want to see the list for the Table of Contents? Okay.

‘The Essays’
Character Introductions in (general) order of appearance

Aduan and the Sidhe of the Ages, etc.
Mamm of Phi
Ullin of Iona
Danann of Phi
Dan of Southisle
Clara of Morocco
Etan of Andorra
Ellae of Andorra
Maggie the Magdalean
Birchta and Lann of Northeast
Alianora and Drustann of Dunnottar, etc.

The Circles of Dunnottar

The Voices of SONG

Hell and High Water : Initial Thoughts and Development

Phi

The Before People
The Before World
Arts and Sciences
As Above So Below
Choice
Clothing
Commerce and Currency
Communication
Cultures
Education
Escape
Miscellaneous Stuff

PHI





Wednesday, March 23, 2016

What's Going Into My Front Porch Windows? Eagles.

I'm rough sketching eagles to go into my front porch windows.

Imagine that.

For now they're very simple - graphite on cotton.

Whether or not I'll 'finish' them is anyone's guess. I'll deepen them of course; they're just lightly sketched for the moment. Otherwise, as long as you can tell what they're supposed to be from Main Street I'll probably leave them alone.

I'm making them on the rough side on purpose, using unfinished wood behind the cotton. 

I plan to get seven of them rough sketched tonight. I have to take a break now and then because my fingers, hand, arm, and shoulder get tired. 

Yeah I know - it's not like I'm 'overworking' them. Even so it isn't going to do me any good at all to push beyond reason or they will get overworked. 

When I get them all sketched I'll think about backgrounds. At the moment I'm leaning toward skyscapes in the six basic color families: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple. The seventh one will probably have black coming in from the outside to white coming out from the eagle. Maybe I'll just use that for all of them, come to think of it, and skip the skyscapes.

Ach.

Who knows?

I reckon the eagles themselves will make that call. And yes I do realize that sounds weird. Cope as best you can. I have a hunch these eagles are going to be as bossy as our Characters are.

Speaking of whom ... yes, they're champing at their respective bits but are showing admirable restraint at the moment. After all this nation represents what they all lived and died to protect and preserve. They aren't going to balk about sharing a little time here so these eagles can have their say. 

And here they are - the first six anyway - in rough draft form. Yes, three and six are the 'same'. They flank the rest. Actually it was an accident. I was picking the birds as I went along and totally picked the same one twice.







No, they're not finished. There are times I kick myself for letting anyone see works in progress but then I think - what the heck - so be it.

Oh, and I've got one more to do but being as it's past my bedtime already and I have shifts to fill for a few days, rest sounds like it might be a good idea.

Here are these all lined up:












Tuesday, March 22, 2016

An American Story Nobody Wants To Hear

From my perspective, we’ve got several ‘factions’ going here in the good old US of A.

First we’ve got the folk who don’t mind giving everything away to everybody. They’re generous folk, good-hearted, compassionate, and kinda on the scared side. Now that they’ve started that cart rolling  and been so strong in the giving away of everything to everybody, they don’t dare stop for fear those who have been the beneficiaries of their extensive largess will just take it anyhow; they’ve been told such would be the case and they believe the ones who told them so. We’ll call these folk the Givers.

Next are the ones who are more than a little appalled at the free-wheeling open-handedness of their neighbors. See, it’s not just the generous folk’s own stuff they’ve been giving away for all this time – it’s the stuff of these folk too. So these guys are getting somewhat ticked about that situation. They, however, aren’t afraid that the receivers are going to come and take what little they have left if the giving well should go dry. These are the ones who aren’t going to let that happen, at least not to them. These folk we’ll refer to as the Protectors.

Then there are the Receivers. Lots of them have had a true need for a long time. Lots of them take what they’ve been given and put it to good use – so they leave the ranks of the Receivers and go into the ranks of either the Givers or the Protectors. Nobody has a problem with these folk. On the other hand, there are lots and lots of Receivers who never think they’ve received enough to do anything worthwhile with. Whenever somebody mentions that maybe they ought to be kicking in somehow, they rattle the spears that they do always seem to have been given enough to obtain. The Givers back down right quick and give them whatever they want and the Protectors scowl and check their own spears.

