Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
I catch myself
berating others for being cruel, short-sighted, stupid, insensitive, or inattentive
and
I catch myself
doing the same damn stupid things that I berated them for doing
and
I catch myself
remembering other times that I did these stupid damn things
and
I catch myself
reminding myself that we’re all human, with foibles and inconsistencies
and
I catch myself
realizing that I’m just as fucking flawed
and
I catch myself.
“I’ve seen some things, man.”
Recognize that line? Anyway, this is about what I saw while traveling through airports during the last few days.
How about you? Notice any trends in your air travels?
Inflammation surged in her right shoulder through several days, demoralizing her. Pain afflicted her with the smallest motion, dressing, cleaning, even brushing her teeth and combing her hair. Trying to think through options, she put bread in the toaster and considered conversation with her rheumatologist. He disliked giving cortisone shots. What else was there for the agony?
The toast popped up. Flinching her shoulder at the sound, she cried out in pain and fell to the floor, where all she could do was laugh and cry. Sometimes, that’s all that’s left.
Salazin didn’t let me ponder his comment, “And maybe further.”
That was probably good, because I was about to ask him where he thought his ship could go. The Moon? Mars?
Winking again, Salazin said, “I have prepared a model for you. Just a concept.”
He gestured toward the door. As it opened, Salazin said, “Behold the Nautilaus.”
As Salazin said, “I had this prepared to scale to help you visual it,” a young woman led in a cart. What looked like an upside-down ship was on it. Two young men pushed and guided the cart from either side. The upside-down ship’s bottom was glossy black. The top was charcoal gray. A red band divided the top and bottom. Nautilaus was in script in that band.
Salazin said, “I know that you’re a visual person but that you struggle to imagine things. I hope this helps you.”
After parking the cart, the three people left. When the door closed, Salazin said, “What do you think, Dylan? Is it not amazing?”
I’d been wondering what I thought. “It doesn’t look inviting,” I said. “It looks sinister.”
I was thinking that his model looked ten feet long and half a foot wide. Before Salazin could reply, I said, “How tall would this thing be?”
“Twenty-four stories.”
“Twenty-four stories?” I grappled again with his planned vehicle’s size. “Ten miles long, a half mile wide, and twenty-four stories high?”
“No, from the red band,” Salazin said. “Sorry, it’s twenty-four stories from the red band. It would be a total of twenty-seven stories tall, but three of those stories are below the ground level.”
“Jesus,” I said.
Salazin was walking and talking, and pointing what I took to be a remote. Tuning out of my bewilderment to his words, I caught, “The top is dark now so that I can have the pleasure of revealing the interior to you.”
The gray top turned lighter, growing translucent and then transparent. When that happened, it displayed a delicate framework on the upper part. It also displayed rolling green hills, a blue lake or sea, and multiple roadways, paths, forests, fields, and buildings. Some of the buildings were clustered like small villages. I saw a golf course, swimming pools, a needle-like building, like Seattle’s Space Needle, and what looked like vineyards, orchards, a ranch with horses and cows….
There was so much to see and assimilate, I felt like my mind was fusing into numbness. Without realizing it, I’d stood and walked over to the model.
Ten miles long, twenty plus stories high, and half a mile wide.
I didn’t see anything that looked like it could be an engine.
I saw Salazin slip to a stop beside me. I could see his face. A grin split it.
“What do you think?” he said.
“I think you’re crazy,” I said.
I’ve been watching a show on Netflix called “The Fastest Car”. I like speed. It’s my one weakness. This show plays on the challenge, are sleeper vehicles faster than exotic machines like Lamborghinis, Ferraris, McLarens, Ford GTs and Vipers?
The sleeper vehicles are home-built machines. They frequently look like junk but are fast vehicles. You can’t call them cars. Cars are included, but so are trucks (including a diesel) and vans. There’s been a huge variety of machines. While presenting the challengers, the people talk about cars and their relationships with speed, racing, and the vehicle they’ll be using. Family is often a large thumb on the scales about what they’re doing and why.
With four cars racing, all can’t win. The defeated are usually philosophical about it, although some get hissy, challenging the fairness of something that happened. What is really interesting, however, is their absolute belief that they can and will win in the lead up to the race. They express doubts, but typically circle back and say, “I think I’ll win.” It’s that attitude that draws me to the show. As everything is considered and the cars are prepared, the men and women say, “I think I can win. I’m ready. We’re going to win.”
I like that attitude. That’s the sort of fire that writers struggling to make it need to exhibit. “I think I can win, and I’m going to do everything to prove it. It’s not for me as much as it is for xxx.” Xxx is the blank to fill it. They don’t want to win for themselves, but for those who believe and back them.
Isn’t that like a writer. We want to be published, and we’re driven to write. People often lurk in our lives, and we’re seeking to validate their belief in our talent, creativity, determination, and dreams. It’s a fuel that keeps us putting our ass in a chair with paper and pen or pencil, or at a computer keyboard or typewriter.