And finally we have the Giver/Takers. These aren’t quite exactly like the Receivers but the line that separates them might be a little hard to distinguish at times. The main difference is that these folk tend to show up out of the blue, spears in some hands, and take stuff that’s given to them, some of them pleased as punch to actually do their bit to earn that stuff, true enough. But the stuff they earn generally gets sent back to where they came from. These too are generous, good-hearted folk who work hard to take care of their own, most of them – except they’re not supposed to be here in the first place so they don’t get nearly as much stuff as their hard work would seem to warrant. So they get a little owly about things, and their numbers keep right on growing until there are too many of them to keep them all busy any more. Many opt out of the Giver/Taker role and just go with being Takers.

And the Givers just keep on giving, not so much out of kindness of heart or generosity any more but because they’re afraid to stop. What would happen to all those poor Receiver folk and all those poor Taker folk if the Givers stopped taking care of them? And what would the Givers do if the Receivers and the Takers got mad? See, the Givers don’t believe in having spears of their own.

So the Protectors, working their tails off to kick in and doing what they do to provide for themselves and their own folk, are watching all this, safe enough because they do have their own spears. But they’re none too pleased that their hard work doesn’t seem to be getting them and their own folk much of anything.

The Receivers keep right on receiving, rattling those spears once in a while and looking sideways at the Takers who are getting a hefty hunk of the available stuff the Givers are so generous with. They might be thinking how much of that stuff ought to be coming to them instead, who knows? The ex-Receivers who are now in the ranks of the Givers and the Protectors seem to be disgusted by the whole thing but aren’t going to go back to being Receivers, not if they can help it.

The Giver/Takers are too numerous to hide any more. A lot of them still want to just do their bit and have things continue as they’ve gone for a long time. But their kinfolk, who want to be Receivers but can’t because they’re not supposed to be here, make that difficult. If they can’t be Receivers, they’ll be Takers. They want what the Receivers have.

And the Givers are getting nervous because they’ve already given themselves and everybody else right into the red. The well is about to run dry.

The Protectors are getting more and more ticked. Some of them get swords to go with their spears. They set out to either protect what little is left in the well, or cap the thing.

The Receivers add more spears to their arsenals.

The Giver/Takers try to keep a low profile; they’ve gotten pretty good at that. The ones among them who have become Takers look sideways at everybody and get themselves more spears.

Well.

What do we expect to have happen here?

One thing I noticed, which may or may not be pertinent here, is that homegrown folk seem to be literally moving out of the places that are real big on giving. They hie themselves to the places that are bigger on protecting. Imagine that. I doubt most folk even realize that’s been going on for years already.

When they leave, they leave behind the Receivers, a lot of them; they leave behind the Takers, a lot of them; and they leave behind the Givers, a lot of them.

Proportionally speaking, the Givers are liable to wind up with all the Receivers and the Takers on their doorsteps – and won’t have anything left to give them, much as they would dearly love to be able to keep on giving. By this time nobody but some of the Protectors has anything any more; the Givers are hoist on their own petard so to speak. And they’ve managed to hoist most of the rest of us with them.

What are the Givers going to do about it?

They get ticked at the Protectors who are the only ones who have anything left, and blame them for the well going dry.

Because the Protectors have spears and the Givers do not, it’s not like the Givers themselves can just grab any more of the Protectors’ stuff to give to the Receivers and the Takers.

The Receivers and the Takers turn on the Givers. The Givers run to the Protectors for … um … protection. Being smarter than the average bear, the Protectors have realized this would happen. They can’t protect everyone so they focus on protecting themselves and their own. They’ve got stuff, sure they do – they’ve saved up a lot of their stuff; they know how to make more stuff; not only that, they’ve got what they need to make that more stuff. But they cannot make enough stuff for everyone, not any more. So they make stuff for themselves and post guards.

The Givers are on the outside now. They’re out there with the Receivers and the Takers and boy is that an eye-opening situation. They’re the only ones out there without spears. Talk about vulnerable.

They promise to give everything that the Protectors are protecting to the Receivers and the Takers – if the Receivers and the Takers will follow their lead in getting it away from the Protectors.

Well.

The Receivers and the Takers might not be the brightest bulbs in the chandelier but even to them the Givers brainstorm of an idea just sounds dumb.

When they take to picking off the Givers, and rattle their spears at the Protectors themselves, the Protectors get ticked enough to step up to the plate.

That scares the dickons out of the Takers because after all they aren’t supposed to even be here in the first place. They head for home as fast as they can go. The Receivers are right behind them but going somewhat slower because they think the Protectors might change their minds and decide to become Givers.

Nope.

Keep going is the word from the Protectors.

Enough is enough already.

The Givers don’t particularly enjoy becoming Receivers; it goes against their grain.

The Protectors, now in the position of having to be the Givers of the equation, aren’t overly fond of their situation, either.

The abrupt arrival of all the Takers and the Receivers south of the border upsets the status quo down there in a big way. The Takers are let in, but most of the Receivers are refused entrance. Totally not used to having to work for a living, said Receivers have a tough go of it. They’re on their own down there because all of the Protectors and Givers have left the vicinity, the Takers are safely home again, and the Giver/Takers are laying low.

But the Giver/Takers now have plenty of jobs again. Having kept a low profile and staying out of the whole thing, the Protectors invite them to stay. In turn, they invite the Receivers who are good workers to join them – but they do not give them anything except a chance to work.

The Givers (who are now the Receivers) are so uncomfortable in their new role that they get themselves busy and become some of the hardest workers of all. Still Givers at heart, they finally realize that in order to give they must first have.

The Protectors are in no way intimidated by much of anything. They give to the Givers (now Receivers) but only just enough to get by on. The rest the Givers/Receivers have to come up with for themselves by working for it.

All things considered, with the Receivers and the Takers out of the equation, it doesn’t take long for the Givers to get back on their feet. They have a new appreciation of how to go about their giving within the laws of reason, and pay closer attention to the Protectors instead of griping about them all the time. They have learned an extremely painful lesson, which is to say NO before everything gets completely out of hand.

That’s my perspective on things.

Hope springs eternal in the human breast and all that, but if there’s a less drastic way out of all this somebody better come up with it in a real fast hurry.

This little outline of a story is the sugar-coated version, one that has a relatively happy ending.

We had a Civil War once upon a time. The line was fairly clear on a geographical level that time. Much of what is now a part of our nation wasn’t part of it yet. There were places people could go to escape warfare if they wanted to (at least that kind of warfare). You were either a Northerner or a Southerner and it wasn’t all that hard to tell which was which.

Now there’s no real way to accurately even ‘label’ anybody. There is no Mason-Dixon Line. The metaphorical ‘spears’ in the above are not muskets, or even six-shooters; they are weapons with a lot more power. People are not ‘rattling spears’; they’re outright killing people.

The ‘Givers’ have earned for themselves the suspicion of the ‘Protectors’; even the ‘Receivers’ can’t trust them any more – they know that well’s gonna run dry. And the ‘Givers’, the ones who do not believe in arming themselves, are not actually un-armed. They just think they personally do not need to defend themselves because they believe the military will do that for them if need be. As a matter of fact, that’s one of the reasons nobody really trusts them.

So the above is not exactly anything except a very over-simplified perspective.

The other thing about it is that a person could well extrapolate.

Unless the United States really does go into an Isolation Phase, and right quick, until her internal affairs are in order, and manages to keep everyone else out of her house-cleaning, the whole thing is even more complicated.

None of us, not one, is so naïve as to not ‘get it’ that not all of our ‘Receivers’ are locals, so to speak. If the United States decides to ‘clean house’ she’d better be darned sure it’s going to work the way it’s supposed to – to make her stronger than she has ever been. Because, while we’re cleaning house, focusing on internal affairs for a change, the rest of the world is going to be clamoring for our attention, you can bet on that.

If our well going dry makes our local ‘Receivers’ and ‘Takers’ go around the bend, what’s it going to do on a bigger scale?

As I said, extrapolate.

Yet there comes a time, I think, when it is imperative to close our doors and lock our windows for a time, have a Family Meeting so to speak, and find our own way out.

Quite frankly, there is nothing – not one single solitary thing – that we would have to look for outside our own doors.

Nothing.

It is our somewhat arbitrary need to give, to share – perhaps to dominate if you look at it from that not-so-altruistic perspective – that seems to make us think we cannot, or shouldn’t, be self-sufficient. If we were as self-sufficient as we could and should be, without looking beyond our own doorstep; if we could, as we probably should pretty soon, curb our somewhat arbitrary need to give, to share, to dominate … what would the consequences be?

I’m no economist but our unemployment might go away.

I’m no scientist but the genius-caliber ones among us might be encouraged to do what they do best. At home.

I’m no technician but we have among us techs who could do what they do best. At home.

I’m no farmer but our ag people could most certainly produce ample provisions to care for us.

I’m no manufacturer but we have plenty of skill in that arena, and plenty of natural resources to use, including a work force.