It isn’t just about me, we tell ourselves. It’s for everyone else. Remove them, though, and I think most writers will still be writing. I suspect those drivers trying to win would also still be going, even without trying to prove themselves to friends and family.
“Start again,” I said. “Let’s start again.”
Salazin was posed to listen.
I composed myself to think and speak. “Ten miles is a very long vessel.”
“Yes.”
“Why does it have to be so long?”
“Don’t think of it as just a vessel.”
I waited.
“Think of it as a destination, Dylan,” Salazin said. “Think of it as an exclusive island floating in the sky. Think of it as an exclusive destination. We will grow organic food and raised organic animals. We’ll serve them in our exclusive restaurants.”
“We’ll have more than one restaurant?”
“Yes, yes, why not? We will have an inland sea and luxury villas. And vineyards, wineries, and breweries. We will sell Nautilaus wine. Imagine it.”
“I’m trying to. Why call it Nautilaus?”
“Nautilaus is the perfect name. Nautilaus is associated with adventure and technology.”
“Maybe for you, but I think of exercise equipment.”
“No, no, not exercise equipment. Think of Jules Verne and Robert Fulton.”
“Robert Fulton?”
“Yes, yes, he named his steamboat the Nautilaus, and Jules Verne named his submarine after Fulton’s steamboat.”
“That’s another thing,” I said. “The Nautilaus is a submarine.”
“It is a masterpiece, Dylan. It is a luxury jewel, a vessel to fire imagination, inspire adventure, and embrace luxury. It’s mysterious and unique.”
“Fine.” I’d drop it for now. Salazin was smarter than me, and he’d thought about this more, so I was behind. I knew I’d probably give in soon, but it’s my custom not to be graceful about these things. Actually, it’s not my custom, but my nature. I think I get it from my parents, or maybe the whole damn clan. None of us surrender with grace. We fit to the bitter damn end. Come see us at the holidays, and you’ll understand.
“But ten miles seems extremely long,” I said.
“It needs to be so long for what it will have and be.”
“It won’t be able to land anywhere.”
“Yes, it will. It can land on the ocean. It can land in many other places.”
Salazin leaned in toward me. “Dylan, Dylan. Listen. I know that you must think about things before you say okay. I love that about you. I do.
“But, let me give you more to think about so we can hasten the moment when you say okay. Imagine a floating island that can travel anywhere in the world and be there in a matter of hours. Imagine living in a place isolated from war, disease, and pollution. Imagine being able to dine in a fine restaurant while watching a volcano in Hawaii explode, or floating over Antarctica or the North Pole, watching the glaciers break off and float away. Imagine being able to go to the best place to see meteor showers, eclipses, and the Northern Lights. Imagine the greatness of such a vessel. This is why it’ll be more than a vessel, but will be enshrined as the ultimate destination. As a destination, it can be anywhere.”
“On Earth.”
Salazin winked. “And maybe further.”
Imperfect knowledge.
Imperfect truths.
Imperfect understanding.
It was a perfect mess.
This dream comes from the bizarro files.
I was with my wife. We were on a military installation. Walking around as we did while we were young, we were checking out the clubs and exchange. We then decided to leave to explore other places.
Promises of rain shaded the clouds’ colors. We started walking across a broad asphalt expanse. Partway across, I realized I had to piss. Telling my wife that I’d catch up, I hurried to find a latrine but failed to get there in time and pissed my pants. I left the latrine with pissed pants but seeing how I looked in daylight, I decided I needed to go back, remove my pissed pants, and let them dry. So I did.
The latrine was crowded and busy. It wasn’t like a latrine so much as community room with latrines and showers to one side, vaguely reminiscent of an Army place I once visited. Music played from boom boxes. Others watched sat on sofas and chairs or were on beds, watching television. The walls were painted cinder block.
While I was taking all of this in, my pants disappeared. Discovering that, I figured they were stolen. Whoever took them left fluffy gray sweat pants in their place. I had to wear something, so I put those on. With them were Ugg boots. I guessed they went with the sweats, so I put them on, too.
Then I left, walking across the asphalt to find my wife. Naturally, seeing me in gray sweats with Uggs instead of jeans and my regular shoes, my wife wanted to know what happened. I explained in a long, round-about ramble.
And there the dream ended, with me bewildered in a parking lot, explaining myself on a cloudy, windy day.
You ever think, wouldn’t it be cool if they could chip our minds so that they can be found and recovered when we lose them?
Fun fact! Did you know that the expression, “That old chestnut,” originated with with Henry Chestnut? Henry was a pharmacist who liked telling comical tales about the way things were in his grandparents’ era, often exaggerating facts to absurd lengths. People in his town often passed on his stories, and the response on hearing them was often, “That old Chestnut,” usually with laughter. Eventually, Henry’s stories were published in a weekly column called, “That old Chestnut.”
The things you can learn on the Intertubes, right?
Michael Seidel, writer 