I’m not in the military but our soldiers would have plenty to keep them busy, guarding what is ours to protect and preserve.

I’m not an administrator but getting things organized and keeping them that way would be a major task.

I’m not an infrastructure builder but I use our highways and other public things; those whose skills are in those areas would be much needed.

I’m no doctor and haven’t needed one in years but if that time should come I would like to be able to go to one of my own choosing. They will always be needed and ought to be allowed to stand or fall on their own merits.

I no longer have children in school but my grandchildren need to be educated; options on that front might become more of a priority if we had more time to consider their needs.

I’m not a secretary or a sales clerk or a farm hand or a burger-flipper or a firefighter or an electrician or a plumber or a roofer or a waitress or a line-worker or a truck driver or any of the rest of the professions that keep our lives running smoothly … but maybe those jobs would be kept filled with competent folk who know what they’re doing.

I’m not an entertainer but we have some mighty talented people who could make us all laugh, or cry, or think …

I’m not a journalist but we have a number of good folk who would be awfully busy keeping us all informed on what’s going on in this nation of ours, focusing on our own folk for once.

And, contrary to what people might think from reading what I just wrote, I am not an Isolationist.

I just think that we need to be putting more of our attention and our resources to work on our own behalf.

If/when there’s a budget surplus, then would be the time to start taking requests from all and sundry.

We cannot afford to feed the world until our own are fed.

We cannot afford to house the world until we have no homeless of our own.

We cannot afford to outsource employment until our own are all gainfully employed.

We cannot afford to donate bridges or roads or anything else for anyone else until our own are finished and maintained.

We cannot afford to buy energy when we have adequate resources to provide our own at less expense.

We cannot afford to be Givers, not right now.

That time will come more quickly and be more substantial if we take the time and make the effort to tend to what needs tending to on the home front.

So no.

I am not an Isolationist.

I would probably be a Giver if I had anything to give.

But a dry well takes time to refill. When there’s nothing but dust in that deep hole, the Receivers are going to be in for a very rude awakening. So will the Takers. So will the Givers.

It would behoove all of the above to think long and hard about what it will take to refill that well. 

It would behoove the rest of the world to let us be while we do what we have to do here. It would be in their best interests, whether they think so or not.

Too many are too pleased to see that well going dry. I cannot for the life of me figure out how they could think that would be a good thing. Well, aside from the jackels who circle, slavering at the thought of picking the bones.

We do not, believe me we do not, want to find ourselves facing even the sugar-water version of that little story up there. Yet that is exactly where we’re heading.

And that’s about enough of that for this day I do believe. I’ve got some paintings to get done for my front porch windows.

That ought to keep me busy and out of trouble for a little while, unless people figure out what I’m saying with those paintings and decide to be offended by them.



We the People seem to have forgotten who we are and what we stand for.


As this election year progresses, there are going to be a lot of folks who might forget this, who would prefer to believe that it just isn't true, who want to think that Eagle can fly perfectly well with only one wing.

Animosity seems to be flaring up every which way from Tuesday, which is perhaps to be expected - all things considered.

We can point fingers 'til we're blue in the face but the bottom line is that We the People seem to have forgotten who we are and what we stand for.

We've been told this, that, and the other thing about ourselves so frequently and for so long that we look in the mirror and barely recognize ourselves any more.

If we look in that mirror and see pride, and thoughtfulness, and caring about others, and intelligence, and determination, and ambition, and *gasp!* patriotism looking back out at us, we might be forgiven for wondering if there's something wrong with our mirror.

Because none of those things are supposed to be there, y'know.

PRIDE has become a dirty word, unacceptable these days. I'm not talking about hubris here, but simple Pride. We're all apparently supposed to walk around with our heads hanging down and our tails dragging, lest we offend anybody by standing tall and walking proud. 

What the heck is up with that?

Who has been telling us all this crap about ourselves?

More to the point, how in the name of all that's holy did we actually get to the point of tolerating any such thing, let alone apparently falling for it hook, line, and sinker?

We seem to have become a nation divided along so many lines that the tangles have tangles. 

Feathers are getting ruffled on both of those wings, and the wings themselves are so busy beating at one another that they cannot possibly beat in tandem to get that Eagle off the ground. 

Good grief.

We're expected to 'pick a wing' ... where's the option for choosing the whole damn bird?

Where's the notion that those two wings BELONG TO THE SAME BIRD?

Whatever happened to the ability to agree to disagree without fighting about it?

Right now I have the feeling that both wings of our bird are wounded; in the process of exacerbating those wounds by beating at each other, the rest of the bird is taking a beating from both sides.

Because, you know, a bird doesn't consist of just a pair of wings. It's got a body with a beating heart in it and a circulatory system and all of the other systems that make it live, including a brain and instincts.

Now, said bird could well survive without one (or both) wings. It wouldn't be able to fly, but it would survive.

Providing that those wings don't beat the bird to death, of course, in the process of trying to beat one another to death.

Those wings are designed to spread out on either side of the body of the bird, beat in sync, and together make that Eagle soar. They complement one another, provide balance and strength.

Like it or not, people, both of those wings - Left and Right - are pretty much needed. The sooner we get that through our heads, the better off we'll all be. 

Conflict between the two is pretty much not gonna work. Has it done any good yet? No. It has not. So really, cut it out already.

Look at that Eagle up there. 

Yeah, it's got two wings and both of those wings are attached to the body of the Eagle. But think about this : those wings are designed to balance each other. They're attached on opposite sides of that body for a reason, folks. Not only do they provide balance for the whole, they're situated to provide support and strength for each other. They can't actually cause harm to one another; they can barely reach each other although both get their 'orders' from within the body of the bird. So We the People ought not to gripe overmuch if our 'wings' seem at odds. Maybe we've been sending them mixed signals.

Be that as it may be, the point here is that, politically speaking, both sides of the aisle have to be strong, they have to be in opposition, and they have to provide that balance.

So where is the candidate who can and will say to the other wing: 'Hey, I appreciate and respect your contribution to the flight of this bird but, y'know, you're kinda taking us in circles here and this bird's getting a mite dizzy. So it's time to balance things out some.' And have the muscle to make that balance happen without being hateful about it and recognizing that the other wing is just as important. Irritating half of the neurons in the body of the bird is not conducive to a smooth flight.

Right.

Well.

When it comes to birds, those wings really do work in tandem; they take their orders from the bird and are not themselves calling any shots. They do what they're supposed to do exactly as they're designed to. 

Come to think of it, that's how it's supposed to work for us as a nation.

Except that somewhere along the line the wings seem to have gone a little haywire or some kind of neurological defect has developed. Something has gone awry. The body of the bird isn't sending clear signals to the wings; so the wings are going all over the place instead of beating the way they're supposed to.

Remember what I said up there?

We the People seem to have forgotten who we are and what we stand for.

Until we remember, or learn anew, that We the People are the body of that bird, that we are the heart, the instinct, the organs, the blood, the bone, the muscle, the sinew, the brain, and the nervous system, we cannot expect our wings to do what they're supposed to do. 

It is up to US, We the People, to provide what is necessary to make this Eagle soar.

Until we're sending clear signals, we're going to be flapping around on the ground not getting anywhere. Our wings are plenty strong, both of them. We don't have to worry about them being able to carry our weight. But they have to be told what we want and expect from them. 

Yep.

That sounds a little bass-ackward, doesn't it?

That's because ... ahem ... here we go again ... 

We the People seem to have forgotten who we are and what we stand for.

What it will take to remind us, or teach us, I have no idea.

Maybe a huge publicity blitz, which I would certainly do if I had the resources.

Banners for every town and every community, posters for every mailbox, buttons/pins for every schoolchild, signs in every store, notices on every billboard, advertisements in every media outlet in the nation, flags for every parade, notices on every piece of merchandise marketed in the nation ... everywhere a person might look or listen, every day for eternity ... plaster that flying Eagle in every public place, in every nook and cranny in this nation.

When someone asks you what's up with all the Eagles, you say to them, 'Well, that's me. That Eagle right there is me. And that one is Tom, and that one is Dick, and that one is Harry, and that one is Jane, and that one is Martha, and that one is Laura. They are all of us. It's an American thing, you know. Those Eagles are We the People.'

It's already a national symbol.

Use it.

Yeah the wings are important.

But they don't control the bird.

The bird controls the wings.

That is what the United States of America is all about.

That is who We the People are and what we stand for.

Period end of discussion.



Sunday, March 20, 2016

WHAT AMERICA DOES WHEN SHE GETS FED UP


1980 Presidential Candidate Debate: Governor Ronald Reagan and President Jimmy Carter - 10/28/80

The results of that election:




FOUR YEARS LATER:

Well, Minnesota kinda had to do that. Mondale was a Minnesota boy.
As for D.C. ... mm-hm ... fancy that.

I was going to add a bit of a narrative but ... well ... these pictures speak for themselves. Do NOT tell me America cannot unite. Don't even go there.

Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Ronald Reagan in 1964

This is the first time I've sat down and listened to this speech. I was a very little girl in 1964; I did not hear it then, nor have I since for whatever reason. Mainly I suppose life has a tendency to sweep us along with it and we rarely find a reason to look back. Politics, especially 'old news' politics, doesn't really make it to the fore of our minds very often.


It might prove to be a welcome reprieve from everything else we've been hearing. 

I was too little to have even known about this speech. My daughters are too young to have even been aware of the Presidency of Ronald Reagan. My grandlings will have no idea that such an American President ever existed.

God help us.

#

1964 was quite a long time ago, folks. We aren't likely to well remember a Presidential candidate named Goldwater who lost to the incumbent LBJ, successor to assassinated John Kennedy. Then came Nixon who was not a crook. And Gerald Ford who was our first President not to be elected as such. When Nixon resigned under the cloud of deceit surrounding Watergate, Ford as VP stepped up to President. At the end of the term he ran against Jimmy Carter and lost. (Ted Kennedy came to within two points of snagging the Democrats' nomination; Carter barely squeaked it.) And Carter lost to Republican Ronald Reagan by a substantial margin.

So that's a bit of a quick review. Truth be told I had to look it up.While I was at it I checked their political party affiliations. It runs about half and half and I am not gong to do the homework it would take to try to figure out who to blame for our current mess. No doubt both are about equal on that front, too.

#

Listening to what Ronald Reagan had to say back in 1964, fifteen years or so before his own Presidency, is a sort of eerie experience. It's about a thirty minute speech, part of the Barry Goldwater campaign, but take the time to watch/listen to it. See if you find it a little on the eerie side too. I wonder what he would have to say now.

For that matter, I wonder what the Founding Fathers would have to say now.

We'd likely be in for a tongue-lashing.

We deserve it.

It's not like they didn't warn us.

But, you know, nobody reads the Federalist Papers.

We don't even read the Constitution, which is short and sweet by comparison.

So yeah.

We as a nation, and our educational system, deserve a tongue-lashing. We're about to reap what we have allowed to be sown. Time to pay the piper I reckon. Miracles are few and far between these days.




Saturday, March 12, 2016

Impossible Is A Word One Should Use With Great Caution



Living where I do in a community of hardworking, straight thinking, conservative fundamentalist, easygoing, fun-loving, culturally consolidated folk …I am an oddball among the vast majority of the folk of this community. That they like me anyway says a lot for their tolerance level. Plus nobody wants me to write the sequel to Small Town USA because they know full well that it’s not all as rosy here as that book might make it seem.

So I take myself off into realms of the past and the future, leaving the present to fend for itself as best it can.

Which is where the word ‘impossible’ comes into play.

Yes I do write fiction but most of it is not ‘impossible’.

I could cite, chapter and verse, what humankind has done in the past thousand years to make my point. Even the last century, nay decade, would clarify things significantly to those who say ‘impossible’. Just about everything we’ve accomplished was once ‘impossible’ or even beyond anybody’s imaginations. Look it up. You’ll be impressed. We’ve been going great guns just lately.

Give us another couple of thousand years, like the many thousands of years our species had in which to develop in many different ways. Some focused on one thing, some on another. We’re not talking about a different species here, folks. We’re talking about us, humankind, with exactly the same bodies and brains that we have today. Exactly the same. If we can do it, so could they.

We’ve only had ten thousand years to recuperate from something that could have wiped us and everything else from the face of Earth. As the exact same people that we are today we’ve been around for say 200,000 years. All we have to do is look at our own recent history – the past decade, century, millennium – and if you’re still wondering if we could have ‘done this before’ you can stop now. If we can do it now we could have done it before.

Not only that, but an event like the one that happened twelve thousand years ago could happen again and there we would be. Do not pass Go do not collect two hundred dollars. All that genius and hard work down the drain – again.

What we’ve done in a decade, a century, a millennium, ten millennia … think on this for a minute: in our present form we’ve been here for 200,000 years, not 10,000 or 20,000. We haven’t changed a whit as a species in all that time. Are you going to tell me we’ve become smarter? We haven’t.

Earth changes over time; we haven’t. Earth periodically gets massive ice caps and we as a species live through them. Earth also has periods of warm times. We as a species live through them as well.

And our cultural development is markedly irregular. Look at the world in which we live in. People can’t live without their electronics. Ha. Plenty of people live without electronics. We call them ‘primitive’ or ‘underdeveloped’ or ‘backward’ or ‘uncivilized’ or any number of disparaging things. Yet they are identical in form and in brain function to us ‘privileged’ people. They live their lives just as we do, from one day to the next.

Now we’re going to play ‘What If’.

What if something drastic happened and all of our electronics went on the blink at the same time?

What if whatever happened back then happened again? How much of our ‘civilization’ would remain? Hmm? Great heat can melt stone. It can incinerate to ashes every last thing we’ve built in the course of the last ten thousand years. It can obliterate entire continents and all that dwell thereon. Vast amounts of moving water can and do erase and rearrange landscapes on a massive scale, pulverizing anything that gets in its way, just like it does in its frozen form only a lot faster. Don’t think it’s ever happened and couldn’t possibly happen again even if it did once?

See, this is how come most of our local folk look at me sideways a lot of the time. I write ‘What If’ stuff.

What if back in the day the curious folk, the intrepid folk, the folk who wanted to push that envelope … what if they, as in our own history if you recall, weren’t exactly paid attention to by the folk who happened to like things the way they were?

What if they pooled their resources and headed off to a part of the world where they could do their thing without any help, or hindrance, from the rest of humankind?

What if, self-isolated for thousands of years in their own little niche, they used those thousands of years pretty much like we’ve used the last decades, centuries, and millennia?

What if they plopped themselves down smack in the middle of a huge continent, a place nobody really even knew about let alone wanted to go to?

With nobody to tell them otherwise it might not have crossed their minds that there were things they ‘couldn’t possibly’ do.

Such a culture wouldn’t have to be necessarily ‘secretive’ – if nobody cares to come looking to see what you might be up to you wouldn’t bother hiding for heaven’s sake. You’d just do what you do.

Their isolation might have lasted for a lot of millennia. Given our own recent advances, try to wrap your mind around what might develop in the course of the next say forty or fifty thousand years. The world in which they lived in had been stable for a hundred thousand years before the glaciers started to retreat and things started changing. The world in which we live in is apparently on the cusp of another change. Let’s hope it isn’t as drastic as that last one.

All the moaning and groaning and hands in the air drama in the world isn’t going to make the least little bit of difference. What’s gonna happen is gonna happen.

Fictionally speaking, back in the day they had teams whose job it was to take care of a lot of the issues of Earth that were of potential concern to humankind. They controlled the ice caps as best they could. They monitored and made adjustments when Earth’s crust became restless. They capped or vented volcanos. But they only did what they had to do when they had to do it. They weren’t all about controlling Earth herself. They also had teams up there in the skies to nudge space objects away from Earth’s orbit and her atmosphere.

Fictionally speaking, one guy’s attempt to nudge an enormous asteroid didn’t quite turn out to be just another day’s work for him. It was more fragile than anticipated and his nudge fractured it instead of redirecting it.

That’s all it took.

Huge chunks and all the rest of the debris from that big rock hit the atmosphere of Earth and exploded from hell to breakfast. Because at the time Earth was lined up just right in the solar system (just like it is now, come to think of it) Jupiter was out of alignment to shield her. But she had those honkin’ big sheets of ice in her northern hemisphere, the one most vulnerable at the time (just like now, come to think of it). They were in retreat but going almighty slow. They offered what protection they could but when those huge chunks of rock ignited the glaciers took the brunt of the hits. Other chunks hit elsewhere as all that debris nailed the hell out of the northern hemisphere and most especially North America. The ice took the biggest whomp but those other pieces of debris were just as lethal.

The poor guy who started the whole thing didn’t have time to feel bad about it. He was incinerated before his brain could form the thought, ‘Oops.’

So Earth had to cope with the consequences and it took a good thousand years for her to stop reeling from that impact.

On the other hand, if that guy hadn’t been up there doing his job, that massive thing could have hit Earth’s atmosphere in one big lump instead of fracturing ahead of time. Poor Earth might have been knocked for a major loop, clear out of her regular orbit. And then what?

‘Impossible’ you say?

Well, I write fiction and don’t really find the word ‘impossible’ all that intimidating.